2021 Best Free FLAC Player for Mac Big Sur Supported As the top Mac FLAC music player downloaded on many download sites, 5KPlayer is the extremely compatible media player for Mac and Windows 10, not only because it plays all kinds of MP4 MKV 4K HD etc video and FLAC AAC OGG etc music without any plug-ins, but also because it is multifunctional, ultra clean, simple and fast. Top 2: VLC Media Player. As a versatile media player, VLC Media Player support the lossless FLAC natively. It is a useful tool that works with Windows, Mac, Android and iOS. It should be a nice FLAC player if you need to process multiple videos an audios, including FLAC format. Vox supports common files like FLAC, MP3, CUE, and APE, as well as high-resolution audio files for up to 5.1 channel support — ideal if you have your Mac connected to a larger speaker system.
'Can iTunes play flac files? Can it do so natively or be modified to do so? Can it import .flac files, converting them to .mp3 or .mp4 or .aac or something? Thanks.' - By Jeff Blanding on Apple Support Communities.
Designed specifically for audio, audio compressed in FLAC has no loss in quality. Due to the high definition compression, FLAC files deliver excellent audio enjoyment. You could play FLAC file free on your favorite media player. However, currently not so many media players could natively play FLAC file free. If you're also searching for a free FLAC player to play FLAC file free on your computer or mobile devices, this post would be right where you should stop. It introduces you detailed information on FLAC, including: what is FLAC file, how to play FLAC file free, and the best free FLAC player software apps for both Windows and Mac.
Part 1: About FLAC Format
What is FLAC file? Short for Free Lossless Audio Codec, FLAC is an audio compression format like MP3. Different from MP3, which uses a 'lossy' compression that will discard audio information, FLAC uses a lossless compression, which will not change audio quality after compression.
FLAC stands out as the fastest and most widely supported lossless audio codec, and is the only one that at once is non-proprietary and unencumbered by patents. It has an open-source reference implementation, a well-documented format and API, and several other independent implementations.
If you rip an Audio CD track to a FLAC file, the result FLAC file will retain the same audio quality of the original (CD quality), like a WAV file, but take less space (usually about one-third of the corresponding WAV file). If you rip an Audio CD to an MP3 file, the MP3 file would take even less space (about one-tenth of the corresponding Wav file). However, the result MP3 file would be a lossy audio file in which part of sound information would be lost. For average people, lossy compression algorithms like MP3 or WMA have no difference from the FLAC file. But for some people whose ears are well trained or sensible enough, FLAC lossless compression brings obviously high-quality audio enjoyment.
Currently there are 2 major ways to get FLAC files: buy it from online music stores, or rip audio CD to FLAC file (or convert other audios like MP3 to FLAC file). You could also try to download FLAC files online, which is hard legally.
It should be noted that FLAC is currently not accepted by most media players. Microsoft and Apple have not added the support to play FLAC file free within their system's default media player. Therefore, if you want to free play FLAC file, you may turn to some FLAC player freeware. The below content would show you how to free play FLAC file with free FLAC player software.
Part 2: How to Play FLAC File Free
There are multiple solutions to help you play FLAC file free on computer. In this post, we would like to share 3 major ways: free play FLAC files with free FLAC player, play FLAC file free in Windows Media Player with codec pack, and convert FLAC file to other audio formats for free playback. The below 3 solutions introduces you details.
Solution 1: Play FLAC File Free with Free FLAC Player
To play FLAC file free on Windows PC, the best way is without doubt making use of free FLAC player software. What you need to do is find a proper free FLAC player. Leawo Free Blu-ray Player becomes your best choice.
As an all-inclusive media player, Leawo Free Blu-ray Player works far more than a single region free Blu-ray player to play Blu-ray discs as its name suggested. It could also perform as a free audio player. Frigidaire horizon 2000 washer manual. When acting as free FLAC player, Leawo Free Blu-ray Player could play FLAC files free without any loss of audio quality. With advanced audio decoding technologies like Dolby, DTS, AAC, TrueHD, DTS-HD, etc., this free FLAC player delivers cinema-like audio enjoyment to you through home theatre system.
How to play FLAC file free with Leawo Free FLAC Player
- Download this free FLAC player and set it up on your computer. It has both Windows and Mac versions. Select one according to your system and download.
- Launch this free FLAC player and directly add your FLAC file into this FLAC player freeware for playback via drag-and-drop. You could also click the 'Open File' button to browse and add FLAC file.
- You could add multiple FLAC files into this free FLAC player for playback. This FLAC player freeware would create a playlist for you. You could determine the playback order and mode.
Solution 2: Play FLAC File Free with Windows Media Player and Codec Pack
If you prefer Windows Media Player to 3rd-party free FLAC player software, you could also play FLAC file free with Windows Media Player by using a codec pack - Directshow filter. Directshow filter is a plug-in to Windows Media Player that assists Windows Media Player to read FLAC files so as to let you play FLAC file in Windows Media Player freely. It is a lightweight collection of filters which allows you to play the most popular multimedia formats.
These filters are essential if you want to play your video and audio contents using media players based on DirectShow, such as Windows Media Player, Zoom Player or BS.Player.
The below are the detailed steps:
- Download the DirectShow filter.
- After downloading, install this DirectShow filter pack via double-click on the installation wizard.
- After installing, you will receive a notice from the installation saying it's completed.
- Then you could launch your Windows Media Player to import FLAC files for playback. Your Windows Media Player would be able to read and play FLAC file free now.
Solution 3: Convert FLAC File to Other Audio Formats Like MP3 for Playback
This method might cost you more time since you have to convert FLAC to MP3 or other audio formats before you could play FLAC file free on your players. You need to get an audio converter to carry out FLV audio conversion. Take a try of Leawo Video Converter, an professional audio converter that could convert FLAC to MP3, AAC, WMA, etc. fast and easily.
How to convert FLAC to MP3 or other audio formats? The below steps would show you details:
- Download and install this FLAC audio converter.
- Launch it and click the 'Add Video' button to load source FLAC audio files.
- Click the drop-down box next to the 'Add Photo' button and then select 'Change' option to set output audio format. You could select any audio format from 'Format > Common Audio' group, like MP3, AAC, etc.
- After setting output audio format, return tothe main interface and then click the big green 'Convert' button. On the popup sidebar, set output directory in the 'Save to' box.
- Finally, click the bottom 'Convert' button on the sidebar to start converting FLAC audio files to other formats.
- After conversion is finished, you could then freely play converted FLAC files on your media player free.
Conclusion:
Without doubt, playing FLAC file free with free FLAC player is the easiest way. It's not that safe to install plug-ins for Windows Media Player to play FLAC files, but you needn't install 3rd-party FLAC player freeware. The last solution seems to be more trouble, and will definitely result in audio quality loss by converting. But it is much more pratical, since you could play FLAC files free on any media player through this method.
Part 3: 5 Best Free FLAC Player Software for Windows
No. 1 Best Free FLAC Player - Leawo Free Blu-ray Player
As an all-inclusive media player combo, Leawo Free Blu-ray Player features region free Blu-ray player, free DVD player, free 4K video palyer, free audio player and free ISO player. With the support of several different advanced audio decoding technologies like Dolby, DTS, AAC, TrueHD, DTS-HD, etc., this free FLAC player could play FLAC files free without any quality loss. Meanwhile, you could even use this free FLAC player to play Blu-ray disc, DVD disc, up to 4K UHD video, and ISO image files directly for totally free. This free FLAC player could play FLAC files free on Windows 8/8.1/7/10/XP/Vista. Its Mac version free FLAC player for Mac works on OS X 10.6 and later.
No. 2 Best Free FLAC Player - VLC Media Player
This is a widely known free FLAC player software program that offers both wonderful quality and wide support of operating systems. It has multi-OS versions for Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X, iOS, Android, GNU, Linux, BeOS, and BSD. This means that you could even get a portable free FLAC player for your smartphones or tablets. Similar to Leawo Free Blu-ray Player, this free FLAC player could play DVD, up to 4K/1080P video, ISO file and audio files, but lacks support of Blu-ray playback.
No. 3 Best Free FLAC Player - Foobar2000
One of the most sought after FLAC players for Windows, Foobar2000 could be chosen over most others as it promises gapless playback for most of the common formats such as MP3, AAC, Vorbism, WavPack, WMA, MP4 and SND. It boasts of full Unicode support and tags along an interface layout that can easily be customized. Moreover, the tool lets you configure keyboard shortcuts, offers full ReplayGain support and even transcodes audio formats, thanks to its Converter component.
No.4 Best Free FLAC Player - Zoom Player
Zoom Player is a slick player of online multimedia content for Windows PCs. It successfully includes two players in one - a no fuss simple one and an advanced one with just about every imaginable tweaking and customization option. The basic version of Zoom Player comes installed with a graphic equalizer, playlist editor and everything else that you'd expect in a basic player. The professional version comes with more features, including a more powerful Playlist Manager, added safety features (such as password protection), Media Definitions plus Web Remote (so you can control Zoom Player from your web browser) and an Extended command line interface, exposing many Zoom Player functions directly from the command line. What's more, the professional version even supports to play DRM protected movies and music (Windows Media DRM).
It could play back almost all video and audio files, since it has a particular useful codec detector, which will detect your players and suggest correct codec to install for playing different media files. Therefore you needn't to install a 3rd-party inspection device.
No.5 Best Free FLAC Player - 5KPlayer
Once named as DAPlayer, 5KPlayer is a sleek, powerful and free media player that works with hundreds of formats, including high definition video. This free video player comes with more than 400 audio and video codecs. That means you could play nearly all video and audio files with no need to worry about the format incompatibility issue. It could also play Blu-ray and DVD discs, up to 1080P full HD video (AVCHD, MKV, H264 and more). As a free FLAC player, it could play FLAC file free without any quality loss.
Part 4: 5 Best Free FLAC Player Software for Mac
No. 1 Leawo Free Blu-ray Player for Mac
Leawo Free Blu-ray Player for Mac offers comprehensive solutions for you to play all kinds of media files on Mac computer, be it iMac or MacBook, with high quality.
No. 2 Winamp
Winamp is a media player for Windows, macOS and Android, saying that it is an overall player for all systems. It supports numerous audio and video formats. It also plays streamed video and audio content, both live and recorded, authored worldwide. Playing .flac files will be rather easy on this player.
No. 3 Vox
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Music fans would not be unfamiliar to this incredible player. It is a simple media player that will play your music without all the fuss of importing into iTunes, database lookups, album art displays, playlist editors, etc. To be clear, VOX supports all popular formats including Hi-Res ones. Lossless: FLAC, APE, WAV, ALAC, etc. and Lossy: MP3, WMA, OGG, etc.
No. 4 Elmedia Player
It is a five-star music player for MacOS requiring OS X 10.9+. It can play audio files according to the highest standards. Besides it works well with iTunes content except for DRM protected files. This app can go well as an audio receiver. It can stream the music from Mac to another Mac with Elmedia Player installed with larger speakers connected. To play your .flac files on Mac, it won’t let you down!
No. 5 Tomahawk
Tomahawk is less known to people but it does not mean it is not good. In fact, it is a brilliant multi-platform free music player Mac that is supported by Windows, Linux and Mac OS. It is packed with lots of features but its functionality is neither complex nor hard to understand. Like VLC, it is also a free, open-source music player. You can directly put your .flac file on it to play smoothly.
Best Flac Players
FLAC, short for Free Lossless Audio Codec, is an audio file format similar to MP3. The digital audio will be compressed while using FLAC to store the content. But don’t worry, there is no loss in quality. And as an open-source audio format, FLAC is supported by most media players on the market.
In case you want to play your FLAC files on your computer but don’t know which player app is trustworthy, we will give you some recommendations of the best FLAC player to play FLAC music on your computer and smartphone without any quality loss.
Part 1. Best FLAC Players for Windows and Mac
If you have a FLAC music file on your computer, you may subconsciously try to double-click the file to open it. Then a prompt pops up and suggests you select a program to open the file. That is because the built-in player doesn’t support this file type. So, to help you enjoy lossless music, here are 4 free FLAC players for both Mac and Windows PC.
1. Tipard Blu-ray Player
Tipard Blu-ray Player is the universal media player software that is compatible with any mainstream audio and video formats. And it is free to play audio files like FLAC with this tool. You can enjoy FLAC playback on your desktop/laptop with the best quality. You can also upgrade the program to make Blu-ray movies playable with no limitation.
- 1. Support almost all audio and video formats like FLAC, WAV, WMA, MP3, MP2, AAC, OGG, M4A, MP4, M4V, MOV, FLV, MKV, etc.
- 2. Load and play Blu-ray disc/folder/ISO image file without the limitation of countries and districts.
- 3. Play DVD disc/folder/ISO image file with the main menu and multiple well-featured functions.
- 4. Create, organize and manage a custom playlist to play all your media files in the order you prefer.
- Capture any scene that you like for easily sharing online with the useful snapshot feature it provides.
- 5. Offer the best user experience and a feast for the ears of any music lover.
How to play a FLAC file with Tipard Blu-ray Player on Windows/Mac?
Step 1Pick the right download version according to your system. Then free download and install this music player on your computer.
Step 2Launch the program and find the Open File button on the screen. Select the FLAC music file that you want to play. Then click on the OK button to load this audio file. You can also select multiple files at a time. The player will create a playlist for you automatically.
Step 3During the playback, you can easily control the playback process – pause, stop, jump forward and rewind. You can also adjust the playback mode as you like – order, random, single and loop.
2. VLC Media Player
VLC Media Player, without a doubt, is the most used media player that is also free and open-source. Besides being a portable audio player, it can also convert video/audio formats if needed. Fox instance, you are able to convert format like FLAC and OGG to MP4. Like Tipard Blu-ray Player, VLC supports DVD movie playback as well.
Platform: Windows, Mac and Linux
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3. MediaMonkey
MediaMonkey is a powerful FLAC music player that allows you to manage a huge media library that contains over 100,000 audio, videos and playlists. You can organize, search and view the music file by Artist, Genre, Released Year, etc. You can also get a paid version called MediaMonkey Gold. But the free basic version is enough for daily use.
Platform: Windows and Mac
4. MusicBee
MusicBee also is a good choice when you need a music player to play audio files in popular formats, such as FLAC, MP3, AAC, M4A, WMA and WAV. It also provides practical features like media library, playlist, equalizer and more. It even makes it possible for you to change the appearance and skin.
Platform: Windows, Mac and Linux
Part 2. Top 6 FLAC Player Apps on Android and iPhone
But what if you want to play FLAC music on your smartphone? Is there a functional player app for iOS and Android? The answer is yes. Here are top 6 portable FLAC player apps for mobile users.
| No. | Player | Features | Platform |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | AIMP | 1. Supported formats: AAC, FLAC, M4A, OGG, OPUS, WAV, WEBM, MP3 and MP4. 2. Provide balance control, speed control, sleep timer, etc. 3. Changeable theme and smart playlist. | Android |
| 2 | FLAC Player+ | 1. Maintain the high quality of the music while playing. 2. Manage all your music with playlist, album and artists. 3. Support Bluetooth, audio background, and data transfer through Wi-Fi. | iOS |
| 3 | VLC | 1. Free to use and open source, just like the desktop version. 2. Offer a media library for audio and video files. 3. No ads, no in-app-purchases, and no spying. | iOS & Android |
| 4 | VOX Music Player | 1. Multi-functional music player that contains local files, iTunes playlist, online radio and more. 2. Provide sound equalizer, offline music playlist and unusual interface design. | iOS |
| 5 | Poweramp Music Player | 1. Play MP3, OGG, WMA, FLAC, WAV, OPUS, AIFF, MKA, and FLV (audio). 2. Own 10 band optimized graphical equalizer. 3. Lyrics support, custom visual themes, and artist/album image downloading. | Android |
| 6 | n7player Music Player | 1. Customize all parts of the player in your way. 2. Feature scrobbling, album art grabber, tag editor, etc. | Android |
You may also want to know how to get free music on Android.
Part 3. FAQs of FLAC Player
Flac Music Players
1. What's the difference between MP3 and FLAC?
FLAC is a lossless audio file format. Compared with MP3, it should have better sound quality. But that also makes it larger than a normal MP3 file. Besides, MP3 is a much more popular container that is compatible with all platforms.
2. Can iPhone play FLAC?
Super mario flashback mac download. Without the help of a third-party player, you are not able to play FLAC through either Apple Music or the Files app on your iPhone.
3. Is FLAC better than Apple Lossless?
Apple Lossless, aka ALAC, is a compressed lossless file format like FLAC. It is developed by Apple, which makes it compatible with iTunes and iOS. But that doesn’t mean it’s better than FLAC. On the contrary, it is not that efficient when compressing audio content, which makes the compressed file bigger than FLAC.
Conclusion
Best Audio Player For Mac
So far, we have introduced 10 FLAC player apps for Windows, Mac, iOS, Android and even Linux. Hope that you have found the perfect one. If you still don’t know which one is better, why don’t you just give Tipard Blu-ray Player a try? Feel free to leave us your comment if you have other great players to share.