Extract Audio from AVI to WMA — Free Online Tool
Extract and convert the audio track from an AVI file into WMA format using the wmav2 codec — Microsoft's second-generation Windows Media Audio standard. Ideal for stripping legacy AVI audio (often encoded as MP3 or AAC) into a WMA file suited for Windows Media Player, older Windows devices, and streaming scenarios that expect the ASF container.
to
FFmpeg Command
Copy this command to run the same conversion locally with FFmpeg on your desktop. Download FFmpeg
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Note: Browser-based encoding uses approximate quality targets. For precise CRF compression, copy the FFmpeg command above and run it on your desktop.
Estimated output:
Conversion Complete!
DownloadHow It Works
AVI files store interleaved audio and video streams together in Microsoft's legacy RIFF-based container. This tool discards the video stream entirely and extracts only the audio, which is then re-encoded from whatever codec was used in the AVI (commonly libmp3lame MP3 or AAC) into wmav2 — the Windows Media Audio v2 codec wrapped in an ASF (Advanced Systems Format) container with a .wma extension. Because the source audio codec is almost certainly different from wmav2, a full decode-and-re-encode is performed rather than a stream copy, meaning the audio passes through a lossy encoding step. The output bitrate defaults to 128k, which is comparable in perceptual quality to a 128k MP3 for most content.
What Each Flag Does
| Flag | What it does |
|---|---|
ffmpeg
|
Invokes the FFmpeg multimedia processing tool. In the browser, this runs as FFmpeg.wasm — a WebAssembly port that executes the same logic entirely client-side without uploading your AVI file to any server. |
-i input.avi
|
Specifies the input file as an AVI (Audio Video Interleave) container. FFmpeg reads both the interleaved video and audio streams from this RIFF-based file, making them available for selective processing in the next steps. |
-vn
|
Disables video output entirely, telling FFmpeg to ignore the video stream from the AVI. This is the core 'audio extraction' flag — without it, FFmpeg would attempt to include a video stream in the output, which WMA/ASF cannot carry. |
-c:a wmav2
|
Sets the audio encoder to wmav2 (Windows Media Audio v2), Microsoft's standard WMA codec. Because the source audio in the AVI is almost certainly MP3 or AAC, this triggers a full decode-and-re-encode rather than a stream copy. |
-b:a 128k
|
Sets the audio output bitrate to 128 kilobits per second for the wmav2 encoder. This is the default and provides a reasonable balance between file size and audio quality for both music and speech content in WMA format. |
output.wma
|
Defines the output filename with a .wma extension, which causes FFmpeg to wrap the wmav2-encoded audio in an ASF (Advanced Systems Format) container — the standard packaging for Windows Media Audio files. |
Common Use Cases
- Converting AVI files ripped from old DVDs or camcorders into WMA audio for playback on Windows Media Player or legacy Windows Phone devices that natively support WMA
- Stripping the audio from AVI-format video lectures or presentations to create standalone WMA audio files compatible with older Windows-based digital audio players and e-learning platforms
- Preparing audio extracted from AVI home videos for upload to services or intranet systems that specifically require WMA format for their media libraries
- Archiving the audio commentary or soundtrack from AVI-format content into a compact WMA file for Windows-centric media servers like older versions of Windows Home Server
- Extracting dialogue or narration from AVI screen recordings into WMA for use in PowerPoint presentations, which have historically had strong native WMA support on Windows
- Converting AVI audio to WMA as part of a Microsoft ecosystem workflow where downstream tools — such as Windows Movie Maker or legacy SharePoint media libraries — expect ASF/WMA-format audio assets
Frequently Asked Questions
Yes. The audio in most AVI files is already lossy (typically MP3 via libmp3lame or AAC), and re-encoding it to wmav2 adds another generation of lossy compression. This generation loss is most noticeable at low bitrates. At the default 128k bitrate, wmav2 performs comparably to 128k MP3 for typical speech and music content, but if pristine quality matters you should set the highest available bitrate (320k) or consider whether WMA is truly the required output format for your use case.
wmav1 (Windows Media Audio v1) is an older, less efficient codec from the late 1990s with limited compatibility in modern software. wmav2 is Microsoft's improved second-generation WMA codec that offers better audio quality at the same bitrate and is supported by virtually all software and hardware that can play WMA files, including Windows Media Player, Xbox consoles, and most WMA-capable portable devices. This tool defaults to wmav2 because it is the de facto standard WMA codec and there is rarely a reason to choose wmav1 for new conversions.
AVI technically supports multiple audio streams, though it is uncommon in practice. By default, FFmpeg selects the first (or best-ranked) audio stream. To target a specific track, add '-map 0:a:1' to the FFmpeg command before the output filename to select the second audio stream (index 1), adjusting the index number as needed. The browser tool uses the default stream selection, so if you need a non-default track you should use the displayed FFmpeg command locally on your desktop.
Replace the '-b:a 128k' flag in the command with your desired bitrate. WMA supports up to 320k, so for the highest quality output use 'ffmpeg -i input.avi -vn -c:a wmav2 -b:a 320k output.wma'. For voice-only content such as narration or podcasts, 96k is often indistinguishable from 128k and produces a smaller file. The browser tool lets you select from preset bitrate options before running the conversion.
AVI has limited and inconsistently implemented metadata support compared to WMA's ASF container, which has robust native tag support. FFmpeg will attempt to copy any metadata fields it finds in the AVI (such as INAM for title or IART for artist) into the WMA output, but many AVI files carry no meaningful metadata at all. If metadata accuracy matters, you should verify and edit the WMA tags after conversion using a tool like Mp3tag, which has excellent WMA/ASF tag support.
The displayed command processes a single file, but you can adapt it for batch processing in a shell script. On Linux or macOS, use: 'for f in *.avi; do ffmpeg -i "$f" -vn -c:a wmav2 -b:a 128k "${f%.avi}.wma"; done'. On Windows Command Prompt, use: 'for %f in (*.avi) do ffmpeg -i "%f" -vn -c:a wmav2 -b:a 128k "%~nf.wma"'. The browser tool processes one file at a time, so the FFmpeg command is particularly valuable for bulk conversions on your local machine.
Technical Notes
The output container is ASF (Advanced Systems Format), a Microsoft-developed container that predates modern alternatives like MP4 or MKV. WMA files are ASF files with a .wma extension. wmav2 encodes audio using a transform-based lossy algorithm broadly similar in approach to AAC and MP3, though it is proprietary to Microsoft. One notable limitation is that WMA/ASF does not support multiple audio tracks in a single file — if your AVI contains multiple audio streams, only one will appear in the output. Chapters and subtitles are also unsupported by this format, though AVI itself does not support those features either. DRM (Digital Rights Management) can be embedded in WMA files by specialized Microsoft tools but is not applied during this conversion — the output is a plain, unprotected WMA file. File size will be determined almost entirely by the chosen bitrate and the duration of the audio, since the video stream is fully discarded; expect roughly 1 MB per minute at 128k bitrate. Compatibility is excellent within the Windows ecosystem but more limited on macOS and Linux without third-party codecs.