Extract Audio from HEVC to ALAC — Free Online Tool
Extract lossless audio from HEVC/H.265 video files and save it as ALAC in an M4A container — perfect for archiving high-quality soundtracks from 4K or HDR video without any audio quality degradation. ALAC preserves every bit of the original audio stream, making it the ideal choice for Apple ecosystem users who want bit-perfect fidelity.
to
FFmpeg Command
Copy this command to run the same conversion locally with FFmpeg on your desktop. Download FFmpeg
Drop your HEVC file here
or click to browse
Free — no uploads, no signups. Your files never leave your browser.
Settings
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
HEVC video files contain a video stream encoded with the H.265 codec alongside one or more audio streams. This tool discards the video stream entirely and extracts the audio, re-encoding it using Apple Lossless Audio Codec (ALAC) and packaging it into an M4A (MPEG-4 Audio) container. Because ALAC is a lossless codec, no audio information is lost during this process — the output is a mathematically perfect representation of the original audio signal. The re-encoding step is necessary because HEVC containers may carry audio in formats like AAC, AC-3, or DTS that must be decoded and then re-encoded to ALAC. The resulting M4A file is natively supported by iTunes, Apple Music, and all Apple devices without any additional software.
What Each Flag Does
| Flag | What it does |
|---|---|
ffmpeg
|
Invokes the FFmpeg multimedia processing engine, which is running here as a WebAssembly (FFmpeg.wasm) instance entirely within your browser — no data leaves your device. |
-i input.hevc
|
Specifies the input file — an HEVC/H.265 encoded video file. FFmpeg will automatically detect the container format and all contained streams, including the audio track to be extracted. |
-vn
|
Disables video output entirely, telling FFmpeg to ignore the H.265 video stream and produce an output file with audio only. This is what makes the tool an audio extractor rather than a video converter. |
-c:a alac
|
Sets the audio codec to Apple Lossless Audio Codec (ALAC), instructing FFmpeg to decode the source audio (whatever format it may be in the HEVC file) and re-encode it as lossless ALAC for the M4A output. |
-c:a alac
|
This flag appears twice in the resolved command, which is redundant but harmless — FFmpeg applies the last valid value for each stream specifier. In practice, only one instance is needed; both confirm that ALAC is the target audio codec. |
output.m4a
|
Defines the output filename with the M4A extension, signaling to FFmpeg to wrap the ALAC audio stream in an MPEG-4 container — the standard and natively Apple-compatible packaging for ALAC audio files. |
Common Use Cases
- Extracting the lossless audio soundtrack from a 4K HDR HEVC movie file to build an Apple Music library with bit-perfect quality
- Archiving the original audio from HEVC-encoded concert or live performance recordings in a lossless format that won't degrade over multiple copies
- Separating audio from HEVC video captured on modern cameras (such as drone footage or mirrorless camera recordings) to edit the audio independently in GarageBand or Logic Pro
- Converting HEVC video lecture or podcast recordings to ALAC M4A files for playback on iPhone or iPad without carrying the large video file
- Stripping audio from H.265-encoded screen recordings to create clean voice-over tracks for use in Apple-centric post-production workflows
- Producing lossless reference audio from HEVC master files for quality-assurance comparison against compressed versions during audio post-production
Frequently Asked Questions
Not in any perceptible or measurable way that matters for listening. ALAC is a lossless codec, meaning the decoded audio it produces is bit-for-bit identical to the source audio it encodes. The only quality consideration is that the original audio in the HEVC file may already be lossy (e.g., AAC or AC-3), and re-encoding lossy audio to a lossless format does not recover the information lost in the original encoding — but it also does not introduce any new degradation. If the source HEVC file contained lossless audio, the ALAC output will be a perfect copy.
ALAC is not a standalone file format — it is an audio codec that must be stored inside a container. Apple chose the MPEG-4 container (MP4/M4A) as ALAC's standard wrapper. The M4A extension is simply the conventional label for MPEG-4 files that contain only audio, distinguishing them from M4V video files. All Apple software and most modern audio players recognize M4A/ALAC natively, so the container choice is transparent to end users.
The ALAC audio track will typically be larger than the compressed audio stream inside the HEVC file, but the overall output will be dramatically smaller than the HEVC source because the video stream — which accounts for the vast majority of an HEVC file's size — is completely removed. A 4K HEVC movie that is several gigabytes might produce an ALAC M4A soundtrack of only 200–600MB depending on runtime and original audio format. ALAC achieves roughly 40–60% size reduction compared to uncompressed PCM, but it will be larger than a lossy AAC or AC-3 track.
The M4A container supports chapters, and if the source HEVC file contains chapter metadata, FFmpeg may carry it through to the output. However, HEVC containers do not commonly embed chapters in a way that maps cleanly to M4A chapter tracks, so preservation is not guaranteed and depends on how the source file was authored. For reliable chapter data in the output M4A, you may need to add or edit chapters separately using a tool like MP4Box or iTunes.
Yes. On macOS or Linux, you can run a shell loop such as: for f in *.hevc; do ffmpeg -i "$f" -vn -c:a alac "${f%.hevc}.m4a"; done. On Windows Command Prompt, use: for %f in (*.hevc) do ffmpeg -i "%f" -vn -c:a alac "%~nf.m4a". This processes every HEVC file in the current directory and outputs a corresponding M4A file with the same base name. The -vn and -c:a alac flags remain unchanged for each file in the batch.
By default, FFmpeg selects the first audio stream it detects in the HEVC file. ALAC M4A does not support multiple audio tracks in a single file, so only one track will be included in the output. If you need a specific audio track — for example, a 5.1 surround track rather than a stereo track — you can specify it in the FFmpeg command using the -map flag, such as: ffmpeg -i input.hevc -vn -map 0:a:1 -c:a alac output.m4a, where 0:a:1 selects the second audio stream (zero-indexed).
Technical Notes
HEVC (H.265) files commonly carry audio encoded as AAC, E-AC-3, DTS, or TrueHD, depending on their origin — broadcast, Blu-ray remux, or camera capture. This tool decodes whatever audio codec is present and re-encodes it to ALAC, which means no additional FFmpeg audio codec flags are needed for the input side; FFmpeg handles codec detection automatically. Because ALAC is strictly lossless, it cannot reduce quality below the source, but it also cannot exceed it — if the source audio is lossy AAC at 192 kbps, the ALAC file will be a lossless copy of that lossy signal. The M4A container supports standard ID3-style metadata tags (artist, album, title, track number), and FFmpeg will attempt to copy any compatible tags from the source HEVC file, though HEVC containers often carry minimal metadata compared to mature audio formats. Notably, HEVC files do not support embedded subtitles or multiple audio streams in the output M4A, so complex multi-track HEVC sources will be reduced to a single audio stream. The output M4A is natively playable on all Apple platforms without transcoding, and is compatible with VLC, foobar2000, and most modern media players on other platforms.