Convert CD to MP3 Windows 10

One common question I get from friends and co-workers is how to take a regular audio CD and convert the tracks into MP3 files. The days of carrying around a CD player are long gone, thanks to smartphones! However, why pay 99 cents on iTunes or the Google Play Store for music you might already own!? Instead, you should dig out all those old CDs and rip them to your computer, which you can then import into your iTunes music library and sync over to your phone.

The process is actually quite simple and only requires Windows Media Player, which is installed with Windows by default. In Windows 7 and Windows 8, you can rip the audio CDs directly to MP3 format, no need to convert them to from one format to another.

Table of Contents

To get started ripping music from an audio CD, go ahead and pop it into your CD/DVD drive. If Windows Media Player was not already open when you put the CD in, a small window will pop up called the Now Playing mode and when you hover your mouse over the album artwork, you’ll see a small button to rip the CD.

If you already had WMP open, then you’ll be in Library mode and you should see a few new menu items at the top: Rip CD and RIP Settings.

Library mode is better in the sense that you can choose exactly which tracks you want to rip instead of ripping the entire CD. To do that, you just uncheck any track you don’t want ripped before clicking the Rip CD button.

Note: Before you rip a CD, make sure you are connected to the Internet because WMP will look up information on the album and track and add that metadata to the file. 

Also, before ripping, you should check the rip settings to make sure they are what you want in terms of format, quality, etc.

For the format of the output file, you can choose Windows Media Audio, Windows Media Audio Pro, MP3, and WAV. By default, the audio quality is 128 kbps, but you can rip it all the way up to 192 Kbps if you like.

If you are ripping a lot of CDs and don’t want to change these settings for every CD, click on More options and then change the defaults. Here you can also see the default location for ripping music, which is probably the Music folder in your Users folder.

When you click Rip CD, the process will begin and the amount of time to rip the CD depends on your CD/DVD drive speed and CPU speed, but overall it should be a fairly quick process.

That’s about it! Ripping a CD is really easy nowadays and if you have a lot of old music CDs laying around, go ahead and rip them all before you lose them. If a CD has copyright protection on it, the ripping process may fail, but so far Windows Media Player has been able to rip just about every CD I’ve thrown at it. If you have any questions about ripping

The steps on this page will show you how to copy music from your Audio CD to your computer's hard drive in MP3, WMA, WAV, or FLAC audio format.

Methods:

• Windows Media Player (MP3, WMA, FLAC, and WAV)
• Exact Audio Copy (EAC) (Only FLAC)
• fre:ac (MP3 and FLAC)
• VLC (MP3 and FLAC)

Ripping an Audio CD is a good option for backing up your CD music collection, listening to songs from your CD on a portable music player or mobile phone, or recovering music from a damaged CD.

To rip an Audio CD, you'll need a CD drive and a CD ripper. A CD Ripper (also known as CD grabber, or CD extractor) is software that copies and converts audio tracks from an Audio CD to a computer in standard audio file formats, such as MP3, WMA, WAV, or FLAC.

What does ripping a CD mean?

Ripping a CD is copying the contents of a CD to a computer.

What is the best audio format to rip a CD?

The best audio format to rip an Audio CD is a lossless audio format, such as WAV, FLAC, ALAC or WMA Lossless.

Does ripping a CD affect the CD?

Ripping a CD will not affect the CD in anyway.

Where is the “Rip CD” button in Windows Media Player?

When there's an Audio CD in the CD drive of your computer, the “Rip CD” button will appear in the top menu of Windows Media Player (see image below).

How to rip an Audio CD in Windows 10 and 11 using Windows Media Player

1. Insert the audio CD you want to rip into the CD drive of your PC.

2. Open Windows Media Player. One way to open Windows Media Player is by clicking on the Windows start menu button > type wmp > click on Windows Media Player when it appears in the search results.

Another way to open Windows Media Player is by pressing the Windows

3. In the left sidebar, you click on your CD (e.g., AlbumName (F:)).

4. Click on Rip settings, go to Format and choose MP3 or another audio format, like WMA, WAV or FLAC. FLAC and WAV offer better quality.

5. Click again on Rip settings, go to Audio Quality and choose 320 Kbps. Note: If you've selected the WAV or FLAC audio format, then you don't have to select a quality setting.

6. You can uncheck the songs you don't want to rip to your computer.

7. Click on Rip CD located next to Rip settings at the top.

Windows Media Player will now copy the music from your Audio CD to your computer.

Windows Media Player will save your CD in the Music folder on your PC.

How to rip an Audio CD to FLAC in Windows 10 and 11 using Exact Audio Copy (EAC)

Exact Audio Copy (EAC) is one of the best (probably the best) CD rippers available. And it's completely free.

You can download Exact Audio Copy from FOSSHUB, here.

First, you'll have to setup Exact Audio Copy.

You'll only have to set it up once.

Setup Exact Audio Copy (EAC)

1. Open Exact Audio Copy.

2. Make sure the CD drive of your PC is selected. You can find the drive selection menu in the top left corner of EAC.

3. Insert the CD into the CD drive of your computer.

4. When the “Configure AccurateRip” window appears, you click on the Configure button, and AccurateRip will configure the CD/DVD drive of your computer.

It will only take a few seconds.

It will make the CD drive work properly with EAC.

This configuration only needs to be done once. Afterward, the drive will stay configured.

AccurateRip improves Audio CD ripping by verifying ripped tracks against an Internet database, making sure they're error-free.

You'll need an older more popular CD to activate the AccurateRip plugin.

Just try to find a CD that makes the “Configure AccurateRip” window appear when you insert it into your PC.

There are a lot of CDs in the calibration database. You can use pop, rock, hip hop, and other classics to configure the CD/DVD drive of your PC using AccurateRip.

If the “Configure AccurateRip” window does not appear, you will need to find a CD that makes it appear, and after the configuration, you can insert the CD you want to rip.

When the AccurateRip configuration is complete, a small confirmation window will appear.

5. Click on the OK button.

You will now see the tracks of your CD in EAC.

6. Click on EAC in the top left corner, and then click on EAC Options.

A “EAC Options” window will appear.

7. Click on the Extraction tab.

8. Make sure the settings on the Extraction tab are exactly like in the image below.

9. Click on the General tab.

10. Make sure the settings on the General tab are exactly like in the image below.

11. Click on the Tools tab.

12. Make sure the settings on the Tools tab are exactly like in the image below.

13. Click on the Normalize tab.

14. Make sure the Normalize option is off. This option is usually off by default.

15. Click on the Filename tab.

16. Here you will see various examples for filenames. Type whatever filename scheme you want into the Use various artist naming scheme field. See image below for an example.

17. Make sure the Replace spaces by underscores option at the bottom is disabled.

18. Click on the OK button at the bottom of the settings window.

19. Click on EAC in the top left corner, and then click on Drive Options.

20. If an information/warning window appears, you click on the OK button.

A “Options for drives” window will appear.

21. Click on the Extraction Method tab.

22. Enable the Secure mode with following drive features option.

23. Make sure the Drive has 'Accurate Stream' feature and Drive caches audio data options are enabled.

24. Click on the Drive tab.

25. Click on the Autodetect read command now button, and wait till the read command process is complete, and a read command is selected. Your selection might look different than mine. It depends on the CD drive.

26. There are four more options, but you should only select the options if you know your CD drive supports these options. If your CD drive doesn't support the options, or you don't know, then just leave the options unchecked.

27. Click on the Offset / Speed tab.

28. Make sure the settings on the Offset / Speed tab are exactly like in the image below.

29. Click on the Gap Detection tab.

30. At Gab/Index retrieval method, you select a method.

31. At Detection accuracy, you select either Accurate or Secure. I select Secure here.

32. Click on the OK button at the bottom of the settings window.

33. Click on EAC in the top left corner, and then click on Compression Options.

A “Compression Options” window will appear.

34. Click on the External Compression tab.

35. Enable the Use external program for compression option.

36. Select User Defined Encoder.

37. Change Use file extension to .flac.

38. At Program, including path, used for compression, you click on the Browse button.

A “Select Command-Line Encoder” window will appear.

39. Within this window, you go to the location on your computer where the flac.exe file is.

Exact Audio Copy comes with an older FLAC encoder in C:\Program Files\Exact Audio Copy\Flac or C:\Program Files (x86)\Exact Audio Copy\Flac.

Or you can download the latest FLAC encoder here.

40. Select the flac.exe file.

41. Click on the Open button.

42. At Additional command-line options, you copy and paste the line below.

-8 -V -T "ARTIST=%artist%" -T "TITLE=%title%" -T "ALBUM=%albumtitle%" -T "DATE=%year%" -T "TRACKNUMBER=%tracknr%" -T "GENRE=%genre%" -T "PERFORMER=%albuminterpret%" -T "COMPOSER=%composer%" %haslyrics%--tag-from-file=LYRICS="%lyricsfile%"%haslyrics% -T "ALBUMARTIST=%albumartist%" -T "DISCNUMBER=%cdnumber%" -T "TOTALDISCS=%totalcds%" -T "TOTALTRACKS=%numtracks%" -T "COMMENT=%comment%" %source% -o %dest%

43. At Bit rate, you can select a bitrate. But actually, it doesn't do anything. So you can select anything you want here. It doesn't matter.

44. Disable the Use CRC check and Add ID3 tag options.

45. Enable the Check for external programs return code option.

46. Click on the ID3 Tag tab.

47. Disable all options except the last option, which is Write cover image into extraction folder.

48. Click on the OK button at the bottom of the settings window.

49. Click on EAC in the top left corner, and then click on Metadata Options.

A “Metadata options” window will appear.

50. On the Metadata Provider tab, you make sure that CUE Tools DB Metadata Plugin is selected.

51. Click on the OK button at the bottom of the settings window.

EAC is setup now. You don't have to do this again unless you want to use EAC on another PC.

Now it's time to rip the CD.

Note: If Exact Audio Copy doesn't show CD information (titles and artists), then follow the steps below. If it does show the correct CD information, then you can skip these steps and continue with step 60.

Exact Audio Copy does not show CD information (titles and artists)

52. Click on EAC in the top left corner, and then click on Metadata Options.

A “Metadata options” window will appear.

53. Click on the freedb tab.

54. Enter your email address.

55. Click on the OK button at the bottom of the settings window.

56. Click on the Get CD Information From Metadata Provider button.

A small window with a warning message will appear.

57. Click on the Yes button.

A “Metadata Lookup” window will appear and it will search for metadata.

58. If your CD appears in the search results list, select it.

59. Click on the OK button.

Exact Audio Copy will hopefully display the correct title(s) and artist(s).

Rip an Audio CD with Exact Audio Copy

60. Click on Action in the top menu, and then click on Detect Gabs.

EAC will now analyze your CD and detect gabs.

61. Click on Action in the top menu, and then click on Append Gabs To Previous Track (default).

62. Click on Action in the top menu > Create CUE Sheet > Multiple WAV Files With Gabs...(Noncompliant).

A “Save CUE Sheet” window will appear.

63. Select a location on your computer where you want to save the file.

64. Click on the Save button.

65. Once the CUE sheet is created, you click again on Action > Test & Copy Selected Tracks > Compressed.

A “Browse For Folder” window will appear.

66. Select a location on your computer where you want to save the CD. You also have the option to create a new folder.

67. Click on the OK button.

Exact Audio Copy will now copy the music from your Audio CD to your computer.

This may take a while.

The time it takes depends on the CD, CD drive, and your PC's hardware.

How to rip an Audio CD in Windows 10 and 11 using fre:ac

fre:ac is another popular free CD ripper.

You can download fre:ac from the Microsoft Store, or you can download it from their website, here.

1. Open fre:ac.

2. Insert the CD into the CD drive of your computer.

fre:ac will now retrieve information from the CD, and after that, it will show the tracks of your CD.

3. Enable the Create playlist option.

4. At Selected encoder, you select FLAC Audio Encoder, LAME MP3 Encoder, or another audio format.

The WAV and FLAC audio formats offer the best quality, but the file size of the tracks will be much larger than MP3 files. I would select FLAC for high quality or MP3 if your device doesn't support FLAC or when disk space is a problem.

How do I convert my CDs to MP3?

How do I Rip music from a CD in Windows 10?

Can I Rip a CD with Windows Media Player?