Convert WAV to FLAC on iPhone
Lossless in, lossless out. FLAC stores the same samples as your WAV in roughly half the space, and decodes back to them exactly. This is the rare conversion with no downside worth arguing about.
What FLAC actually does
A WAV is uncompressed PCM: every sample written out at full width, one after another, with a short header on the front. Nothing clever, nothing discarded, and about 10 MB per minute for stereo 44.1 kHz 16-bit audio.
FLAC compresses that — but it is lossless compression, which works the way ZIP does rather than the way MP3 does. It models the waveform, stores the difference between its prediction and reality, and packs the result. Decode it and you get back the exact original samples, bit for bit. Not "indistinguishable". Not "transparent". Identical.
The saving is real but not magic: expect roughly 40–60% smaller, depending on the material. Sparse, quiet recordings compress well. Dense, loud, heavily-limited masters compress badly, because there is less predictable structure to exploit. A speech recording might halve; a loud rock master might only shed a third.
Why bother, if the audio is the same
Because the audio being the same is precisely the point. You are buying space at no cost to fidelity:
- Archiving recordings you cannot repeat. Interviews, gigs, field recordings, takes. FLAC halves the storage and gives up nothing.
- Real metadata. WAV's tagging story has always been a mess of competing chunk conventions. FLAC has a proper, universally-understood tag block — artist, title, album, whatever you need — and it survives the trip between tools.
- Built-in integrity checking. FLAC stores an MD5 of the raw audio in its header, so a decoder can tell you whether the file has rotted since it was written. A WAV cannot tell you anything of the sort.
- Moving files around. Half the bytes over the same connection, with the master intact at the other end.
One case where it is not bit-exact: 32-bit float WAV. Some DAWs export 32-bit floating-point WAVs. FLAC is an integer format and has no 32-bit float mode, so Convexy writes those as 24-bit FLAC. For anything that has been mixed and normalised, 24 bits is far more headroom than the recording actually contains and the difference is inaudible — but it is a real conversion, not a bit-perfect copy, and you should know that before archiving a float master this way. 16-bit and 24-bit WAVs convert exactly.
What Convexy writes
Convexy encodes FLAC at 16-bit when the source is 16-bit, and 24-bit when the source carries more. Sample rate can be preserved or forced to 44.1 kHz or 48 kHz, and channels can be preserved, downmixed to mono, or kept stereo.
Leave all three on Preserve unless you have a specific reason not to. This is an archival conversion — the entire value of it is that the file comes out the other side unchanged. Resampling or downmixing while you archive throws away the thing you were trying to protect.
The catch, such as it is
FLAC's only real weakness is playback support in Apple's world. iOS will decode a FLAC sitting in the Files app perfectly well, but the Music app library does not accept FLAC. Some older hardware, car stereos and cheap Bluetooth receivers cannot read it either.
That is a listening problem, not an archiving problem, and it has an easy answer: keep the FLAC as your master and export an MP3 or M4A whenever something needs one. Because FLAC is lossless, you can do that as many times as you like, from the same source, forever.
How to do it
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Bring the WAV into Convexy
Tap Browse files and pick it from Files or iCloud Drive, or share it in from the app that recorded it.
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Choose FLAC
Convexy offers only what the file can genuinely become — FLAC, MP3, M4A, AIFF and CAF.
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Leave the options on Preserve
For an archival conversion, preserve the sample rate and channels. Changing them defeats the purpose.
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Convert
The encode runs on your iPhone. Long recordings take a moment; nothing is uploaded at any point.
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Save it
Save the FLAC to Files or iCloud Drive. Once you have verified it, the WAV is redundant — the FLAC contains the same audio.
Common questions
Does WAV to FLAC lose any quality?
No. FLAC is lossless: decode the FLAC and you get back the exact samples that were in the WAV, bit for bit. The one exception is a 32-bit float WAV, which Convexy writes as 24-bit FLAC because FLAC has no float mode — inaudible in practice, but not literally bit-identical. 16-bit and 24-bit WAVs convert exactly.
How much smaller will the FLAC be?
Usually 40–60% smaller. It depends entirely on the audio: quiet, sparse material compresses well; loud, dense, heavily-limited masters compress poorly. There is no quality setting to trade off — FLAC's compression levels change encoding speed and file size slightly, never the decoded audio.
Can I delete the WAV afterwards?
Once you have confirmed the FLAC plays, yes — it contains the same audio, and you can regenerate an identical WAV from it at any time. The usual caution applies: verify before you delete anything irreplaceable.
Why won't my FLAC show up in the Music app?
iOS can decode FLAC — it will play from the Files app — but the Music app library does not accept the format. This is a library restriction, not a codec limitation. Keep the FLAC as your master and convert a copy to M4A or MP3 for listening.
Is FLAC better than WAV?
For storage, yes: same audio, half the size, proper metadata, and a built-in checksum that tells you if the file has been corrupted. For raw compatibility with old hardware and editing tools, WAV still wins. Archive in FLAC; hand out WAVs when something demands one.