


It utilizes vague approximations and the partial discarding of data enabling large reductions in file sizes when compared to uncompressed audio. MP3 uses lossy data compression to encode data. MP3 file format has files containing an elementary stream of MPEG-1 Audio or MPEG-2 Audio encoded data. However, it is not a recognized standard. It was defined as the third audio format of the MPEG-1 standard, thus retained and further extended as the third audio format of the successive MPEG-2 standard.Ī third version known as MPEG 2.5 was implemented to better support lower bit rates.

It was formally known as MPEG-1 Audio Layer III or MPEG-2 Audio Layer III. This is the most popular coding format for digital audio.
