How to Convert Apple Music to FLAC (Lossless) in 2026

If you care about audio quality, FLAC is probably already on your radar. It’s the format audiophiles trust, the one that fills hard drives at home servers, and the one that plays on almost everything that isn’t made by Apple. So it makes sense that a lot of Apple Music subscribers eventually ask the same thing: can I just pull my Apple Music tracks out as FLAC files and keep them forever?

The honest answer is yes, but with a few caveats most guides skip over. Apple Music doesn’t actually stream FLAC, the files are locked down, and “lossless” means something specific that’s easy to lose if you do the conversion wrong. This guide walks through what’s really going on under the hood, the methods that work in 2026, and how to keep your audio genuinely lossless instead of accidentally downgrading it.

First, clear up the FLAC vs. ALAC confusion

Here’s the thing nobody tells you upfront. Apple Music’s lossless catalog isn’t encoded in FLAC at all. Apple built its own format years ago called ALAC, short for Apple Lossless Audio Codec. The entire Apple Music library is available in ALAC at resolutions running from 16-bit/44.1 kHz (basic CD quality) all the way up to 24-bit/192 kHz for Hi-Res Lossless tracks.

FLAC (Free Lossless Audio Codec) and ALAC do the same job. Both compress audio without throwing any data away, so a properly converted file sounds identical to the master. The difference is mostly about ecosystem. ALAC is the Apple way of doing things. FLAC is open-source and plays on Android phones, hi-fi streamers, car systems, Plex, most DAPs, and just about any media player you can name. That universal support is the whole reason people want to convert in the first place.

So when someone says “convert Apple Music to FLAC,” what they usually mean is: get the lossless audio out of Apple’s walled garden and into a format my other gear actually likes. That’s a reasonable goal, and it’s completely achievable.

What “lossless” really means (and how people lose it by accident)

A FLAC file is only as good as the source it came from. This trips people up constantly.

If you convert a lossless ALAC track to FLAC, nothing is lost. You’re moving from one lossless container to another, and the audio data stays intact. That’s a real, bit-perfect conversion.

But if you start from a lossy file — say a regular 256 kbps AAC stream — and convert that to FLAC, you do not magically get lossless audio back. The detail that was thrown away during AAC compression is gone for good. The FLAC wrapper just makes a bigger file containing the same compromised sound. People do this all the time and then wonder why their “lossless” library doesn’t sound any better. The format on the outside doesn’t fix what was already discarded on the inside.

The rule is simple: to end up with true lossless FLAC, you have to start from a lossless source. With Apple Music, that means making sure Lossless or Hi-Res Lossless is switched on before you do anything else.

Turn on lossless before you convert

On iPhone or iPad, go to Settings, then Music, then Audio Quality, and switch Lossless Audio on. You can pick Lossless (up to 24-bit/48 kHz) or Hi-Res Lossless (up to 24-bit/192 kHz) for streaming and downloads separately.

On a Mac, open the Music app, go to Settings, then Playback, and turn on Lossless under Audio Quality. The Windows Apple Music app has the same option buried under Settings and Playback.

One catch worth knowing: if you already downloaded songs in a lower quality, switching the setting on won’t upgrade them automatically. You need to delete those downloads and grab them again so Apple sends you the lossless version.

Can you really pull FLAC straight out of Apple Music?

Not directly, and this is the part where you should be realistic. Apple Music tracks are protected with FairPlay DRM. That encryption is what stops you from simply right-clicking a song and saving it as a file. It’s also why you can’t just drag a track into a converter and call it a day. The protection question is a whole topic on its own, and it’s worth understanding how that DRM works on protected Apple Music files before you pick a method, because it shapes which approach will actually work for you.

Because of that lock, getting Apple Music into FLAC comes down to a handful of practical routes. Each has trade-offs, so pick based on what gear you have and how much fuss you’re willing to tolerate.

Method 1: Convert your own ALAC files to FLAC

This is the cleanest, most defensible approach, and it’s bit-perfect.

If you own music you ripped from CDs, bought as downloads, or imported into the Music app as Apple Lossless, those ALAC files aren’t DRM-locked. You can convert them to FLAC with zero quality loss using a free tool.

The go-to options are XLD on Mac, fre:ac on Windows and Mac, or dBpoweramp if you want a paid tool with great tagging. The workflow looks like this:

1. Find your ALAC files. On a Mac they usually live in the Music/Media folder; the file extension is .m4a but the audio inside is ALAC.
2. Open your converter and load the tracks.
3. Set the output format to FLAC. Choose a compression level — level 5 is a sensible default and gives a good size-to-speed balance. Higher levels make smaller files but take longer; the audio is identical either way.
4. Make sure “preserve metadata” or “copy tags” is enabled so artist, album, and artwork carry over.
5. Convert, and you’re done.

The output is genuinely lossless because ALAC and FLAC both keep every bit of the original. This route only works for music you actually own outright, not streamed Apple Music catalog tracks still wrapped in DRM.

Method 2: Use a desktop Apple Music converter that outputs FLAC

For tracks pulled from the Apple Music catalog, you need software designed to handle the DRM and export to FLAC. These desktop apps work by playing or decoding the track and re-encoding it, then writing the result as a FLAC file with tags and album art attached.

When you’re shopping for one of these, the features that actually matter are:

• FLAC output with selectable bit depth and sample rate, so you can keep that 24-bit resolution instead of downsampling.
• Batch processing, because converting an album one song at a time gets old fast.
• Metadata and artwork retention, since a FLAC library with no tags is a nightmare to browse.
• Reasonable speed, because some tools convert in real time and a big library will eat your whole evening.

Run a track through, set the format to FLAC, point it at the highest quality your source allows, and let it work. The result should match the lossless source closely, assuming you started with Lossless enabled.

Method 3: The free MP3 route for portability and compatibility

Here’s where it’s worth being honest with yourself about what you actually need. FLAC is fantastic for archiving and for a home system where storage is cheap and you want every bit preserved. But it’s also large, and plenty of devices, gym earbuds, old car stereos, and basic players still get along better with MP3.

If your real goal is just to keep your favorite Apple Music tracks for offline listening on any device, a free converter often makes more sense than wrestling with FLAC. A tool like Apl Music Downloader saves Apple Music songs as MP3 with clean, clear audio quality, no subscription, no limits, and no cost. You get files that play literally everywhere and take up a fraction of the space.

Yes, MP3 is lossy, so it’s not the format for a reference-grade archive. But for most people loading a phone or an MP3 player for a road trip, the difference is inaudible on typical earbuds, and the convenience wins. If you do go the MP3 route, push the bitrate as high as the tool allows; using a 320 kbps Apple Music downloader keeps the sound noticeably crisper than the low-bitrate defaults some converters fall back to. A lot of listeners keep two libraries: FLAC at home for the good speakers, and high-bitrate MP3 on their phone for everything else. That combination covers nearly every situation without forcing you to compromise.

If you want to weigh free options against paid ones before committing, it’s worth skimming a rundown of the best free Apple Music to MP3 converters to see how the tools stack up on speed, quality, and ease of use.

Step-by-step: a clean FLAC conversion that stays lossless

Pulling the pieces together, here’s a workflow that won’t quietly downgrade your audio:

1. Enable Lossless or Hi-Res Lossless in Apple Music settings first. This is non-negotiable. Convert from a lossy source and you’ll get a lossy result no matter what format you pick.
2. Re-download any tracks you want in lossless if you grabbed them earlier at a lower quality.
3. Pick your method. ALAC files you own go through a free converter (Method 1). Catalog tracks need a desktop FLAC converter (Method 2). Anything you just want portable and universal can go to high-bitrate MP3 (Method 3).
4. Set the output correctly. For FLAC, match the source resolution; don’t downsample a 24-bit/96 kHz track to 16-bit/44.1 kHz unless you specifically need the smaller file.
5. Keep your tags. Turn on metadata and artwork retention so your library stays organized.
6. Verify one track before batch-converting a whole library. Play it, check the file properties, confirm the sample rate and bit depth are what you expected. Fixing a setting now beats redoing 500 songs later.

A quick word on legality

This part matters, so don’t skip it. Converting music for your own offline, personal use generally sits in a different category from sharing or distributing it. Streaming services also have terms of service that govern what you’re allowed to do with downloaded content, and those terms aren’t the same thing as copyright law.

Rather than hand you a blanket “it’s fine” or “it’s illegal,” the responsible move is to understand the actual rules where you live and what Apple’s terms say. There’s a solid breakdown of whether it’s legal to convert Apple Music to MP3 and how personal use factors in. Read it, keep your conversions for yourself, don’t redistribute, and you’ll stay on the sensible side of the line.

Getting the quality settings right

A few details separate a great FLAC library from a mediocre one:

Bit depth and sample rate. If your source is Hi-Res Lossless at 24-bit/192 kHz, keep it there. Downsampling to save space is fine if you’re storage-constrained, but do it knowingly, not by accident because a converter defaulted to CD quality.

Compression level. FLAC compression is lossless at every level. Level 0 is fast and large, level 8 is slow and small, and level 5 is the comfortable middle. The audio is bit-for-bit identical across all of them, so this only affects file size and encoding time, never sound.

Metadata. FLAC supports rich tagging through Vorbis comments. Make sure your tool writes artist, album, track number, year, genre, and embedded cover art. A converter that strips tags leaves you with a folder of “Track 01” files, which is miserable to live with.

Gapless playback. If you listen to live albums or DJ mixes, check that your converter preserves gapless metadata so songs flow into each other the way they should.

Device compatibility: why FLAC wins for hardware variety

The reason FLAC is so popular outside the Apple world comes down to where it plays. Android handles FLAC natively. Most dedicated music players support it. Hi-fi network streamers, NAS boxes, Plex, Jellyfin, VLC, and foobar2000 all read it without a second thought. Car infotainment systems increasingly do too.

Apple devices are the odd ones out — they prefer ALAC, though apps like VLC will happily play FLAC on an iPhone if you sideload your files. So if your listening happens across a mix of brands and platforms, FLAC is the format that asks the fewest questions. That flexibility, more than any audible quality gap over ALAC, is the real argument for converting.