HexaConverter
mkvmp3

Convert Matroska (MKV) to MP3

Free online converter for Matroska (MKV) files. The most widely compatible lossy audio format. Nothing to install, no watermark, and every file is deleted automatically.

Drag and drop your files

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Upload a Matroska (MKV) file to convert it to MP3. Up to 3 files at once, 100 MB each.

Free · up to 3 files · 100 MB each · files deleted automatically after 1 hour.

About MKV and MP3

Matroska (MKV) .mkv

Matroska: an open container that will hold almost any combination of video, audio, subtitle and chapter tracks in one file.

Good for

  • Unlimited tracks — multiple languages, subtitles, chapters
  • Codec-agnostic, so it holds nearly anything
  • Open, well documented, and resilient to damage

Trade-offs

  • Browsers will not play it natively
  • Many TVs and phones refuse it — the usual reason to convert
  • Being a container, contents vary wildly file to file

video/x-matroska

MP3 .mp3

The format that made digital music portable. Lossy, thirty years old, and still the safest choice when you have no idea what will play the file.

Good for

  • Plays on essentially every device ever made
  • Small files at listenable quality
  • Patents long expired, so support is everywhere

Trade-offs

  • Lossy — detail is gone permanently
  • Beaten by AAC and Opus at the same bitrate
  • No transparency about what was discarded

audio/mpeg

MKV and MP3 side by side

Matroska (MKV) compared with MP3
MKVMP3
CompressionContainer — any codecLossy
TransparencyDepends on codecn/a
Typically used forArchival video, multi-language releasesMusic, podcasts, anything that must simply play

What changes when you convert MKV to MP3

Only the sound is kept

This takes the audio track out of the MKV and writes it as MP3. The picture is discarded entirely, and no conversion back will return it — keep the MKV if you still need the video.

This is a re-encode, not a repackage

Some tools can move a stream into a different container untouched when the codecs happen to line up. We do not — every job here is decoded and encoded again, so the conversion takes time in proportion to the length of the file and costs a small amount of quality even where a repackage would have been possible. In exchange the output is predictable: it plays everywhere, rather than inheriting whatever the source happened to contain.

What your MP3 will contain

The output is MP3 — written by LAME, the reference MP3 encoder, at 192 kbps by default. That sits comfortably above the point most people stop hearing a difference on ordinary equipment, and the bitrate is adjustable from 32 up to 320 if you want the file smaller or the quality nearer the source.

MKV to MP3 questions