Audiophiles love their oxygen-free copper cables and expensive equipment and often proclaim that MP3 is far inferior to lossless audio. (And, that a needle dragged over tiny grooves in vinyl is the best.)
Many tests have been done, but almost all of them have the issue that participants either outright knew which version was which or could easily differentiate the lossless version from the compressed one by looking at the file sizes. And this often skews the results, because “the lossless file surely must sound better”.
However, in 2013, user Archimago did a proper blind test and took measures so the files are NOT easily discernible – to settle this argument about MP3 sound quality (properly encoded at high bitrates, of course).
Here’s the setup:
High Bitrate MP3 Internet Blind Test: Part 1 – PROCEDURE
And the results were remarkable:
High Bitrate MP3 Internet Blind Test: Part 2 – RESULTS
Out of 150 participants:
- 78 (52%) answered, Set A (lossless) sounded inferior to them
- 45 (30%) answered, Set B (MP3) sounded inferior to them
- 27 (18%) couldn’t hear a difference
So, 70% of participants preferred the MP3s over lossless, or heard no difference at all.
High Bitrate MP3 Internet Blind Test: Part 3 – DISCUSSION
In the results discussion, he highlights that participants with more expensive equipment had a stronger preference for the MP3 versions of the test songs.
He also published some verbatim comments from participants:
High Bitrate MP3 Internet Blind Test: Part 4 – SUBJECTIVE DESCRIPTIONS
To be fair, this test only had 3 songs and 150 participants. For other musical genres, e.g. classical music, there might be some audible difference between compressed and lossless formats.
But still, a remarkable result.
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