Best Audio CD Ripping and Extraction Software

Stand-alone CD rippers are useful when you have a large collection of CDs that you want to rip. They're also helpful when the media player you use doesn’t come with a built-in CD ripper.

These dedicated audio CD extraction programs typically have more features than the options built into popular media players such as Windows Media Player.

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Extreme Accuracy and Stability: Exact Audio Copy

Exact Audio Copy CD ripping software for Windows

What We Like

Tests CD drive for accuracy and reliability.
Adds song lyrics.
Feature-rich in CD ripping options.

What We Don't Like

Website to download program is cluttered and confusing.
Enter email address to get song and album information.

EAC—Exact Audio Copy—is valued for its accuracy. The free Windows program reads every CD sector at least two times to verify correct data copying. Then it compares the copy to the original CD until at least eight of 16 tries produce identical results. After that, it reads troublesome sections of the CD, such as scratched areas, repeatedly up to 80 times.

EAC's accuracy comes at the cost of speed, but if accuracy is important to you, a minute or more extra time isn't a problem. On the other hand, EAC isn't the most user-friendly CD ripping software program, and it doesn't apply its own codec. It also doesn't pull the album metadata from the database until you tell it to do so.

Despite these shortcomings, free EAC is probably the best and most powerful ripping tool available.

Download Audio Exact Copy

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Quick and Easy Ripping: FreeRIP Basic Edition

FreeRIP Basic Edition software interface

What We Like

Automatically fills out track and album information.
Rips music to five audio formats.
Rips CDs quickly.

What We Don't Like

Search feature doesn't work.
Interface looks a bit dated.

FreeRIP has a well-designed (though slightly outdated) interface that's intuitive to use. This free CD ripper can extract the audio from your music CDs to several lossless audio formats such as MP3, WMA, WAV, Vorbis, and FLAC formats. The program also supports CDDB query, which automatically fills in the information for your digital audio files.

You can use FreeRIP as an audio format converter and a tagger. When you're converting from one audio format to another, you can either add files manually or drag and drop them using your mouse. If you're looking for a free CD ripper, converter, and tagger, FreeRIP is a solid choice for Windows users.

Download FreeRIP

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A Powerful Audio Player With Ripping Capabilities: foobar2000

foobar2000 audio player and CD ripping software

What We Like

Available for Windows, macOS, and mobile devices.
Interface is customizable.
Looks up album information from two databases.

What We Don't Like

Default layout is too simplistic.
Lacks tutorials to show advanced features.

Foobar2000 is a free advanced audio player for Windows. Although primarily a player, its audio component provides secure ripping of audio CDs. The software supports a range of audio formats, including MP3, MP4, CD Audio, WMA, Vorbis, FLAC, and WAV.

This software is also widely available on different devices, including Windows and macOS computers and Android and iOS smartphones.

Download foobar2000

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Rip and Apply Album Info at the Same Time: FairStars CD Ripper

FairStars CD Ripper software for Windows

What We Like

Query music databases for album information.
Help files have great explanations of the interface.
Adjust sound sampling rates.

What We Don't Like

Interface lacks some features.
Software looks a bit dated.

FairStars CD Ripper is a donationware Windows program that is a powerful software for ripping audio CD tracks to WMA, MP3, OGG, VQF, FLAC, APE, and WAV formats.

The interface is user-friendly and includes ID3 tagging, handles multiple CD/DVD drivers, and comes with audio playback controls. FairStars CD Ripper also supports normalization when ripping.

Download FairStars CD Ripper

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