Question Is there a way to Normalize ALL of my music files at once?

[Haliax68]

I'm just wondering if anyone knows of a free software app/program that will allow me to normalize the volume of all my music files? I have stopped using Apple Music (as it is horrible and lousy with glitches and apple doesn't care to help us anymore) and now have all my iTunes music on my PC. Things still aren't great, but it's actually working getting the songs onto my iPhone from my PC using iTunes instead of Apple Music (whereas I couldn't even do that for the last year or so on Apple Music). And just FYI, these are all my own songs, from my own CD's that I have ripped over the years. Only a handful may have been purchased from Apple. All the rest are mine. And all of the music files are either MP3 or M4a

But the one thing I'd like to do if possible is normalize all the volumes of the songs. iTunes "Sound Check" barely does anything, it's a joke. I have it on, and songs are still WILDLY different volumes. So I was hoping something like MP3gain or Audacity (or some other program) would allow me to adjust ALL the music I have on my PC iTunes now? I know how to do one song at a time, but that will take years to go through all my music. I need a way to be able to edit them ALL at one time and it actually work. Not like this crappy Apple "sound check" thing that barely even works.

Thanks in advance

 

[Darkbreeze]

What format are the files in? MP3? Ogg? Apple lossless? FLAC? What?

 

[Darkbreeze]

Sorry, missed where you said MP3 or M4a. Unfortunately I don't think you're going to find a program that will do both MP3 AND M4A normalizing at the same time, but maybe, but you could certainly do all the MP3 files then all the M4A files if it won't.

What you want is a "batch normalizer" and there are several utilities and applications that will do this.

Music too Loud or Soft? Make Your MP3 Files Play at the Same Volume

This MP3 tutorial will show you how to normalize your MP3 files so they all play at the same volume level.

www.lifewire.com

M4A will take a bit more work but it can be done.

 

[Lafong]

..................I know how to do one song at a time...............

Not sure why you feel you are limited to one song at a time.

You can load thousands of songs into Mp3gain and do them all at once. On an average PC, it can process several thousand songs per hour.

It has an option to include subfolders.

I don't think it works on M4A files, but a program called AACGain reportedly does. Never used it, but it is said to be very similar to mp3gain.

 

[Darkbreeze]

I believe MP4gain, which works on normalizing M4A songs, can do batch normalization as well.

 

[Ralston18]

Do be sure that those thousands of song files are backed up.

Backups should be being done anyway but especially so if you plan to attempt some batch method to normalize, etc..

The process may take off and run but could be corrupting the files as it goes....

Create a small test environment so you can limit what happens and play some of the songs at random to ensure that all is well.

 

[Haliax68]

Thanks everyone for your responses. I've been super busy the last few days. But I'll try all of this and see which works. The get back here and let you know. I appreciate it

 

[Darkbreeze]

Cool man. We just want to help you get what you need to do, done.

 

[Math Geek]

and do post back with your experience

i've considered looking for such a thing myself in the past and would love to benefit from you being the guinea pig

 

[Darkbreeze]

Personally, I don't like to "normalize" my music. It tends to flatten a lot of otherwise very dynamic selections. If it's a good quality rip to begin with, there should never be any need to do this.


And, if it's a lower quality rip and you are trying to bring it's volume UP, it's going to really affect it's quality even further.

 

[Math Geek]

i've got some old cd's from literally the 80's that no matter what i have done to rip them, they always end up with a very low volume. like less than half the volume of other music i have ripped. very annoying when hitting shuffle on the library and having certain songs almost silent while the rest was at a decent volume. i'm willing to lose a little bit if some normalizing would fix the issue.

i've tried many programs and tips/tricks i have found on the web, but nothing has ever fixed the issue for these old cd's. not when ripping them or other post rip tweaks. i had an old player that actually normalized them very well without changing the file itself, but that awesome old piece of software is long gone from the world.

i'm def in one ear and the other one only works about 75% so it will take a massive quality hit for me to even know the difference. lol

so not to hijack the thread, but i'm very interested in how these new options work for the OP.

 

[Darkbreeze]

It's almost 100% not due to the ripping process, it's because there were SO MANY of those 80's CDs that were simply low quality reproductions or in many cases, simply poor mastering to begin with. And when that's the case, you can certainly elevate the volume but you are going to see further degradation of the rip.