Power User Tips
An MP3Cut Alternative for Splitting One File into Many Tracks
MP3Cut is a quick way to trim one piece out of an audio file: a ringtone, an intro, a clip for a video. But if you're holding a 70-minute album, mixtape or live set and want twelve separate, tagged tracks, that's a different job. This is a look at where each tool fits.
We built a free online track splitter for that second job, so we're not neutral. We've tried to describe MP3Cut only by what its own page says, and to be clear about where it's the better pick.
What MP3Cut does
A trimmer, and a good one.
MP3Cut is 123apps' Audio Cutter. Its page describes the workflow simply: upload a file, select a fragment with the sliders, and click "Cut". It also lists:
- Fade in and fade out, which it notes is useful for phone ringtones.
- Support for over 300 file formats, and extracting the sound from a video.
- A one-click iPhone ringtone: a 40-second file in m4r format.
- Pitch, volume and speed changes before you save.
- Opening files from your device, Google Drive, Dropbox or a URL.
- A free tool, with a paid Premium plan across 123apps that adds larger files and removes ads.
What the page describes is cutting one selection out of one file. It doesn't mention splitting a file into many tracks in one pass, or writing title, album or track-number tags.
Two different jobs
One clip, or a whole album.
Trimming is "keep this part". Splitting is "turn this whole recording into tracks, back to back, with nothing lost in between". When you want a dozen tracks from one file, a trimmer means a dozen rounds of select, cut and save, and then tagging each file somewhere else. A splitter takes every cut at once.
| Task | MP3Cut (per its page) | Track splitter |
|---|---|---|
| Cut one clip or ringtone | Yes, its main job, with m4r ringtone export | Possible, but more steps than you need |
| Many tracks in one pass | Not described | Yes, no limit on the number of tracks |
| Paste a tracklist | Not described | Yes, YouTube-style timestamps |
| Find tracks by silence | Not described | Yes, threshold and minimum gap |
| Tags and cover art | Not described | Title, artist, album, year, genre, track number, cover art |
| Fades | Fade in and out | 0–5 s per track, when re-encoding |
| Pitch, speed, volume | Yes | No |
| Audio from video | Yes | No, audio files only |
| Input formats | Over 300 | MP3, WAV, FLAC, M4A/AAC, Ogg Vorbis, Opus |
How it works
A whole album in one pass.
-
01
Upload one long file
MP3, WAV, FLAC, M4A/AAC, Ogg Vorbis or Opus, up to 450 MB. It's uploaded over HTTPS and cut on our server with FFmpeg.
-
02
Mark every track at once
Paste a tracklist, one line per track, like
3:45 Second Song. Or choose "Find tracks automatically" to cut at silences, into equal parts, or every N minutes. Or tap "Add track" on the waveform as it plays. -
03
Add album info
Artist, album, year, genre and cover art go on every track; each gets its own title and number. Lines written "Artist - Title" give each track its own artist.
-
04
Download
Grab the zip, or download tracks one at a time, which is handy on a phone. The zip also holds a .cue sheet for the original file.
The details
What makes an album, not a pile of clips.
Nothing falls between tracks
A new track fills in the previous track's end time, and deleting a track extends the one before it, so no audio quietly goes missing.
No quality loss by default
"Keep original" copies MP3 audio without re-encoding; FLAC is re-encoded losslessly with identical samples. Or choose MP3, AAC or Opus at 128–320 kbps, or FLAC or WAV.
Tags your player reads
Title, artist, album, year, genre and track number, with cover art embedded in MP3, M4A and FLAC. WAV and Ogg files get tags but no cover art.
Your work is kept
Timestamps, album info and cover art are saved in the browser, so a refresh doesn't lose a long tracklist.
Got a tracklist from a video description? The YouTube album splitter page walks through it. For rips with gaps between songs, see split audio by silence.
When to use which
Pick by the job.
MP3Cut fits when
- You want one clip or a ringtone, especially an iPhone m4r.
- Your source is a video, or a format the splitter doesn't take, such as AIFF or WMA.
- You want to change pitch, speed or volume.
- Your file is in Google Drive, Dropbox or at a URL.
The track splitter fits when
- One file holds many songs: an album, mixtape, DJ mix or live set.
- You have a tracklist with timestamps, or the songs are separated by silence.
- You want every track tagged, numbered and with cover art.
- You want a zip of the whole set, plus single-track downloads.
FAQ
Questions people ask.
- Can I split one MP3 into several tracks for free?
- Yes. The track splitter is free, needs no account and has no limit on the number of tracks. The one limit is a single file of up to 450 MB per job.
- Do I have to type every cut point?
- No. Paste a tracklist you already have, or let "Find tracks automatically" place cuts at silences, at equal lengths or every N minutes. You can still edit any track before splitting.
- Will the tracks lose quality?
- Not with "Keep original", the default. MP3 audio is copied without re-encoding. Fades need re-encoding, so they're available when you choose an output format.
- Can I make a ringtone with the splitter?
- You can cut a clip and download that one track, but there's no ringtone preset or m4r export. For a ringtone, a trimmer like MP3Cut is the more direct tool.