5 Ways to Convert Apple Music to MP3 in 2025

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Grace
January 3, 2025

With a library of 100 million songs and over 30,000 expert-curated playlists, Apple Music stands as one of the leading music streaming platforms. Subscribers can access nearly any song and download them for offline playback across multiple devices.

Yet, Apple Music doesn’t offer a free plan, and access to downloads is lost once the subscription ends. To address these limitations, this article presents five methods to convert Apple Music to MP3 files, allowing you to keep them on your devices forever for offline playback, even after unsubscribing.

CONTENTS

  1. Why Convert Apple Music to MP3
  2. How to Convert DRM-Free Apple Music to MP3
  3. How to Convert DRM-Protected Apple Music to MP3
  4. In the End

1. Why Convert Apple Music to MP3?

Due to Apple’s FairPlay DRM technology, songs downloaded from Apple Music are encrypted M4P files, aiming to prevent playback on unauthorized devices. While songs purchased from iTunes and Apple Music are not DRM-protected, they are stored as M4A files, which may not be compatible with some devices or players.

Under such conditions, playing downloaded Apple Music tracks on another device or music player becomes challenging. Moreover, once you unsubscribe from Apple Music, all downloaded files become inaccessible from your library. Therefore, a reliable tool is needed to convert Apple Music to MP3 local files, enabling offline playback on any device at any time.

2. How to Convert DRM-Free Apple Music to MP3

As mentioned earlier, songs purchased from iTunes and Apple Music are not DRM-protected. That means you can convert unprotected music to MP3 directly with Apple Music on Mac or iTunes on Windows.

Option 1. Convert songs to MP3 with the Music app on Mac

Please note that when using Apple Music to convert DRM-Free tracks to MP3, the sound quality may be reduced. Also, to use this feature of Apple Music, you need to upgrade to macOS Catalina 10.15, where iTunes is not available on Mac anymore with its functions divided into three all-new apps Apple Music, Apple TV, and Apple Podcasts.

To convert music to MP3 with the Music app, follow these steps:

  1. Open the Music app on your Mac, and choose Music > Preferences/Settings in the menu bar.
  2. Click the Files tab, then click Import Settings.
import settings

3. Choose the encoding format to MP3 Encoder in the Import Using menu, and you can also set the output quality (up to 320kbps). Click OK to save the changes

MP3 Encoder

  1. If you want to convert songs in your library, select the songs in your library and Choose File > Convert, then Create the MP3 Version file. New song files appear in your library next to the original files.
  2. If you want to convert songs in a folder or on a disk, hold down the Option key on your keyboard, and choose File > Convert > Convert to MP3. Select the folder or disk that contains songs that you want to import and convert. New song files appear in your library.
Convert to MP3

Option 2. Convert Apple Music to MP3 with iTunes

Windows users can convert Apple Music songs without DRM protection on iTunes. Detailed steps are as follows.

iTunes

  1. Open iTunes for Windows.
  2. Choose Edit > Preferences in the menu bar.
  3. Click the General tab, then click Import Settings.
  4. Choose the encoding format to MP3 Encoder in the Import Using menu. Click OK.
  5. If you want to convert songs in your library, select the songs in your library that you want to convert. Choose File > Convert to Create the MP3 Version file, which appears in your library next to the original files.
  6. If you want to convert songs in a folder or on a disk, hold down the Shift key on your keyboard and choose File > Convert > Convert to MP3. Select the folder or disk that contains songs that you want to import and convert. New song files appear in your library.

3. How to Convert DRM-Protected Apple Music to MP3

Option 1. Use an Apple Music to MP3 Converter [100% Working]

Pazu Apple Music Converter is a professional software tool to download Apple Music songs, albums, and playlists to MP3 and other popular audio formats, without any loss in quality. Compatible with both Mac and Windows computers, Pazu offers exceptionally fast download and conversion speeds, nearly 10 times faster than other similar software.

A standout feature of Pazu is its integration with the Apple Music web player, enabling users to batch convert any Apple Music playlist or album to their preferred format without requiring iTunes or the Music app. After downloading, you can freely transfer the MP3 files to any supported device or application for offline enjoyment.

Key Features of Pazu Apple Music Converter

  • User-friendly interface
  • 10x Fast Music download speed
  • Advanced DRM removal
  • Lossless audio quality
  • Keep original ID3 tags & metadata
  • Download Apple Music songs, albums and playlists
  • Unlimited downloads
  • Adjustable output options

The following tutorial will show you how to download Apple Music to MP3 and get Apple Music for free. 

Step 1. Launch Pazu Apple Music Converter

Download, install and run Pazu Apple Music Converter on your Mac or Windows.

Apple Music Converter

Step 2. Choose the output format

The default format is M4A in 256kbps. Apple Music Converter also supports MP3, AAC, FLAC, WAV and AIFF. Click the gear icon if you want to change the output format or output folder.

Apple Music Converter settings

Step 3. Choose a playlist, artist, or album you want to download

Follow the on-screen instructions to choose a playlist, artist, or album that you want to download.

add Apple Music songs

Step 4. Start to download Apple Music songs

Click the “Convert” button to start downloading Apple Music songs, albums, and playlists to MP3, so you can play them anywhere you want, even after canceling your Apple Music subscription.

convert Apple Music to MP3

Option 2. Convert Apple Music to MP3 with the online downloader

Soundloaders Apple Music Downloader (soundloaders.com/apple-music-downloader) is a free online tool to convert not only Apple Music but also music from several other platforms such as Spotify, Deezer, YouTube, etc. It doesn’t require any personal information or account creation to use the service and can convert the song you want into an MP3 file with the best possible quality.

The downloader is compatible with macOS and Windows and can be used with both the Apple Music web player and the desktop application.

It also works well with Apple Music mobile app for Android and iOS. Meanwhile, Android users can enjoy the smooth operation of the downloader on popular browsers including Chrome, Firefox, and Opera. However, iOS users need to use the Safari browser on their mobile devices.

Soundloaders

  1. Open the Apple Music website/desktop app/mobile app and go to a playlist or album page
  2. Click on the three dots to see the options panel, then click on “Share”/”Share Song
  3. Click on “Copy” /“Copy Link”
  4. Paste the URL in the text input above
  5. Click on “Search” to check the track information
  6. Click on “Download” and it will start automatically
Soundloaders

Option 3. Convert Apple Music to MP3 with the Audio Recorder

In addition to the online converter or software, the audio recorder is also a good choice to convert Apple Music to MP3 files. Audacity (audacityteam.org) is a free, open-source, and cross-platform audio editor and recorder for Windows, macOS, GNU/Linux, and other operating systems.

Audacity

It can record streaming Apple Music but it can also record the other sound from a microphone. Therefore, please make sure there isn’t any noise from your microphone when recording Apple Music on Audacity.

Recording Apple Music with Audacity is simple and easy. But please note that quality loss may happen when you use Audacity to convert Apple Music songs.

  1. Download and install Audacity on your device. Then open it.
  2. Play the Apple Music song you want to convert to MP3.
  3. Return to Audacity and press the red round Record Button to start recording. You can press the square Stop Button once finished.
audio recorder

4. To save the file you recorded, go to File > Export > Export as MP3.

Export as MP3

During the process of saving the recorded Apple Music MP3, you may edit the file name and the metadata tags as well.

Save to MP3
Edit Name

4. In the End

Among all the above-mentioned great ways to convert Apple Music to MP3, Pazu Apple Music Converter is the best option. Each of the other options has some limitations: Apple Music and iTunes can only convert unprotected music; the online Apple Music Converter can and sometimes the download could fail; the audio recorder may cause reduced sound quality; all of them can only convert single songs and don’t support album and playlist conversion.

Therefore, if you want to convert DRM-protected music with a fast, reliable, and 100% working tool, try the Pazu Apple Music Converter, and it will not let you down.

Download, install and run Pazu Apple Music Converter on your Mac or Windows.

Apple Music Converter

Apple Music Converter

Download Apple Music to MP3, M4A, etc.