What is Amazon MP3?

 

Amazon MP3 offers Earth's biggest selection of a la carte, DRM-free MP3 music downloads. With over 2 million songs from more than 180,000 artists represented by over 20,000 major and independent labels, Amazon MP3 complements Amazon.com's existing selection of over 1 million CDs to offer customers more selection of physical and digital music than any other retailer.

 

Every song and album on Amazon MP3 is available exclusively in the MP3 format without digital rights management (DRM) software. This means that Amazon MP3 customers are free to enjoy their music downloads using any hardware device, organize their music using any music management application, and burn songs to CDs. Most songs are priced from 89 cents to 99 cents, with more than 1 million of the 2 million songs priced at 89 cents. The top 100 best-selling songs are 89 cents, unless marked otherwise. Most albums are priced from $5.99 to $9.99. The top 100 best-selling albums are $8.99 or less, unless marked otherwise. Every song on Amazon MP3 is encoded at 256 kilobits per second, which gives customers high audio quality at a manageable file size.

 

What does DRM-free mean?

Digital Rights Management or "DRM" commonly refers to software that is designed to control or limit how a file can be played, copied, downloaded, shared, or accessed. DRM-free means that the MP3 files you purchase from Amazon.com do not contain any software that will restrict your use of the file.

 

 

Why are Music Downloads only available in MP3 format?

MP3 is the most widely compatible music file format and is supported by most media player applications, hand-held music devices, and some CD and DVD players. Our MP3 format also provides you with the freedom to transfer music you buy at the Amazon MP3 store to any device you'd like or copy it to a CD without restrictions of any kind.

 

 

Here's more information about music files from the Amazon MP3 Music Downloads store:

• Bit Rate: Where possible, we encode our MP3 files using variable bit rates for maximum audio quality and smaller file sizes, aiming at an average of 256 kilobits per second (kbps). Using a variable bit rate allows us to allocate a higher bit rate to the more complex sections of music files while using a smaller bit rate for the less complex sections. The average of these rates is then calculated to produce an average bit rate for the entire file that represents the overall sound quality. Some of our content is encoded using a constant bit rate of 256 kbps. This content will have the same excellent audio quality at a slightly larger file size.

• File Size: A typical 3-minute song takes up approximately 5MB of storage space.

• Download Times: A single MP3 file 5MB in size will download in less than one minute on a typical broad-band Internet connection. A similar download on a 56k dial-up connection can take up to 30 minutes.

• Album Cover Art: Album cover art is included with each song you download.

What is an .amz file?

The first time you purchase from Amazon MP3, you may be prompted to open or save an .amz file if you have the Amazon MP3 Downloader installed. This file activates the Amazon MP3 Downloader and initiates downloading your MP3 song files. Be sure to select "Open" when prompted.

 

Can I burn my MP3 files on a CD and listen to it on my CD player?

Yes. MP3 files downloaded from the Amazon MP3 store should be compatible with most CD burning software or CD and DVD players capable of reading MP3 audio files.

 

Download popular music, classical music, new releases and more, in MP3 format. Most songs are $0.99 and most albums are $9.99 or less.

 

 

You probably have enough change in your couch to score some truly excellent MP3 albums. Starting at just $5.00, you can pick up albums from all-time favorites such as Nine Inch Nails, Led Zeppelin and Radiohead, plus titles from up-and-coming artists such as Melody Gardot, Kate Nash and A Fine Frenzy. Also, don't miss free songs from Manu Chao, the Blakes, Finest Dearest and others.