I wanted to know how well this compared to ffmpeg | base64 (or base{emoji}), but actually I can't make anything that sounds as good in as small a filesize. The

I wanted to know how well this compared to ffmpeg | base64 (or base{emoji}), but actually I can't make anything that sounds as good in as small a filesize. The FMT version is 2379 bytes of shell. Opus bottoms-out at 6000bps (even when you ask for something smaller like 4000bps): ffmpeg -i tripple.wav -ac 1 -ar 8000 -b:a 4000 -ss 4.9 -t 3 tripple.opus That makes a 3638 byte file. It sounds a lot better than the FMT version, but it's 1.5x the size and still non-printable. Speex can apparently go as low as 2000bps: ffmpeg -i tripple.wav -ac 1 -ar 8000 -b:a 2000 -ss 4.9 -t 3 tripple.spx That makes a 1322 byte file, or 1788 after base64, much smaller than FMT, even after you add the necessary base64|ffplay shell wrapping. But it sounds significantly worse than FMT (and ffmpeg had clipped off the last few audio frames). EDIT: AMR-NB (1999) can drop to 4750bps, and Codec2 (2011) can drop to 450bps, but my copy of ffmpeg doesn't support encoding into either format.