AIFF (Audio Interchange File Format) is one of the two most-used audio file formats used in the Apple Macintosh operating system. The other is Sound Designer II (SDII). AIFF is sometimes referred to as "Apple Interchange File Format."
The extension for this file type is ".aif" of ".aiff" when it is used on a PC. On a Mac, the file extension is not needed. A Mac file uses a Type and Creator resource to identify itself to the operating system and the applications that can open it.
An AIFF file contains the raw audio data, channel information (monophonic or stereophonic), bit depth, sample rate, and application-specific data areas. The application-specific data areas let different applications add information to the file header that remains there even if the file is opened and processed by another application. For example, a file could retain information about selected regions of the audio data used for recalling zoom levels not used by other applications.
The AIFC variation of the AIFF specification was conceived to allow compressed audio to be contained within AIFF files. A number of platform specific compression formats were allowed, which have since been superseded by more efficient compression methods such as MP3, WMA, OGG, etc..
AIFF supports ID tagging with album art compatibility, an internal id3v2 tag (compatible with iTunes)
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