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05 December, 2011

Convert 3ga to mp3

I had been recording sounds with Samsung Galaxy S2's 'Voice recorder' and I wanted to play it on my PC. But, the files are in 3ga format. Oh no. It turns out my PC can't play media of this format. What do I do?

So I googled 'convert 3ga to mp3 online'.

Google convert 3ga to mp3 online image


I found a few solutions with my results. One of them is Online-Converter.com and another from xda-developers forum member, jmaddox1978:
"This isn't very technical, however, I just changed the file extension from .3ga to .mp3 . I just gave it a try out of frustration and it now plays as an mp3 on all of my devices."
rename 3ga to mp3
Next, I followed the advice and it worked for me. Great! Now, I can play the 3ga file in VLC and Windows Media Player.


P.S. To change file extension, simply select the file and then press f2 (make sure 'Hide extensions for known file type' is unchecked in Folder Options->View) to edit the file extension.

P.P.S Is this what you are looking for? Does this answer your question? If not, tell me about it in the comments below. I like to have your feedback.
By at 8:40 PM
Labels: ,

50 comments:

  1. ajinkyaJanuary 5, 2012 at 3:55 PM

    wowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww its................working........thanx

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. UnknownJuly 3, 2012 at 10:04 PM

      OCY...I literally spent hours of my valuable time trying to download free 3ga to mp3 file converters without success & out of sheer frustration I tried your method. At first I unchecked the wrong box, but after re-reading your instructions, I unchecked the correct box & renamed the file & voila...mp3 playing just as I need it. I was able to finally send my record producer the dummy vocal track he'd been waiting for me to send. I had used my Samsung Galaxy s-II to record. I know this is long winded but I just wanted to sincerely thank you. You saved my career today. Jo from girl group Marilyn...coming soon!

      Delete
    2. lazeyjackFebruary 23, 2013 at 2:01 PM

      I right click on the file and press f2 and nothing happens?
      can you assist please as converting takes a long time
      rgds
      Stu

      Delete
    3. JH KuehFebruary 23, 2013 at 2:34 PM

      Hi Stuart, you only need to left-click the file and press f2 to be able to rename the files. Hope that helps.

      Delete
    4. lazeyjackFebruary 23, 2013 at 3:19 PM

      thanks , well does not happen, so I have a 3ga file on say desktop, or I search 3ga, highlight and left click still nothing occurs, any ideas please
      ah searched folder options, all ok danke, merci , :))

      Delete
    5. CBSMarch 1, 2013 at 4:23 PM

      THANK YOU!!!!

      Delete
  2. JH KuehJanuary 8, 2012 at 10:38 PM

    You're welcome. Glad to hear that it worked for you, ajinkya.

    Is there anything else that I might be able to help you with?

    ReplyDelete
  3. UnknownFebruary 18, 2012 at 8:08 AM

    So simple, yet so useful!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. JH KuehMarch 4, 2012 at 8:57 PM

      Yes it is, and that is the kind of solutions that I wish to utilise in my personal life and share it with my readers :)

      Delete
    2. UnknownFebruary 8, 2013 at 5:36 PM

      I bow to the simplicity of exploration as necessity is always the mother of invention. Thank you.

      Delete
  4. EzMarch 24, 2012 at 1:28 PM

    Hi there - I could play my recorded 3ga file in VLC player prior to converting the extension to .mp3. Im hoping to get the file into itunes so i can use it as a ringtone on my iphone. Any idea how i can do this?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. EzMarch 24, 2012 at 1:29 PM

      Note - for some reason after changing the extension to .mp3, itunes doesn't like it :-S

      Delete
    2. EzMarch 24, 2012 at 1:44 PM

      I answered my own question - here's what i did:

      1. Renamed file.3ga to file.3gp. This allowed me to open in itunes.
      2. I then converted the file to AAC.
      3. I located the AAC file in Windows explorer by right clicking the AAC version in itunes and selecting 'show in Windows Explorer'
      4. I changed the extension to file.m4r.

      Hope this helps others with the same issue.

      Delete
    3. JH KuehMarch 26, 2012 at 4:25 PM

      Thank you for sharing your solution with us, Ez.

      I must say that you're an example that we could all emulate in our own life. For you are a self-starter, who do not just complains about the problems in this world, but one who takes action to own the problems and came up with the solutions for them (Decisions for Success #3 & 4).

      Delete
  5. Mary CimeniApril 3, 2012 at 9:50 AM

    Omg, thanks to this, i did not expect converting 3ga to mp3 is very simple. Yet i wouldnt have known it if not because of this. Thanks yah ez.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. JH KuehApril 3, 2012 at 2:47 PM

      Hi Mary, glad that this guide has been helpful to you. Just curious, how do you discover this blog?

      Btw, what an imaginative blog you have got there ;)

      Delete
  6. Adrian MeliaApril 6, 2012 at 7:41 AM

    thank you so much for this simple solution. It makes you wonder why Samsung didn't name it "mp3" in the fist place!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. JH KuehApril 6, 2012 at 10:49 PM

      Hi Adrian, to quickly answer your question:

      Since 3ga is associated with the 3GPP multimedia file format, it's required for one of the wireless mobile networks multimedia services such as MMS.

      Not just Samsung. It is a widely adopted standard by most other phone manufacturers.

      If you want to know more, have a look these 2 links:
      http://www.file-extensions.org/3ga-file-extension
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3GP#Specifications

      Delete
  7. MARY ANNApril 28, 2012 at 2:20 AM

    Thank you very much this is very helpful info!!! I followed the solution you gave I used "online-converter.com" and it works now I know how to convert 3ga audio into mp3...Thanks once again!!! cheers!!!

    ReplyDelete
  8. Ahsanul HoqueMay 2, 2012 at 3:29 PM

    excellent!!!...

    Thank you very much.

    Regards,
    Ahsanul Hoque.

    ReplyDelete
  9. UnknownJune 6, 2012 at 11:10 PM

    This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  10. UnknownJune 15, 2012 at 8:59 PM

    hi. Many thanks for your answer, btw, I converted the voice recorder into a mp3, then when I import it to the video marker it does not work. I would like to ask you know why? and how can I fix it?

    Thanks alot

    ReplyDelete
  11. vsJune 19, 2012 at 3:08 PM

    Thanks for sharing this information, so simple and yet so useful. I too wonder why these companies can't come up with common formats and become user friendly and time and trouble savers. Anyways, I have another job at hand of that I want to find a simple solution to convert my old songs collection on audio cassettes to my computer preferably to mp3 or like. Please help if you can. THANKS

    ReplyDelete
  12. CyndiJune 21, 2012 at 3:53 AM

    Thank you for the helpful information!! :D I found it hard trying to go to fine extensions..as i have two languages on my pc ( Eng + Chinese) lolz. Kinda confusing at times. But tried to online coverter YEY it worked! Thank you so much.

    ReplyDelete
  13. Mike CowburnJune 26, 2012 at 6:27 PM

    Thankyou - this was a great help :-)

    ReplyDelete
  14. KerimJune 28, 2012 at 4:32 AM

    Gracias, worked. First tried my Adobe Suite to try and open it before I googled it and found your post.

    ReplyDelete
  15. AnonymousJuly 19, 2012 at 9:05 PM

    Thank you so so so much! You saved me downloading a virus and it was so easy!

    ReplyDelete
  16. Mark IliffJuly 25, 2012 at 7:09 AM

    FWIW the rename trick didn't work for me. Converting it with VLC was fine though.

    ReplyDelete
  17. UnknownAugust 2, 2012 at 10:10 PM

    I have many .3ga audio file, I'm going to used it in my thesis. Do you have alternative way to convert my 3ga files faster. I just a 200+ 3ga files to convert.

    Thanks

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. JH KuehAugust 7, 2012 at 3:05 PM

      Hi Kim, if renaming the .3ga file to .mp3 works for you, what you could do is get a batch-file renamer (such as Ant Renamer for Windows) and have the program to help you bulk rename all your 3ga files to mp3 files.

      Delete
  18. UnknownAugust 9, 2012 at 1:55 PM

    hi, i wanted to upload this mp3 format to the internet so i can share to my friends in fb but the problem is file hosting doesnt upload the mp3 format. help please

    ReplyDelete
  19. Doug EhrlichAugust 16, 2012 at 8:33 AM

    Thank you for posting this. It is as amazing as it is simple.

    ReplyDelete
  20. Mike NegliaSeptember 11, 2012 at 6:33 AM

    Very simple. Thanks for the post.

    ReplyDelete
  21. LauraBOctober 8, 2012 at 7:21 AM

    Wow! It worked! Thanks so much for this post, simple and easy. After an hour of messing about with other methods and trying to get it to work, YEAHHHH!

    ReplyDelete
  22. Marianna GoOctober 26, 2012 at 11:45 PM

    Thanks for the info! It really helped. I wasted about 30 minutes trying to find a converter online before I read your post.

    ReplyDelete
  23. BecksblogspotNovember 14, 2012 at 7:52 PM

    Audio files from my Samsung S3 don't have 3ga as part of the file extension for some reason so I don't know how to change it. 3ga is under the file name as File Type, rather than being expressed as .3ga which is what I would have expected. Can you help

    ReplyDelete
  24. dewi's pensieveNovember 20, 2012 at 1:17 AM

    You're a genius! Thank you :-)

    ReplyDelete
  25. Lauren Marie OwenNovember 27, 2012 at 2:45 PM

    YOU ROCK! Thanks!!!

    ReplyDelete
  26. Lala~November 28, 2012 at 3:26 PM

    This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  27. EvelynDecember 5, 2012 at 4:18 AM

    Thanks for the solution, it really worked! Can't believe it's this easy... after going through websites after websites searching for a suitable audio converter. Now I can finish my job and sleep early :)

    ReplyDelete
  28. UnknownDecember 5, 2012 at 6:37 AM

    I'm so bummed I cannot get this to work! Every time I click on the title, then click F2, it allows me to change to MP3, but as soon as I hit enter, it goes back to .3ga. :( Any advice?? (I unchecked that box already too...)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. UnknownJanuary 17, 2013 at 4:17 AM

      same for me Cassandra....aaaargh I hope someone can help us!

      Delete
    2. JH KuehJanuary 17, 2013 at 3:59 PM

      Hi Cassandra & Jennifer, it would be difficult to help without knowing anything about your computers (Windows/Mac version etc).

      However, I'll list several reasons why you may not be able to change the file extension:
      1. Logged in as a non-admin user.
      2. The file might be in use.
      3. The file might be marked read-only.

      As a last resort, you might want to try to convert them online via Online-Converter.com.

      Do let me know how it goes. Cheers!

      Delete
  29. UnknownFebruary 19, 2013 at 12:28 PM

    You are awesome! Thank you very much. I actually right clicked and renamed the file as it was deleted the .3ga and added the mp3. Bingo! Windows Media Player is playing it as we speak! Thanks again!

    ReplyDelete
  30. adoorFebruary 20, 2013 at 2:12 AM

    I wish all my technical problems would get solved so easily. I just changed the extension from .3ga to .mp3, worked like a charm. Thanks a ton!

    ReplyDelete
  31. im_jiawenMarch 7, 2013 at 12:39 AM

    Hi, thanks for sharing this. Absolutely helpful for geek like me. There is one problem. After converting into .mp3, i could not find any workable software to trim/ edit the files. Any idea? Thanks lot!!!

    ReplyDelete
  32. mytincartMarch 22, 2013 at 3:38 PM

    Renaming the file extension doesn't make it an mp3 file. So while some players will try to run this as an mp3 and it will work, if you try to import it into other applications it will fail with an "unexpected file format error" because it's still a 3ga.

    ReplyDelete
  33. AnonymousMarch 27, 2013 at 1:15 AM

    Please Helppp. It can play on my laptop but I need to convert it into mp3 so I can play the audio file as sound in windows live movie maker

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Shuja RafiMarch 28, 2013 at 6:10 AM

      http://www.softpedia.com/get/Multimedia/Audio/Audio-Convertors/3ga-to-mp3-Converter.shtml

      Delete
  34. softwareMay 10, 2013 at 5:01 PM

    If your media player doesn't contain direct support for 3GA audio files, but supports 3GP multimedia files, rename .3ga to .3gp or .mp3, then you can play the renamed 3GA files in most situations.

    If your media player does not natively support 3GP and 3GA, a recommended solution is to convert 3GA to other popular format like MP3, WMA, WAV, M4A and etc. Bigasoft Audio Converter is just the right 3GA Converter which can convert 3GA to WMA, WAV, MP3, M4A, AC3, OGG, FLAC, RA, AU, AIFF, MP3 and etc. Aside from converting 3GA recorded voice files, Bigasoft Audio Converter also can convert QCP, AMR, AWB, FLAC, OGG, SHN, TTA, MPC, PCM, APE, VOC, VOX, AIFF, Apple Lossless and etc to MP3, WAV, and WMA and etc. In addition, it can extract audio from all kinds of video formats and save as MP3, WAV, FLAC, WMA, AC3, and so on.

    Step by step guide at http://www.bigasoft.com/articles/how-to-convert-3ga-to-mp3-wav-wma.html

    ReplyDelete

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