Cannot convert ANY file to MP3 (tried with MP4 and AAC)

[DAC324]

Hello all,

I am using VLC 3.0.16 under Linux.
It looks like it is impossible to convert any file (no matter if video or audio) to MP3. Apparently, VLC cannot make use of an MP3 encoder in Linux.
I tried with a MP4 video file (H.264/AAC) as well as with an AAC audio file.

All I get using the guide for transcoding provided at https://www.vlchelp.com/convert-video-audio-mp3/ is an empty file when I choose MP3 output.

If I choose, for example, FLAC or OGG, I get the expected audio file which plays flawlessly. Only MP3 is not working.

As there is no error message, I do not know what I could try to fix this.

Please let me kindly ask you for help.

Thank you very much in advance and kind regards,
DAC324

[egmond42]

I have the same problem since I updated to Ubuntu 22.04.1 LTS
Is there any driver I have to add to the system?
thanks in advance!
kind regards
egmond

[DAC324]

As you can see from the fact that nobody responded to the initial post for several months, this question seems to be of no interest to anybody.
We will have to accept that but some information about the reasons would be great.

[Rémi Denis-Courmont]

I believe that Debian and Ubuntu are stripping AAC encoding from their VLC packages. That being the case, you have to expect that it won't work. There is not much to be done about it here.

You can install the VLC Snap if you want an unstripped VLC.

[DAC324]

Looks like it's not only Debian and Ubuntu but Arch as well.
Thanks for that hint anyway - looks like we will have to ask our package maintainers.

UPDATE: At least in Manjaro Linux, the conversion to MP3 works again with vlc 3.0.17.4. Looks like checking for an updated vlc package indeed makes sense

[egmond42]

I found a solution that works for me:
I changed the profile for mp3, section audiocodec from "MP3" to "MPEG Audio"

[snowfinch]

- I changed the profile for mp3, section audiocodec from "MP3" to "MPEG Audio"
That worked for me, too! Thanks for the hint!

[BroadcastTV]

You might be missing the MP3 codec on your Linux system. VLC usually requires additional codec packages to handle MP3 transcoding. Try installing the 'lame' codec, which is specifically for MP3. It's available in most Linux distributions' package repositories.

[Paramahansa]

Had the same problem, and this worked for me.

I fixed it by installing 'lame'. Just open your terminal, type a command to get 'lame' (it's different for each Linux version), and that should do it. It's pretty straightforward and worked well for me.