How to open Dolby Digital sound .ac3 files
Have you had trouble opening the ac3 file on your computer? What are ac3 files? We explain what they are and recommend software that we know will open them.
What is ac3 file?
An ac3 file extension is associated with the Dolby Digital sound file format also known as AC3 (Audio Coding 3).
Dolby Digital sound description
The ac3 file extension is used for for Dolby Digital sound files.
Launched in 1987, the Dolby Digital format is a digital audio encoding standard developed by Dolby Labs.
Unlike Dolby ProLogic systems, Dolby Digital audio tracks are independent (the term "discrete" is also sometimes used). For consumer electronics, the Dolby Digital format relies on a compression algorithm called AC3 (Audio Coding 3), which can compress audio streams by a factor of 10 to 12 with a 16-bit sampling rate of 48 kHz, for an overall bitrate of 384 kbps. For this reason, the Dolby Digital format is sometimes called Dolby AC3. For professionals, instead of an AC3 decoder, Dolby Digital uses a system called SR-D.
Dolby Digital is likely the most commonly used system in home theater systems. To be able to use media recorded in Dolby Digital format (DVD video or DVD audio, for example), you need a device with an integrated AC3 decoder.
Suggested software to open ac3 file
Media Player
Windows 11 default media player.
VLC media player
One of the most popular multi-platfom multimeda player
There are other AC3 filename extensions with the same .ac3 suffix
ac3 - SPICE AC/frequence domain output file
Files ac1 extension are used by SPICE. They contain domain output data.