Do CDs or vinyls sound better?

Vinyl has been having a resurgence in recent years, and CDs are starting to become popular again too. The two media work much differently from one another, with vinyl being analog and based on the grooves etched into the record, and CD being a digital format read by a laser. Within the communities of people who stick with these older formats over streaming, there is a constant source of contention: which sounds better?

The short answer? It depends. What it depends on is mostly up to your own preferences. Vinyl and CDs both have different auditory qualities, both based on the actual physical format of each medium, but also due to the specific choices made by audio engineers and artists. It really depends on what your definition of “better” is when it comes to music.

CDs have a more clear, less noisy sound quality

Dynamic range is the key to CDs’ robust sound

A few factors make CDs have higher quality sound than vinyl. CDs have a lower signal-to-noise ratio, meaning the amount of noise generated by the medium itself. Vinyl has a higher signal-to-noise ratio because of the sounds created by the stylus on the grooves of the record, whereas CDs have little, if any, noise generated at all, since they’re fully digital.

When it comes to measures like bitrate, which are commonly used to compare quality of digital tracks, these two formats aren’t necessarily comparable. CD being digital means it has a bitrate, which is 16-bit/44.1kHz, also known as CD-quality lossless. But vinyl being analog means it doesn’t have a measurement like that to compare. Well-pressed vinyl can have a lot of dynamic range, but as a record gets used more and more, the noise floor will rise, making the dynamic range smaller over time. CDs don’t take damage like this, and the digital tracks on a CD will always maintain a higher dynamic range with a permanently low noise floor.

Vinyl has a warmer analog sound

Records have a cult following for a reason

One major aspect that vinyl nerds love is that vinyl records have a distinctive, warm auditory quality to them. This sound isn’t necessarily superior or inferior to the sound of a CD, but a lot of people prefer that sound just due to personal taste. Analog sound waves are very natural sounding, whereas some people find that digital sound feels a bit more sanitized, technical sound.

One might also prefer some of the sounds of vinyl that come with use, like little blips and clicks, and a higher noise floor, because of the vintage sound it has. This isn’t technically something that makes vinyl better, but rather it makes vinyl preferable to some people who are looking for that kind of sound.

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Bass is better on digital recordings

Digital can achieve a lot that analog just can’t

Vinyl records produce sound through the grooves pressed into the vinyl, and bass requires deep and wide grooves in order to create a robust, deep bass sound. If a track has a very deep bass or sub-bass frequency, a record with deep and wide enough grooves risks having the record skip if the grooves are too close together. This means that sometimes tracks on vinyl, instead of risking that, will just be less bassy than the masters used for CDs.

Since CDs are fully digital, you can have bass and sub-bass as loud and deep as you want. It doesn’t rely on anything physical, so there are no setbacks to transmitting bass as the artist and engineer intended. So if you care a lot about bass, you’re probably going to prefer the sound of CDs over vinyl.

So which is better?

Pick what you enjoy

In a very technical sense, CDs are better than vinyl when it comes to sound quality. This is due to the lower noise floor and wider dynamic range, as well as the fact that fully digital audio doesn’t experience the same inconveniences and setbacks that vinyl can, being an analog format.

However, if you prefer the analog warmth of a vinyl record, and you like the quirks and wear and tear that comes with vinyl, especially with use over time, that doesn’t mean you’re wrong for liking it. It may not technically be the “best,” but enjoyment of music isn’t about what is best, it’s about what you enjoy. So if you like vinyl regardless of its supposed technical setbacks, you’re just as correct as someone who prefers CDs for their dynamic range and robust sound.

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