Stand-alone CD rippers are useful when you have a large collection of CDs that you want to rip. They're also helpful when the media player that you use doesn’t come with a built-in CD ripper. Dedicated audio CD extraction programs typically have more features than the ones that are built into popular media players such as ​Windows Media Player. ​

In the last 10 years CD Ripper has ripped over 80 Million CDs. For Windows 10, 8.1, 7, Vista & XP (SP3), OS X Mavericks or newer. DBpoweramp is free from spyware, malware and Trojans, our installer does not bundle other programs.

Exact Audio Copy

What We Like

• Tests CD drive for accuracy and reliability.

• Add song lyrics.

• Feature-rich in CD ripping options.

What We Don't Like

• Website to download program is annoying.

• Not a native Windows 10 app.

• Enter email address to get song and album information.

EAC—Exact Audio Copy—is valued for its accuracy. The free Windows program reads every CD sector at least two times to verify the correct data is copied. Then it compares the copy to the original CD until at least eight of 16 tries produce identical results. Troublesome sections of the CD, such as scratched areas, are read repeatedly up to 80 times.

EAC's accuracy comes at the cost of speed, but if accuracy is important to you, a minute or more extra time isn't a problem. EAC isn't the most user-friendly of the CD ripping software programs and it doesn't apply its own codec. EAC also doesn't pull the album metadata from the database until you tell it to do so.

Despite these shortcomings, free EAC is probably the best and most powerful ripping tool available.

FreeRIP 3 Basic Edition

What We Like

• Automatically fills out track and album information.

• Rips music to 5 different audio formats.

• Rips CDs quickly.

What We Don't Like

• Search feature doesn't work.

• Interface looks a bit dated.

FreeRIP 3 has a well-designed interface that is intuitive to use. This free CD ripper can extract the audio from your music CDs to MP3, WMA, WAV, Vorbis and FLAC formats. The program supports CDDB query, which is used to automatically fill in the information for your digital audio files. FreeRIP 3 can also be used as an audio format converter and a tagger. When you're converting from one audio format to another, you can either add files manually or drag and drop them using your mouse. If you’re looking for a free CD ripper, converter, and tagger, then FreeRIP is a solid choice.

foobar2000

What We Like

• Available for Windows, Mac OS, Android, iOS, and as a portable app.

• Interface is customizable.

• Looks up album information from 2 databases.

What We Don't Like

• Default layout too simplistic.

• No tutorial to show advanced features.

Foobar2000 is a free advanced audio player for Windows. Although primarily a player, its audio component supports secure ripping of audio CDs. The software supports a wide range of audio formats including MP3, MP4, CD Audio, WMA, Vorbis, FLAC, and WAV.

FairStairs CD Ripper

What We Like

• Query music databases for album information.

• Help files have great explanations of the interface.

• Adjust sound sampling rates.

What We Don't Like

• Interface lacks some features.

• Software looks a bit dated.

FairStairs CD Ripper is a donationware Windows program that is powerful software for ripping audio CD tracks to WMA, MP3, OGG, VQF, FLAC, APE and WAV formats. The interface is user-friendly and includes ID3 tag support. It supports multiple CD/DVD drivers and includes audio playback controls. FairStairs CD Ripper supports normalization when ripping.

When you want to archive your CD collection, you can just rip the tracks using Windows Explorer or your regular media player. However, the quality of those files will never be as good as the original discs due to errors when data is read, and compression when it’s encoded. That's why you need a dedicated CD ripper.

Ideally, archived audio files should be as close to the original CD as possible, with complete and accurate metadata, encoded in a lossless format (usually Free Lossless Audio Codec, or FLAC). This requires a lot of space, the cost of which would once have been prohibitive, but the plummeting price of storage makes it feasible to keep those files as a backup, and make copies for everyday use. You can also encode copies using lossy codecs for playback on devices with limited storage.

A 'secure' CD ripper ensures audio files are free from errors by reading each sector of the disc several times, and comparing the results with data collected from other users. There aren’t many of these tools around, and here we’ve picked the CD rippers we’d trust with our own tunes.

Are CD rippers legal?

Although every Windows PC comes with software for backing up CDs, it's not legal everywhere. For example, in 2014, UK copyright law was changed to make legalize personal backups, but that decision was overturned by the High Court in 2015. Make sure you check out intellectual property law in your country before you start ripping.

1. Exact Audio Copy

The best free CD ripper for Windows if you have time to invest in the setup

Usually we’re spoilt for choice when it comes to software, with dozens of programs approaching the same task from different angles. When it comes to CD rippers, however, there are only two programs we recommend – one free, and one premium (but still reasonably priced).

Exact Audio Copy is the free option, and it's so good, many audiophiles prefer it to its paid-for counterpart. It takes a while to set up, so we've put together a full guide to get you started.

EAC employs a technology called AccurateRip, which uses data from users around the world to detect whether your rips are totally free from errors. No CD or DVD drive is perfect, and many will insert periods of silence into audio tracks where errors occur, so this verification is essential for making 1:1 copies of your discs.

EAC can also find metadata for your music from four different sources (complete with album art), rename files automatically, and normalize audio as it's processed. If you have the time to invest, you couldn't wish for more.

2. dbPowerAmp

A premium CD ripper that makes archiving and encoding music a breeze

dBpoweramp is a premium CD ripper (a license for a single PC costs $39/£31/AU$39), but you can try it free for 21 days to make sure it's the tool for you before buying.

dBpoweramp's main advantage over Exact Audio Copy is its clear interface, which helps simplify the process of ripping your discs. Otherwise, it’s very similar; it uses the same AccurateRip technology to ensure your files are as close as possible to the original CD, scanning and re-scanning for errors, and comparing the results with data from other users.

dBpoweramp uses all your CPU cores simultaneously for the fastest possible encoding, and can encode to multiple formats at once, saving you the effort of converting files for playback on other devices.

dBpoweramp also includes an audio converter, with batch support for encoding files en masse – very useful if you need copies in a different format for a new device, or your everyday playback files have become lost or damaged.