Audio Calculators
Audio Bitrate Calculator
Calculate uncompressed PCM audio bitrate from sample rate, bit depth, and channel count, with reference bitrates for CD, studio, and hi-res formats compared.
Audio File Size Calculator
Estimate audio file size for uncompressed PCM or bitrate-based compressed formats from duration, with example sizes for WAV and MP3 at common settings.
BPM Tap Tempo Calculator
Determine a song's exact tempo in beats per minute from the number of taps and elapsed time, with typical BPM ranges for common music genres included.
Decibel Calculator
Convert between power or voltage ratios and decibels in either direction, with reference values for doubling power (+3 dB) and voltage (+6 dB) explained.
Frequency Wavelength Calculator
Convert between sound frequency and wavelength at any air temperature, with a reference table spanning the full audible range from 20 Hz to 20 kHz shown.
Reverb Time Calculator
Calculate RT60 reverberation time using either the Sabine or Eyring equation, with an explanation of when each formula gives a more accurate estimate.
Room Acoustics Calculator
Estimate a room's RT60 reverberation time from its dimensions and average absorption coefficient using the Sabine equation, with a full worked example shown.
Speaker Impedance Calculator
Find total speaker impedance for series or parallel wiring configurations, with a reference table of common speaker pairing combinations and their totals.
Speaker Wire Gauge Calculator
Find the minimum speaker wire gauge needed to keep power loss under a target percentage for a given run distance and impedance, with a copper resistance table.
Subwoofer Box Volume Calculator
Convert internal or external subwoofer enclosure dimensions into internal air volume in cubic feet, accounting for panel wall thickness on external builds.
The Math Between a Good System and a Damaged One
Audio systems fail in specific, predictable ways when the numbers are wrong — wire gauge too thin for the run length wastes power as heat, speaker impedance mismatched to an amplifier risks damaging both, and a subwoofer box volume off from the driver's specification kills the bass response it was designed to produce. These calculators work through the electrical and acoustic formulas that keep a build safe and sounding right.
Popular Audio Calculators
Ten tools cover electronics, encoding, and room acoustics:
- Speaker Wire Gauge Calculator — matches wire thickness to run length and impedance to keep power loss low.
- Subwoofer Box Volume Calculator — sizes an enclosure to the driver's Thiele-Small parameters for accurate bass response.
- Decibel Calculator — converts between decibel levels and actual power or intensity ratios.
- Audio Bitrate Calculator — estimates file size and quality tradeoffs for a given sample rate and bit depth.
- Room Acoustics Calculator — estimates reverberation and reflection behavior from room dimensions and surface materials.
Why Decibels Don't Add Up the Way You'd Expect
The decibel scale is logarithmic, not linear, which is why doubling perceived loudness takes roughly a 10 dB increase rather than doubling the raw number, and why two speakers each producing 90 dB together produce about 93 dB, not 180 dB. Speaker impedance works similarly against intuition: wiring speakers in parallel lowers total impedance and can overdrive an amplifier not rated for the load, while wiring in series raises it and can starve the speakers of power — getting the wiring topology right matters as much as picking the right wire gauge.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does thicker speaker wire always sound better?
Not for its own sake — thicker gauge only matters when the run is long or impedance is low enough that resistive loss becomes significant; for short runs at 8 ohms, standard gauge is usually fine.
Why does a subwoofer box need a specific volume rather than "bigger is better"?
Each driver has Thiele-Small parameters tuned to a particular enclosure volume; too large or too small changes the box's resonant frequency and can produce boomy or weak bass instead of the intended response.
Explore More
Working on video or streaming setups too? See the Video Calculators, or dig into the underlying wave physics with the Physics Calculators.