Audio
In digital audio the most common sampling rates are 44.1 kHz, 48 kHz, 96 kHz and 192 kHz.
The Audio Engineering Society recommends 48 kHz sample rate for most applications but gives recognition to 44.1 kHz for Compact Disc and other consumer uses, 32 kHz for transmission-related application and 96 kHz for higher bandwidth or relaxed anti-aliasing filtering.
A common frequency in computer sound cards is 48 kHz – many work at only this frequency, offering the use of other sample rates only through resampling. The earliest add-in cards ran at 22 kHz. High-end audio equipment, such as in SACD or DVD-Audio players or studio equipment, can reach as high as 192 kHz.
A more complete list of common audio sample rates is:
| Sampling rate | Use |
|---|---|
| 8,000 Hz | Telephone and encrypted walkie-talkie, wireless intercom and wireless microphone transmission; adequate for human speech but without sibilance; ess sounds like eff (/s/, /f/). |
| 11,025 Hz | One quarter the sampling rate of audio CDs; used for lower-quality PCM, MPEG audio and for audio analysis of subwoofer bandpasses. |
| 16,000 Hz | Wideband frequency extension over standard telephone narrowband 8,000 Hz. Used in most modern VoIP and VVoIP communication products. |
| 22,050 Hz | One half the sampling rate of audio CDs; used for lower-quality PCM and MPEG audio and for audio analysis of low frequency energy. Suitable for digitizing early 20th century audio formats such as 78s. |
| 32,000 Hz | miniDV digital video camcorder, video tapes with extra channels of audio (e.g. DVCAM with 4 Channels of audio), DAT (LP mode), Germany's Digitales Satellitenradio, NICAM digital audio, used alongside analogue television sound in some countries. High-quality digital wireless microphones. Suitable for digitizing FM radio. |
| 44,056 Hz | Used by digital audio locked to NTSC color video signals (245 lines by 3 samples by 59.94 fields per second = 29.97 frames per second). |
| 44,100 Hz | Audio CD, also most commonly used with MPEG-1 audio (VCD, SVCD, MP3). Originally chosen by Sony because it could be recorded on modified video equipment running at either 25 frames per second (PAL) or 30 frame/s (using an NTSC monochrome video recorder) and cover the 20 kHz bandwidth thought necessary to match professional analog recording equipment of the time. A PCM adaptor would fit digital audio samples into the analog video channel of, for example, PAL video tapes using 588 lines by 3 samples by 25 frames per second. Much pro audio gear uses (or is able to select) 44.1 kHz sampling, including mixers, EQs, compressors, reverb, crossovers, recording devices and CD-quality encrypted wireless microphones. |
| 47,250 Hz | world's first commercial PCM sound recorder by Nippon Columbia (Denon) |
| 48,000 Hz | The standard audio sampling rate used by professional digital video equipment such as tape recorders, video servers, vision mixers and so on. This rate was chosen because it could deliver a 22 kHz frequency response and work with 29.97 frames per second NTSC video - as well as 25 frame/s, 30 frame/s and 24 frame/s systems. With 29.97 frame/s systems it is necessary to handle 1601.6 audio samples per frame delivering an integer number of audio samples only every fifth video frame. Also used for sound with consumer video formats like DV, digital TV, DVD, and films. The professional Serial Digital Interface (SDI) and High-definition Serial Digital Interface (HD-SDI) used to connect broadcast television equipment together uses this audio sampling frequency. Much professional audio gear uses (or is able to select) 48 kHz sampling, including mixers, EQs, compressors, reverb, crossovers and recording devices such as DAT. |
| 50,000 Hz | First commercial digital audio recorders from the late 70s from 3M and Soundstream. |
| 50,400 Hz | Sampling rate used by the Mitsubishi X-80 digital audio recorder. |
| 88,200 Hz | Sampling rate used by some professional recording equipment when the destination is CD (multiples of 44,100 Hz). Some pro audio gear uses (or is able to select) 88.2 kHz sampling, including mixers, EQs, compressors, reverb, crossovers and recording devices. |
| 96,000 Hz | DVD-Audio, some LPCM DVD tracks, BD-ROM (Blu-ray Disc) audio tracks, HD DVD (High-Definition DVD) audio tracks. Most pro audio gear uses (or is able to select) 96 kHz sampling, including mixers, EQs, compressors, reverb, crossovers and recording devices. This sampling frequency is twice the 48 kHz standard commonly used with audio on professional video equipment. |
| 176,400 Hz | Sampling rate used by HDCD recorders and other professional applications for CD production. |
| 192,000 Hz | DVD-Audio, some LPCM DVD tracks, BD-ROM (Blu-ray Disc) audio tracks, and HD DVD (High-Definition DVD) audio tracks, High-Definition audio recording devices and audio editing software. This sampling frequency is four times the 48 kHz standard commonly used with audio on professional video equipment. |
| 352,800 Hz | Digital eXtreme Definition, used for recording and editing Super Audio CDs, as 1-bit DSD is not suited for editing. Eight times the frequency of 44.1 kHz. |
| 2,822,400 Hz | SACD, 1-bit delta-sigma modulation process known as Direct Stream Digital, co-developed by Sony and Philips. |
| 5,644,800 Hz | Double-Rate DSD, 1-bit Direct Stream Digital at 2x the rate of the SACD. Used in some professional DSD recorders. |
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