Even in the age of streaming, the MP3 lives on. Even if you're a subscriber to Spotify or a similar service, there's a high chance that you still have folders or drives stuffed full of MP3. Depending on how old these music files are, and where they came from, they may be very well tagged and organised, very badly – or even not at all.
This is the sort of chaos that Mp3tag has a been designed to help out with, and it has been doing so for years for Windows users. Now – years later – it is finally the turn of Mac users.
The app can be used in a variety of ways to automatically apply tags to your music colelciton so you can search it later when you're looking for certain music. You can create tags based on the folder structure you have in place, have the app complete partially entered tags, or perform and online database search and apply whichever tags and formatting you are most comfortable with.
Rules can also be used to change the formatting, wording and number of existing pre-tagged audio files, making it quick and easy to correct mistakes, or make changes to suit your taste. If you find that you're doing the same things over and over again, you can combine tasks into action groups which serve as efficient workflows to help speed things up.
The app can also be used the other way around, using existing tags to rename MP3 files using rules you configure. But, despite the name, Mp3tag is not just limited to working with audio files stored in the MP3 format – it can also handle MP4, M4A, M4V, FLAC, OGG, OPUS, AIF, DSF, MPC and the humble WAV file. There's also support for cover art editing, so you can be sure that you see the correct album art when you're listening to music.
The app is available to buy from the Mac App Store, but there is a trial version available to download separately so you can test drive it before committing to a purchase. While the fact that this is only a seven-day trial may not seem like very long, the developer points out that "only days you’re using the app are counted" – so it's actually quite generous.
Verdict:
It has been a very long time coming, but the Mac version of Mp3tag is finally here. For anyone who has used the Windows version, you already know that this is a great app – for everyone else, you have our assurances. The software makes light work of getting even the largest and most unwieldy of MP3 collections in order, making it worth every penny of the asking price.
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