How to read Audio File into Vector?

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dieter alfred
dieter alfred on 15 Jul 2020
Commented: Walter Roberson on 29 Dec 2025 at 20:52
Hello, I have to read a Audio File (.wav) into a vector.
I know how to plot it:
info = audioinfo('sound.wav');
[y, Fs] = audioread('sound.wav');
t = 0:1/Fs:info.Duration;
t = t(1:end-1);
plot(t,y);
xlabel('Time');
ylabel('Audio Signal');
But this Sript does not read the Audio into a Vector.
I also tried to read every single Sample, but this is to complex and I get error after error. Is there a simple way to do this?
  2 Comments
Cris LaPierre
Cris LaPierre on 15 Jul 2020
It would be helpful if you could share the error messages as well as your sound.wav file.
dieter alfred
dieter alfred on 15 Jul 2020
Sorry, I cannot upload the file, because the forum doesnt accept the .wav filetype. And I have already deleted the code with the error messages. But next time I will upload everything.

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Accepted Answer

Sugar Daddy
Sugar Daddy on 15 Jul 2020
Edited: Sugar Daddy on 15 Jul 2020
[y, Fs] = audioread('sound.wav');
sound_duration = length(y)/Fs;
t = 0:1/Fs:sound_duration;
t = t(1:end-1);
%%
soundsc(y,Fs);
%%
plot(t,y);
xlabel('Time');
ylabel('Audio Signal');
  3 Comments
bob bob
bob bob on 21 Dec 2024
Any idea on how to reduce the # of points? I am trying to get the SVG to use in a graphic design setting so I will be altering the shape more in Illustrator but I would like to reduce the point by quite a bit
Walter Roberson
Walter Roberson on 29 Dec 2025 at 20:52
I suggest using resample
If you do not have the Signal Processing Toolbox, then you could instead try using imresize

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More Answers (1)

Walter Roberson
Walter Roberson on 29 Dec 2025 at 20:49
An audio file would not be read into a vector in the case where the audio file had multiple channels.
%approach #1
[y, Fs] = audioread('sound.wav');
y = y(:,1); %take the left channel only
t = (0:length(y)-1)/Fs;
%approach #2
[y, Fs] = audioread('sound.wav');
y = mean(y,2); %average all channels
t = (0:length(y)-1)/Fs;
Note that the code
t = 0:1/Fs:info.Duration;
t = t(1:end-1);
could result in a time vector that was one element too long or too short because of round-off errors in accumulating the 1/Fs in the colon operation.

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