SanDisk Clip Jam 8GB MP3 player - Black

Product Information

This ultra-small, wearable music player offers 8GB 3 storage, and comes with a built-in microSD™ card slot 4 so you can add even more songs or audiobooks. Where the NW-A306 is let down is not in its music-playing skill, but slight niggles with its all round usability. During our testing, we found that the menu could be a little unresponsive, the battery longevity would vary and it surprisingly sounded like it struggled when playing a standard 128kbps audio file, which all together let down our all-round experience just a tad (well, by half a star to be exact). But there’s no denying that the positives vastly outweigh the negatives here. As the name suggests, Lossless Audio doesn't sacrifice any of the musical information: the successors to the WAV format used in CDs, which is also lossless, use more advanced technology to take the audio information and make the file smaller without compromising on quality. There are several versions of Lossless Audio including Apple Lossless, FLAC and WMA Lossless, and as you'll see from our guide above you'll often find that the best MP3 players support at least some of those formats.

The player is built with a full version of Android, complete with Wi-Fi connectivity and the Google Play Store, which results in it being kind of like an Android version of the iPod touch, able to do much more than just play music. However, the Onkyo DP-X1A is built for super-high-quality audio, and it's an absolute dream. It supports a range of music formats, including FLAC, OGG, WAV, MP3, ALAC, and more. In terms of hardware, the device has two chipsets, one to power the overall device, and one to handle the DAC and amplifier – resulting in a noise-free experience.

The best MP3 players

It’s almost 10 years since iBasso developed the world’s first high-resolution Android portable music player (24bit/192kHz, numbers fans), and it’s been honing its range of players ever since. So by rights the new DX160 should represent the state of the midrange PMP art. You don’t have to listen long, hard, or through especially accomplished headphones to realise the M11S is the real deal. In every meaningful music-making respect, it has skills – and in some areas, it’s a genuine expert. If you’re looking for something to keep you company on long journeys, we’d opt for something with a longer battery life that also has more storage space. The Sony NW-E394 below should last you 35 hours, while three of the devices on this list come with a microSD slot for you to expand the amount of storage to accommodate even the largest of music collections. Can I use my MP3 player to stream music? At this price the M11 Pro couldn’t be described as a bargain. But everything’s relative, of course - and if you consider the FiiO’s painstaking specification, premium materials, bank-vault construction and beautifully realised interface, you might consider the asking price could be worse.

Although it hasn't been shouted about, four new and quite different-sounding DAC filters are also onboard, which will work if listening in 24-bit/192kHz or less PCM (although they won't work in MQA and DSD formats) and they certainly add value and scope for customization at the level. If your budget stretches to this player and not a penny more, you won't be disappointed.

Thank you!

Some people enjoy listening to MP3 players when they work out, so they don't have their phone with them. Whether that's also to keep calls and messages at bay or keep their phone safe. Speaking of phones, you may find the touchscreen to be a little sluggish, compared to what you’re used to, but with some patience, it’s easy enough to navigate for anyone familiar with the Android launcher. If you can overlook these minor flaws, the Sony NW-A306 is more than worthy of the Walkman legacy and a great way to enjoy your favourite music. And there's style to match the substance, with manufacturers also competing on design to deliver players that look as good as they sound. Fan of brutalist architecture? Astell & Kern is the name for you. Something a bit more colorful? See SanDisk or Sony. Want something about the size of a matchbox? Cowon's Plenue D3 is the one – see them all in our guide above. Why do people still use MP3 players? For many people the convenience of MP3 –you can fit more into your device's storage, streaming uses less mobile data and you don't need a really good internet connection – outweighs the loss of sound, especially if you're listening on the move. But MP3 is a fairly old tech now, and there are better options: Lossless Audio and Hi-Res Audio.

The Sony Walkman has long been a staple of the MP3 player market, and this latest model keeps the brand firmly in the game. The Sony NW-A306 is a remarkably petite and light device, but still capable of putting out powerful, authoritative audio with a wealth of detail. We make sure to test each product against its chief competitors too, so you can be sure that if we say so, the product is the best bet for the money. We live with these players for well over a week and run them in religiously so that the components have 'bedded in' before we commence our tests, and we don't finalize our testing until we are certain of the sound quality. Another reason is that not everything you might want to listen to is available on the various streaming services –and not everything that's there today might be there tomorrow, because songs and even artists come and go. By synchronising an MP3 player with your desktop music collection you can always be sure that you can hear what you want to hear. A big bonus for many people is that with your own music collection, you don't need to pay a monthly subscription to listen to it, or to listen to it without advertising. If you want to listen beyond your own music collection, don’t worry. The SE180 is equipped with Wi-Fi connectivity and supports a wide range of high-quality streaming services. Some, like Tidal and Deezer, are included out of the box, but you can install many Android music streaming apps via A&K’s Open APP Service. The SanDisk Clip Jam™ mp3 player comes with user-friendly navigation. The one-inch screen is bright and easy to see and the buttons are big enough for all sizes of fingers to use with confidence. The result is, you always know where you are and what you’re hearing.If you pair one of the devices in this buying guide with a set of the best headphones you’ve got the ultimate in premium, portable music: high-quality music that you can take on your travels. The MP3 file format, which played a significant role in the popularity of devices like the iPod, has been officially discontinued. This decision was made by the Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits, who stopped providing licenses for MP3 technology. The discontinuation is due to the emergence of more advanced audio formats that have rendered the MP3 obsolete. 4. Is MP3 being phased out?