HACKER Q&A
📣 segasaturn

What's the best MP3 player I can buy today?


I'm looking to buy an MP3 player. My reason for not using my phone as an MP3 player is that there simply aren't any good MP3 player apps on the iOS App Store. Everything either a streaming app, or "free with ads".

Criteria isn't strict, but no devices that are just an Android with the cellular modem taken out, which I see a lot of listings for. Rockbox support is preferred but I've had no luck finding anything in their supported devices list that's not an iPod, used or new. I'll probably get a used iPod if nobody has an alternative recommendation.

  👤 beretguy Accepted Answer ✓
Sandisk used to offer basic old-school mp3 players but looks like they shut them down. Can still find used on Amazon/ebay.

iOS has KMPlayer which was good the last time I used it: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/kmplayer/id835776444

Also Plexamp if you want to use Plex.

Walmart has a big selection of mp3 players: https://www.walmart.com/search?q=mp3%20player&typeahead=mp3%... However, i was not able to find good enough one that I would recommend. You can try searching yourself.

I personally use Plexamp and Musi.

👤 NaOH
I've long used old iPhones as MP3 players and have been quite happy with the US $3 app Cs Music Pro. I would prefer an actual MP3 players with hardware controls, but I haven't found one and it's hard for me to justify the price difference for a dedicated device.

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/cs-music-pro/id924491991

👤 WheelsAtLarge
I got 2 of these cheap mp3 headphones with a sd card slot. One charges while the other is in use. The charge is usually good for a few hours. I have a few SD cards with my playlists that I insert on the headphones as desired. They also have Bluetooth capabilities which is a plus. The FM function is mostly useless for me. It's a bit primitive but it works for me. I have no need to pay monthlies and don't care if there's an internet connection. Plus, I don't have to carry additional hardware.

BS19C Bluetooth-Compatible Headset Sports Music Headphone TF Slot FM Radio

https://www.ebay.com/itm/364453819724

👤 accrual
I've been out of the loop on MP3 players for a while, but when I was in the scene I really liked FiiO's products, e.g.:

https://www.fiio.com/m11s

iPods are still a really awesome device for pure music listening in my opinion. There are a lot of mod options to bring high-capacity modern storage to them, even Bluetooth and haptics. Lots of good info in the sub:

https://old.reddit.com/r/ipod/

👤 Two4
The VLC media player app is pretty decent - not the best UI ever, but it's pretty good for what it is. It'll play almost any audio file you throw at it, plus most video files to boot. On iOS it's easiest to load media via the local webserver it runs for exactly that purpose, as apps are quite ringfenced when it comes to accessing data.
👤 talldayo
Posts like this make me so sad. There are dozens of open-source and excellent MP3 players on Android but people apparently can't have the same on iOS because Apple refuses to accept sideloading.

What an absolutely abominable state of personal computing.

👤 999900000999
This is literally a phone, but it comes with 2 headphone jacks.

https://moondroplab.com/en/products/miad01

👤 Suppafly
>My reason for not using my phone as an MP3 player is that there simply aren't any good MP3 player apps on the iOS App Store.

Don't they have itunes? Or is it not good?

👤 firecall
Plex Amp is actually a very good player app!

You need to run a Plex server I believe.

But is great and works like you want an MP3 player to work!