How to Play multiple audio files simultaneously

Question

how to Play numbers Of audio files at same time With AVAudioPlayer? Is it Possible to Play numbers Of audio files can play at same time using AVAudioPlayer? or any other way to play numbers of audio files at same time ? Thank You!

Answer 1

Files with below formats can be played simultaneously on iPhone.

AAC, MP3, and ALAC (Apple Lossless) audio: have CPU resource concern. Linear PCM and IMA/ADPCM (IMA4 audio): without CPU resource concerns.

You just need to create a new player instance for every music file, that you want to play.

Sample Code snippet:

-(void)playSounds{
    [self playSound1];
    [self playSound2];
}

-(void)playSound1{
    NSString *path = [[NSBundle mainBundle] pathForResource:@"file1" 
                                                      ofType:@"m4a"];  
    AVAudioPlayer* player= [[AVAudioPlayer alloc] initWithContentsOfURL:
                                                 [NSURL fileURLWithPath:path]
                                                                  error:NULL];  
    player.delegate = self;  
    [player play];
}

-(void)playSound2{
     SString *path = [[NSBundle mainBundle] pathForResource:@"file2" 
                                                      ofType:@"m4a"];  
    AVAudioPlayer* player= [[AVAudioPlayer alloc] initWithContentsOfURL:
                                                 [NSURL fileURLWithPath:path]
                                                                  error:NULL];  
    player.delegate = self;  
    [player play];
}

Convert to supported format (i.e. mp3 to caf):

/usr/bin/afconvert -f caff -d ima4 sound.mp3 sound.caf

Detailed tutorial:

https://brainwashinc.wordpress.com/2009/08/14/iphone-playing-2-sounds-at-once/

Answer 2

Swift 2+ Solution

-> Now you can play multiple sounds simultaneously with mp3 or m4a suffix. However, if you want to convert mp3 to m4a you can download this free program from official website: http://audacityteam.org/download/mac/

Also you may need FFmpeg 2+ to convert process: http://lame.buanzo.org/#lameosxdl

-> I prefer to use m4a because, in short it is Apple's own audio format.

//import AVFoundation

  // you have to define them first
  var player1 = AVAudioPlayer()
  var player2 = AVAudioPlayer()

  func playMultipleSound() {
    playSound1()
    playSound2()
  }

  func playSound1() {
    let soundUrl = NSBundle.mainBundle().URLForResource("sound1", withExtension: "mp3")! // or m4a

    do {
      try AVAudioSession.sharedInstance().setCategory(AVAudioSessionCategoryAmbient)
      try AVAudioSession.sharedInstance().setActive(true)

      player1 = try AVAudioPlayer(contentsOfURL: soundUrl)
      player1.numberOfLoops = 0
      player1.prepareToPlay()
      player1.play()
    } catch _ {
      return print("sound file not found")
    }
  }

  func playSound2() {
    let soundUrl = NSBundle.mainBundle().URLForResource("sound2", withExtension: "m4a")! // or mp3

    do {
      try AVAudioSession.sharedInstance().setCategory(AVAudioSessionCategoryAmbient)
      try AVAudioSession.sharedInstance().setActive(true)

      player2 = try AVAudioPlayer(contentsOfURL: soundUrl)
      player2.numberOfLoops = 0
      player2.prepareToPlay()
      player2.play()
    } catch _ {
      return print("sound file not found")
    }
  }

The only official filename extension for MPEG-4 Part 14 files is .mp4, but many have other extensions, most commonly .m4a and .m4p. M4A (audio only) is often compressed using AAC encoding (lossy), but can also be in Apple Lossless format.