# Distinguishing between 16 & 24 bit flac files
**URL:** https://community.mp3tag.de/t/distinguishing-between-16-24-bit-flac-files/13069
**Category:** Support
**Created:** [February 8, 2012, 6:57am UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/distinguishing-between-16-24-bit-flac-files/13069 "2012-02-08T06:57:44Z")
**Posts on this page:** 4
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@skypilotpete](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/skypilotpete)
#### Post date: [February 8, 2012, 6:57am UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/distinguishing-between-16-24-bit-flac-files/13069/1 "2012-02-08T06:57:44Z")
Can mp3tag tell me if flac files are 16 or 24 bit? I can't see a column which would show this information. There are a lot of 24 bit flac files going around at the moment, but they cause my Cowon J3 player to crash, so I would like to be able to look at all my flac files quickly to see which ones I need to convert to 16 bit.
I have noticed that all the 24 bit flac files I have come across so far are 96 kHz. I'm very new at this - can I assume that if a flac file is shown as 96 kHz in mp3tag, that means it will be a 24 bit file? And if mp3tag shows it as 44.1 kHz, will it by definition be a 16 bit file?
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### Author:  [@garym](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/garym)
#### Post date: [February 8, 2012, 11:44am UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/distinguishing-between-16-24-bit-flac-files/13069/2 "2012-02-08T11:44:56Z")
not sure, but I've never seen a 96 file that wasn't 24/96 nor a 44.1 file that wasn't 16/44.1. This doesn't mean these are not possible (don't know), but they are certainly unlikely.
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### Author:  [@JJ\_Johnson](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/JJ_Johnson)
#### Post date: [February 9, 2012, 9:52pm UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/distinguishing-between-16-24-bit-flac-files/13069/3 "2012-02-09T21:52:22Z")
It would be nice to have variables in Mp3tag for both bit depth and number of channels. I don't know whether or not %\_mode% is supposed to directly translate into number of channels, as the documentation doesn't list the possible values.
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### Author:  [@system](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/system)
#### Post date: [February 9, 2026, 12:23pm UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/distinguishing-between-16-24-bit-flac-files/13069/4 "2026-02-09T12:23:39Z")