Thinking about converting lossless to AAC QAAC in 160 kbps VBR for on-the-go listening. Any idea about what this quality would be equal to for MP3 LAME bitrate? Any consensus about difference in quality between varying bitrates and file types? E.g. 128, 160, 192, 320...
Sham 69,
You can search for blind tests here MP3 vs AAC.
I found these https://kamedo2.hatenablog.jp/entry/20111029/1319840519
https://hydrogenaud.io/index.php?topic=120007.0
Also You can look into
https://wiki.hydrogenaud.io/index.php?title=Private_Listening_Tests
https://wiki.hydrogenaud.io/index.php?title=Hydrogenaudio_Listening_Tests
Roughly, Take AAC bitrate and add 32k to get Mp3 rate
Aple AAC (qaac) provides at least 64 kbps bitrate reduction.
https://kamedo2.hatenablog.jp/entry/20111029/1319840519
(https://cdn-ak.f.st-hatena.com/images/fotolife/k/kamedo2/20111128/20111128234434.png)
https://hydrogenaud.io/index.php?topic=121579.0
(https://listening-test.coresv.net/img2/IgorC-AACMP3-en2x.png)
Here in the last graph Apple AAC@192kbps crashes everything that MP3 can offer at ~260-320 kbps.
That's +64-128kbps bitrate difference.