Editing FLAC (section)

=== Compression ===
The amount of compression is determined by various parameters, including the order of the linear prediction model and the block size. Regardless of the amount of compression, the original data can always be reconstructed perfectly.

For the user's convenience, the reference implementation defines 9 compression levels, which are [[default (computer science)|presets]] of the more technical parameters to the encoding algorithm. The levels are labeled from 0 to 8, with higher numbers resulting in a higher compression ratio, at the cost of compression speed. The meaning of each compression level varies by implementation.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.cuetools.net/wiki/CUETools_FLAC_encoders_comparison |title=CUETools FLAC encoders comparison |website=CUETools Wiki |access-date=27 May 2013}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://wiki.jriver.com/index.php/Encoding_Settings |title=Encoding Settings |website=JRiver Media Centre |access-date=27 May 2013}}</ref>

FLAC is optimized for decoding speed at the expense of encoding speed. A benchmark has shown that, while there is little variation in decoding speed as compression level increases, beyond the default compression level 5, the encoding process takes up considerably more time with little space saved compared to level 5.<ref>{{cite web |title=Lossless Codec Comparison |url=http://synthetic-soul.co.uk/comparison/lossless/index.asp |website=Synthetic-soul.co.uk |access-date=26 November 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090202063734/http://synthetic-soul.co.uk/comparison/lossless/index.asp |archive-date=2 February 2009 |url-status=dead }}</ref>