Extract text from XML playlist files (XSPF)
To convert XSPF playlists to another format, you need VLC media player or other Data software.
To convert other file formats to the "XML Media Playlist" file type, you need software like VLC media player or a similar tool.
The .XSPF file format is an XML Shareable Playlist Format created by the Xiph.Org Foundation. It is an open, non-proprietary format used to organize lists of multimedia files for playback. Popular software like VLC media player uses these files to save and load media stream outputs and playlists.
The primary disadvantage of the .XSPF format is its strict XML structure, which is not supported by many older hardware media players, car audio systems, or legacy software like older versions of Windows Media Player. Furthermore, users often mistakenly believe an .XSPF file contains the actual audio or video data. It does not. It only contains text strings pointing to the file locations (URLs or local directory paths). If you move the media files or share the .XSPF file without the corresponding media, the playlist breaks.
To ensure broader compatibility, you often need to convert .XSPF files into older, widely adopted formats like M3U, M3U8, or PLS. While parsing strict XML can sometimes be challenging for basic text tools, the extraction of paths is straightforward. Standard online converters sometimes fail to process these if they misinterpret the file as media rather than text.
Convert.Guru analyzes your XSPF file, detects the exact format, and lets you read the text inside.
Users also converted VLC, MP3, M3U, MP4, XPSF, M4A, PDF, M3U8, ZIP, WAV, MRL, IFO and TXT files.
If you want to convert XSPF file to MP4, MP3, M3U, M3U8, MOV, WAV, AAC, FLAC, OGG, WMA, M4A or AIFF, you can use VLC media player or similar software from the "Media Playlist Storage" category. In the File menu, look for Save As… or Export….
To convert MIDI, AAC, TTA, AU, WV, DTS, MID, FLAC, RA, MP3, PCM or WAV files to XSPF, try VLC media player or another comparable tool in the "Media Playlist Storage" category.
The history of Convert.Guru began over 25 years ago in California with Tom Simondi’s file-format database. A former contributor to Space Shuttle development and a software pioneer of the 1980s, Simondi established a trusted resource for file type analysis that was even referenced by Microsoft Windows XP. Today, we use modern technology to process and convert thousands of file formats while continually improving our XSPF converter.