This process is called compression, and it involves using some fancy algorithms to remove any unnecessary information from the audio while still preserving its quality as much as possible.

Here’s how it works: first, we take our original audio signal (which might be a song or a podcast episode) and break it down into tiny little pieces called “frames”. Each frame represents a small segment of sound that lasts for about 10 milliseconds. We then apply some mathematical magic to these frames in order to remove any redundant information, which is basically anything that doesn’t contribute to the overall quality of the audio signal.

For example, let’s say we have two consecutive frames that are almost identical (like a long stretch of silence or a repeated note). Instead of storing both frames separately, we can just store one frame and then use some fancy math to generate the other frame based on the first one. This is called “frame skipping”, and it’s a common technique used in audio compression algorithms like MP3 (which stands for MPEG Audio Layer 3).

Another way that we can remove redundant information from our frames is by using something called “perceptual coding”. Basically, this involves analyzing the human ear to figure out which sounds are most important and which ones can be safely removed without affecting the overall quality of the audio signal. For example, if there’s a loud explosion in the middle of a song, we might choose to prioritize that sound over some background noise or subtle details that aren’t as important.

Once we’ve applied all these fancy algorithms and removed any unnecessary information from our frames, we can then combine them back together into a new audio signal that is much smaller than the original one! This process is called “reconstruction”, and it involves using some more math to generate a new set of sound waves based on the compressed data.

Of course, this is just a simplified explanation (and I left out all the technical details), but hopefully it gives you an idea of what goes into creating high-quality audio signals without taking up too much storage space on your devices.