The basic MP3 decoding and encoding technology is patent-free in the European Union, all patents having expired there by 2012 at the latest. In the United States, the technology became substantially patent-free on 16 April 2017 (see below).

With the expiration of US Patent 5,812,672 on 22 September 2015, both encoding and decoding of MP3 (MPEG-1 Audio Layer III) are probably patent-free in the United States. In most other countries it already was patent free.

2007年2月26日 · Of the twenty patents listed there, eighteen are filed in the U.S., to which this list is limited. These are the patents that everyone who makes an MP3-related product has licensed. We’ll get to those. First though, here are the Alcatel-Lucent patents that Microsoft was found guilty of …

2025年2月8日 · In a world with super fast Internet speeds and the abstracting away of music formats behind streaming services, few people still care about MP3. The last patents for the MP3 format expired in...

2017年5月18日 · mp3 is alive and kicking, and has children and grandkids now. The mp3 licensing royalties played a notable role in Fraunhofer IIS’ ability to drive research and the development of new audio technologies, which went on to become de facto standards in the areas of streaming, digital radio, TV and mobile communications.

They now control a portfolio of 18 patents related to MP3, and one for Mp3Pro. This portfolio is very extensive, and cover various aspects of MP3 encoding. Some of those patents could be avoided in an MP3 implementation by either not using several features of the standard, or by using different algorithms than those specified.

MP3 Patents Based on http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2008/7/18/232618/312 which in turn is based on: http://www.tunequest.org/a-big-list-of-mp3-patents/20070226/ http ...

On April 23, 2017, Technicolor’s mp3 licensing program for certain mp3 related patents and software of Technicolor and Fraunhofer IIS has been terminated. We thank all of our licensees for their great support in making mp3 the defacto audio …

MP3 is a highly compressed audio format. It is the de facto standard for audio distribution online, as well as the most-supported format for digital audio players. The MPEG-LA group and Sisvel (Philips) prevent developers from adding MP3 support to …

France Telecom, Telediffusion De France, Philips Electronics, and IRT - Institut fur Rundfunktechnik (the Research and Development laboratory of the German speaking Broadcasters) developed essential parts of the MP3 technology and patented them.