How to split m4b audiobook files to mp3 with chapters

Although VLC can perfectly handle .m4b audiobook files, I usually prefer to split them to mp3 in a way that each .mp3 file is one chapter of the audiobook.

If you want to do do the same, I highly suggest you to use m4b-tool. You can download the .phar file from the GitHub releases page.

This really nice tool requires php, ffmpeg and mp4v2.

In order to install them in Archlinux, give:

pacman -S php ffmpeg libmp4v2

Now, let’s assume that you have a file named audiobook.m4b and you want to split it. All you have to do is give the following command:

php m4b-tool.phar split --audio-format mp3 --audio-bitrate 96k --audio-channels 1 --audio-samplerate 44100 /path/to/audiobook.m4b	

The resulting mp3 files will be placed under a new directory named audiobook_splitted, on the same location with the **.m4b ** file, while each file name will be based on the following template:

<chapter>-<chapter title>.mp3

ex.

001-This is the first Chapter.mp3