Boilsoft Apple Music Converter review: does it actually remove DRM?
Australians have been quietly swapping Spotify for Apple Music over the last few years, drawn by lossless streams and the deep iCloud library hookup. The catch is the same one that has annoyed users from Sydney to Perth since 2009: every downloaded track is wrapped in FairPlay DRM, which means offline playback is locked to the iTunes or Apple Music app that produced it. A handful of utilities promise to lift that wrapper and convert files into portable formats, and Boilsoft has been one of the more persistent names on the list.
The product sits somewhere between a hobbyist project and a polished desktop app. Boilsoft has published media utilities from a small Hong Kong operation since the late 2000s, and its Apple Music tool has been revised often enough to handle the most recent catalog changes Apple has pushed out. For Australians juggling a patchy NBN connection on a regional satellite plan, the appeal is straightforward: rip a playlist once at full quality, then play it back without burning through the monthly data cap every time you leave the house.
This review walks through what the software actually does to FairPlay-protected M4P files, how it behaves on Windows and macOS, where it sits on price in Australian dollars, and how it stacks up against the alternatives still shipping updates. The goal is to give readers in Brisbane, Melbourne, Adelaide and the smaller capitals enough to decide whether it belongs in their audio toolkit.
What the app does and who makes it
Boilsoft's pitch is narrow. The application ingests Apple Music tracks, Audible AA files and iTunes M4P purchases, then rewrites them into standard formats any player can read. There is no streaming aggregator, no YouTube or SoundCloud downloader, and no tag editor beyond what is needed to preserve what Apple already stamps onto each file.
The interface reflects that focus. The main window is a single pane with an Add button, a settings drawer for output format and bitrate, and a Convert button at the bottom. Anyone who has used a desktop converter in the last decade will be comfortable within minutes. There is no learning curve around virtual sound cards, no ASIO configuration, and no subscription wall gating the DRM-stripping function.
Where the app earns its keep is in the boring plumbing. It talks to iTunes or the standalone Apple Music app on Windows, asks for an authorisation token, then re-encodes each track through a local pipeline. Because nothing leaves the machine, there is no upload step and no risk of a library ending up on someone else's server.
How FairPlay removal works under the hood
FairPlay is the encryption layer Apple uses to bind downloaded Apple Music songs to the account that fetched them. The keys live on Apple's servers and are negotiated through the iTunes or Apple Music client at the time of download, which is why a freshly ripped playlist stops working once a subscription lapses. Boilsoft's job is to intercept the decrypted audio as it plays inside the authorised app and re-record it into an unencrypted container before the wrapper seals back over it.
In practice, that means the software has to keep pace with Apple's regular updates. Older versions of any M4P converter tend to break the moment Apple rolls out a new encryption key rotation, and the gap between an Apple update and a converter patch has historically been the main pain point. Boilsoft has been reasonably quick through 2023 and 2024, with patches usually arriving within a few days of major Apple Music client releases.
The output side is more interesting than the cracking side. Once the audio is unencrypted, the app offers MP3, AAC, WAV and FLAC, with bitrates from 128 kbps up to 320 kbps for lossy formats and full sample-rate preservation for the lossless ones. For Australians chasing CD-quality playback through a decent pair of headphones, the FLAC option preserves the original 16-bit/44.1 kHz stream without a second encode pass, which keeps the result audibly identical to the source.
Platform support for Windows and macOS
On Windows, Boilsoft works with both the legacy iTunes application and the newer Apple Music client that Microsoft began bundling through its Store in 2024. The setup wizard detects whichever one is installed and asks for a sign-in so the authorisation handshake can complete. On macOS, the standalone Apple Music app handles its own DRM, and Boilsoft reads from the library folder directly.
This dual-track approach matters because Australian households are often split-platform. A home in Parramatta might run a Windows gaming PC alongside a MacBook, with iPhones and iPads filling the gap and the same Apple ID shared across all of them. Boilsoft is one of the few tools that works consistently across that mix without separate licences for each operating system; a single key activates on up to five machines.
There are caveats worth knowing. The software does not support Linux, which rules out some of the budget-conscious Linux builds popular in Australian home labs. It also does not interface with the Apple Music web player, which means anyone who has shifted entirely to the browser-based experience will need to install the desktop client first.
Comparing Boilsoft with the main M4P alternatives
The competitive set is small. TunFab, NoteBurner, DRmare and a handful of others hold down the Apple Music DRM-removal niche, and Boilsoft sits roughly in the middle of the pack. The breakdown below summarises the headline differences across the apps Australian users are most likely to encounter.
| Feature | Boilsoft | TunFab | NoteBurner | DRmare |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lossless ALAC or FLAC output | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Batch conversion | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Built-in tag editor | Basic | Basic | Basic | Basic |
| macOS support | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Linux support | No | No | No | No |
| Lyrics preservation | Yes | Yes | Partial | Yes |
| Free trial cap | 3 min per track | 1 min per track | 3 min per track | 30-day limit |
| Licence model | Perpetual | Subscription | Subscription | Perpetual |
| Approximate price in AUD | ~$45 | ~$70 per year | ~$75 per year | ~$60 |
For most Australian listeners, the practical differences come down to two things: whether a one-time purchase beats a recurring subscription, and how well the app has kept up with the most recent Apple Music client updates. Boilsoft scores well on the first point and reasonably well on the second.
Output formats and audio fidelity
Lossless handling is the make-or-break feature for anyone moving beyond casual listening. Boilsoft advertises full support for Apple Music's ALAC streams up to 24-bit/192 kHz, and the FLAC output preserves the original bit depth and sample rate rather than resampling on the way through. That distinction matters, since some cheaper converters quietly downsample to 44.1 kHz during the rewrite step.
For lossy formats, the encoder options are reasonable but not outstanding. MP3 uses a competent LAME build at the chosen bitrate, AAC output goes through a QuickTime-derived encoder that does slightly better at low bitrates, and WAV is a bit-perfect PCM dump. There is no built-in normaliser, which is preferable for users who want to apply their own gain staging later.
Metadata handling is generally clean. Track title, artist, album, genre, year, track number, disc number and embedded artwork all carry through. Lyrics downloaded with the Apple Music app are preserved as standard LRC text inside the FLAC and MP3 containers. The one weak spot is composer credits, which occasionally arrive empty when Apple has them stored under a non-standard field.
Speed, batch behaviour and metadata handling
Batch conversion is where Boilsoft earns back the licence fee for anyone with a large library. The app queues files, processes them on multiple cores when available, and reports progress per track rather than for the whole batch. A typical 12-track album in lossless FLAC finishes in around four to five minutes on a mid-range desktop, in line with what the more reputable rivals manage.
Where it lags is in very large batch handling. Drop a 5,000-track library onto the queue and the app will process it, but the memory footprint creeps upward and the progress display becomes sluggish after the first few hundred files. Splitting the queue into smaller chunks avoids this, and the app includes an option to limit the number of files processed in a single session.
The ID tag editor is minimal. There is no batch-rename based on a pattern, no disc-number renaming, and no support for the more obscure tags that archivists care about. Users who want to massage their tags before playback will need to run the output through something like Mp3tag or MusicBrainz Picard afterwards, which is a workflow gap rather than a deal-breaker for most listeners.
Pricing, licensing and Australian consumer angles
Boilsoft sells the Apple Music Converter through its own website and through a handful of software download portals, with a perpetual licence rather than a subscription. The current asking price works out to roughly the cost of a mid-range dinner for two in Melbourne, with seasonal discounts that bring it closer to a casual takeaway meal. A free trial is available, but it caps output at the first three minutes of each track, enough to verify compatibility but not enough to evaluate an entire album.
The licence is straightforward: one key, up to five computers, lifetime updates within the major version line. Australian Consumer Law, which the ACCC enforces with some bite, treats software purchases under the same guarantees as physical goods, so users who find the software defective within a reasonable period are entitled to a repair, replacement or refund through the Australian distributor if one exists.
One practical note for Australians weighing a purchase: paying with an Australian-issued card sometimes triggers an overseas transaction fee, and PayPal purchases are billed in US dollars by default. The company has begun accepting AUD at checkout for direct purchases, which sidesteps the conversion cost and is worth checking before completing the order.
Strengths worth noting:
- Perpetual licence with no recurring fee
- Reliable handling of lossless ALAC and FLAC streams
- Clean metadata transfer including artwork and lyrics
- Works across Windows and macOS without separate licences
Weaknesses to weigh against the price:
- No built-in tag editor beyond basic preservation
- Memory creep when processing libraries larger than a few hundred files
- No Linux support for users running non-Apple desktops
- Trial version caps output at three minutes per track
Boilsoft's Apple Music Converter delivers what it claims: a local pipeline that strips FairPlay DRM from downloaded tracks and rewrites them into standard formats. For Australians who want a one-time purchase over a yearly subscription, and who do most of their listening through iTunes or the standalone Apple Music app on Windows or macOS, the value proposition holds up well.
Head over to the Vstpirate software directory to compare current pricing across the major Apple Music converters and grab the official download link for Boilsoft's tool. The listing includes version history, feature notes and licence terms in plain English, which makes it easy to decide whether the app fits your setup before committing to a purchase.