A subband coding system for high quality digital audio signals is described. To achieve low bit rates at a high quality level, it exploits the simultaneous masking effect of the human ear. It is shown how this effect can be used in an adaptive bit-allocation scheme. The proposed approach has been applied in two coding systems, a complex system in which signal is split into 26 subbands, each approximately one third of an octave wide, and a simpler 20-band system. Both systems have been designed for coding stereophonic 16-bit compact disk signals with a sampling frequency of 44.1 kHz. With the 26-band system high-quality results can be obtained at bit rates of 220 kb/s. With the 20-band system, similar results can be obtained at bit rates of 360 kb/s
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