ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5

Audio signal

Hey there! So, you know how when you listen to music or when you hear people talking, the sound comes out of a speaker or from your headphones? Well, that sound is called an audio signal!

Now, let's pretend that you are a tiny little person inside your device (like a phone or computer) and you can hear everything that's going on inside of it. When someone plays music or speaks into a microphone, the sound waves get converted into electrical signals that travel through wires or circuits inside the device.

These electrical signals then cause changes in the voltage or current that is flowing through the device, and these changes represent the different sounds and pitches that make up the audio signal.

Finally, these electrical changes get sent to the speaker or headphones, which use magnets and coils to turn the electrical signals back into sound waves that your ears can hear!

So essentially, an audio signal is just a fancy way of talking about the electrical signals that represent sound waves and allow us to hear music and voices through our devices. Pretty cool, huh?