How to create and set a custom ringtone for your iPhone

Important: This post is satirical. If you have reached this page from a web search on how to do this, I’m really sorry, but the TL:DR is that - ludicrously - you can’t do it without installing additional software. The only ringtones you can set in iOS by default, other than ones that already come with the phone, are ones that you have purchased in Apple’s store. Some people online seem to have had success with importing their file into the GarageBand app and then setting as the ringtone from there, but I haven’t tried this so I can’t vouch for it.

Since the dawn of time, instructional articles have been published with entirely superfluous introductory paragraphs. These often contain a sentence or two suggesting why a reader might wish to follow the given advice, but this is almost never necessary: someone who has looked up an article about how to perform a specific task is probably already convinced of the merits of doing so. Indeed, you probably already know that, for as long as mobile phones have existed, people have sought to express themselves through their choices of ringtones. You may yourself be wondering how you can customise the sounds your mobile computing devices produce.

This sort of verbiage, which makes the article longer but no more useful, is annoying to readers. In this case, though, the point is moot, as the article was entirely useless to begin with, but the joke is quickly ceasing to be funny by this point (if it ever was), so I will move on.

Step 1: create or download your ringtone

There are many sites online that allow you to download audio files. Alternatively, Audacity, any DAW, or really any other software that outputs audio will do.

Step 2: plug your iPhone into your computer

This step isn’t necessary (see next paragraph), but if you are unfamiliar with iOS devices, it is probably what you will try. To do this, you’ll need a Lighting to USB cable.

Step 3: attempt to copy your ringtone to your iPhone

Open the iPhone in the file manager on your computer and drag and drop the file from wherever you saved it. Notice that this doesn’t work. Try right-clicking the ringtone, selecting “Copy”, right-clicking in the iPhone’s directory and clicking “Paste”. Notice that this also doesn’t work. Try it again. Realise that the iPhone is, for some ridiculous reason, presenting itself to the computer as a digital camera and not a storage medium, so you can only import images from it and not copy anything onto it.

You really thought you could just plug your phone in and copy the files across? Of course not. That makes too much sense for us here at Apple.

Step 4: unplug your iPhone from your computer

Well, that was a colossal waste of time, wasn’t it.

Step 5: attempt to send your ringtone to your iPhone by Bluetooth

Pair your laptop with your iPhone by Bluetooth. Initiate a Bluetooth transfer from your laptop. Observe that this doesn’t work. Realise that your iPhone thinks your laptop is a Bluetooth headset. Yes, for some reason, despite having Bluetooth hardware, iOS can’t handle Bluetooth file transfers.

Step 6: just email the ringtone file to yourself

Yes, I know that’s straight out of the early 2000s. But at least it works.

Step 7: open the mail client on your iPhone and save the file

This is fairly straightforward. Just long-press the attachment and click on “Save to Files”, then select somewhere to save it.

That bit, at least, seems to work.

Step 8: attempt to set the ringtone from the settings

Go to the Sounds section in the settings app and choose the ringtone you would like to change. Scroll through the list and observe that there is no option here to set the ringtone from a file.

Scroll through again, very slowly, to make sure you haven’t missed anything. No, the option really isn’t here.

Step 9: attempt to set the ringtone from the file manager

In the Files app, navigate to wherever you saved the ringtone. Long-press the ringtone file to bring up a list of relevant options. Note that none of these actually let you set the file as a ringtone.

In the absence of anything else to try, click “share” and see if that helps. (It doesn’t).

Step 10: Google

Search for information about this issue and skim-read some forum posts. See references to an Apple-specific format for ringtones called m4r.

Yes, for some reason, iPhones only support ringtones in a specific, non-standard format, so you’ll need to convert to that.

Step 11: Install FFMPeg.

FFMpeg is an extensive library and command-line tool for encoding audio in various different formats. We’ll use it to convert your file to m4r. See their website for installation instructions.

Step 12: Convert your file to m4r

With credit to “TheZoc” and “AaronM04” on GitHub, the command you need is

ffmpeg -i [input_file] -ac 1 -b:a 128k -f mp4 -c:a aac -t 29.99 -y [output_file]

where [input_file] is your audio filename, and [output_file] is the filename that the converted audio will be written to (which must have the filename extension “m4r”).

Steps 13 and 14

Repeat steps 6 and 7 (emailing the ringtone file and then saving it), but for the newly converted file.

Step 15: attempt to set the ringtone again

We’ve already established there’s no option to do this in the settings, so return to the Files app, and go back to wherever you saved the ringtone.

Observe that your converted file is actually recognised by the OS as a ringtone. Great - nearly there! All we need to do is figure out how to apply it. Long-press the ringtone file to bring up the list again.

And notice that. Still none of them let you apply the ringtone, and there’s still nothing in the share list either.

What?

Step 16: Google again

Thank God search engines exist.

Step 17: give up

Many of the pages in your search result have that little Apple logo at the top, but this is a red herring, for your search is completely and utterly fruitless. There is indeed no way to set a downloaded file as a ringtone on your iPhone.

I don’t know why this basic functionality is missing, but not to worry, you can buy access to one of a huge range of ringtones for just £0.99 in Apple’s very own “Tone Store”. Linked right there in the settings menu.

Actually, maybe I do know why this basic functionality is missing…