How to turn a video’s sound into an iPhone ringtone

• Videos you recorded yourself, or that someone sent you, are the easiest: save them to Photos first.
• Clips from social apps can be used only if the app lets you save the video to your phone. Respect the creator’s rights, and remember that music inside a clip may be copyrighted — fine for your own phone, not for sharing as a ringtone pack.
• Streaming audio and DRM-protected content cannot be extracted by any app.

Shortcuts is Apple’s free automation app, already installed on most iPhones (re-download it from the App Store if you removed it). You build this shortcut once, then reuse it from the share sheet for any video.

1. 1Open Shortcuts, go to the Shortcuts tab and tap + to create a new shortcut.
2. 2Open the shortcut’s details (the ⓘ button) and turn on Show in Share Sheet. Back in the editor, tap the input line at the top and leave only Media selected.
3. 3Tap Add Action, search for “Encode Media” and add it. It uses the Shortcut Input automatically.
4. 4Tap the arrow on the Encode Media action to expand its options and turn on Audio Only.
5. 5Add a second action: search for “Save File” and add it. Leave “Ask Where to Save” on so you can choose a folder.
6. 6Name the shortcut something like “Video to Audio” and tap Done.

Now open the video in Photos, tap Share, scroll down and tap Video to Audio. Choose a folder in Files (for example On My iPhone) and tap Open. After a few seconds you have an .m4a audio file with the video’s soundtrack. The original video is not changed.

A video’s sound usually has silence, wind noise or chatter around the part you care about. An iPhone ringtone also has to be under 30 seconds. So trim before you set it:

• Note the time in the video where your moment starts and ends — Photos shows the playhead time as you scrub.
• Trim the audio in GarageBand (drag the clip’s edges on the track) or in any editor that opens files from Files.
• Keep the moment at the very start. Ringtones play from second zero, and most calls are answered within a few rings.
• Very short sounds (a two-second laugh) feel abrupt as a ringtone. Repeating them a few times to fill 10–30 seconds works better.

On iOS 26 or later: in Files, touch and hold the trimmed audio file, tap Share, then “Use as Ringtone” (scroll the row of actions if you don’t see it).

On iOS 17 or 18: import the file into GarageBand, then from My Songs touch and hold the project, tap Share › Ringtone › Export, and choose “Use sound as… Standard Ringtone”. Our guide to making a ringtone without a computer covers those GarageBand steps in detail.

You’ll find it afterwards in Settings › Sounds & Haptics › Ringtone, at the top of the list.

Video audio is often recorded quietly and from a distance, so it can disappear on a small speaker in a pocket. A few things help:

• Raise or normalise the volume so the loudest part sits just below clipping.
• Add a short fade-in (half a second) if the clip starts with a click, and a fade-out so it doesn’t stop mid-word before looping.
• Pick a part where one sound dominates. Crowd noise and music under speech turn into mush on a phone speaker.
• Test it: call yourself from another phone, or play it with the iPhone in a bag, before you rely on it.

The Shortcuts + GarageBand route is free and works well, but it is three apps and several hand-offs for one ringtone.

Ringsy does it in one place: tap Video, pick a clip from Photos, and its soundtrack opens on a waveform ready to trim. You can zoom in to land on the exact start, let short sounds repeat to fill 30 seconds, add fades, and even out a quiet recording before setting it. The video is read only to take its sound, stays untouched, and nothing is uploaded.