HowTo: Create Free Ringtones with iTunes

Many cellphone users spend money for ringtones, downloading and purchasing ringtones from different websites and services like FlyCell, MTV, Jamster and the iTunes app store for iPhone users. Do you know that you can create your own ringtones for free? All you need is the iTunes application and the mp3 files of the songs you want ringtone.

Before we proceed with the steps on how to create free ringtones using iTunes, we need to assume a few things. First, is that you already have the song/mp3 file in the iTunes library and second, that you can transfer files to your phone using a USB data cable or via a Bluetooth connection with or without the use of a third party software. For this tutorial, I am using iTunes version 8.2.1.6 and for the mp3 file, the theme song of one of my favorite TV shows, Chuck. Btw, if you want to find out what version of iTunes you have, open iTunes and click on Help > About iTunes.

Let’s start.

1. Open iTunes, set View setting to List mode (circled with red). Right-click on the song and click on “Get Info“.

Create Free Ringtone with iTunes

2. Click on the Options tab and select or make sure that the Start and Stop Times are checked. Change the Stop Time to 30 seconds. (Don’t worry about this messing up the actual file. It only tells iTunes to play the first 30 seconds of the song. iTunes will create a new/different mp3 file later.)

Create Free Ringtone with iTunes

3. Configure the built-in iTunes MP3 Encoder. Go back to iTunes and click on Edit > Preferences.

Create Free Ringtone with iTunes

4. On the General tab, click on Import Settings.

Create Free Ringtone with iTunes

5. On Import Settings, make sure that Import Using is set to MP3 Encoder. Click on Settings and change Stereo Bit Rate to Custom, select 24 kbps. Click OK twice to get back to iTunes main interface.

Create Free Ringtone with iTunes

7. On the iTunes main interface, click on Advance > Create MP3 Version.

Create Free Ringtone with iTunes

iTunes will then create a new mp3 file based on the settings that you specified earlier. You can choose which part of the song you’d want to be your ringtone by adjusting the Start and Stop time settings in Step #2.

With these simple steps you’ve successfully created a free ringtone for your cell phone. Now that you already have your ringtone in mp3 format, you can now upload it to your phone using a USB data cable or via a Bluetooth connection. You can also use a third party ringtone manager software or if you have a Windows Mobile powered phone, all you need is Windows Mobile Device Center.

 

Hope you guys like this simple tutorial on how to create free ringtones using iTunes. Feel free to ask questions and share your thoughts.

NOTE: This tutorial is not intended for iPhones but for any phone that accepts mp3 file formats as ringtones. For those of you who have iPhones, I’ll be publishing a different post, especially for you guys on how to create free iPhone ringtones using iTunes. So watch out for it. It involves almost the same procedures but with some changes to the settings.

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5 Comments

  1. @Beng – You’re welcome Ate! I’m glad that you found this tutorial useful. Its all good, all you need is to start using it more often and learn new tricks every now and then like this one and soon you can do a lot of stuff with your iPhone. Have a good weekend too! :D

  2. Thanks for the great share Jaypee. This is really very useful for me. May iPhone nga ako pero hindi ko pa ito gaanong alam :). Have a nice weekend.

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