So you picked up an iPhone 4. You love the device and all of the functions, yet desire you weren’t required to pay for your music twice to have a ringtone. There are plenty of tracks in your music library, but no way to create ringtones from any of them. Or is there?
In fact, with some bit of chicanery (absolutely nothing unlawful), you can create iPhone 4 ringtones from any one of the non-DRM songs in your iTunes library easily and for free. It works on both Windows and Mac.
Notice: There could possibly be differences between all of the likely combos of iTunes versions and operating system versions
Make customized iPhone 4 ringtones
- Open iTunes.
- Find the tune that you would like to produce to a ringtone.
- Listen to the melody and locate the section of it you want to utilize. The refrain is often a good place to begin.
- Get the exact start and stop times of the clip.
- Right-click the song and choose “Get Info.”
- Click the “Options” tab.
- Type in the start time of your ringtone in the text box next to “Start Time” in the minutes:seconds (i.e., 2:01) format.
- Enter the end time of your ringtone in the text box close to “Stop Time.” Ensure the ringtone isn’t above 40 seconds long.
- Click “OK.”
- Right-click your song again and select “Convert Selection to AAC.” Wait for iTunes to convert your song. It will create a copy version.
- Right-click the ringtone and choose “Delete.”
- Click the “Keep Files” option.
- Locate the file. It is usually in your User folder under “Music > iTunes > iTunes Music” and under the band’s name. It’ll have an extension of m4a.
- Replace the m4a extension of the ringtone with m4r. Either double-click slowly to rename your file, or right-click and select “Get Info” on a Mac or “Rename” on a Windows PC.
- Click “Use .m4r” or the PC equivalent once the system warns you that your change may affect the use of your file.
- Double-click the ringtone file. ITunes will instantly add it to your ringtones folder within your iTunes Music Library.
- Connect your iPhone and sync your ringtones.
In case you are having trouble syncing your ringtones to the iPhone 4, find the ringtone within your Ringtones directory and change the extension back to .m4a; then try to sync again.
Rather than deleting it, you can also drag the newly transformed ringtone to the desktop from iTunes and follow the rest of the steps.
There may be some problems with the latest version of Leopard; renaming the file may not work properly, and you will be unable to include it to your Ringtones folder.
This will not work with music purchased at the iTunes store or that have DRM (copy protection). Your best bet is by using a tune which you have imported from a CD.