The iPhone 5 Ringtones Mix
September 21, 2012
As you may know, today is the official iPhone 5 release day and yes, I’m one of those dorks that got up in the middle of the night and waited in line to get my hands on the phone early, deal with it. In honor of the new device (which I’m completely loving, by the way, iOS6 Maps aside), I’ve made a mix of 18 tracks that make great ringtones, which you can download below for your own shiny new iPhone 5 (or your old, outdated iPhone 4S).
What makes a great ringtone track you say? Well, usually I gravitate towards upbeat songs with an ultra-catchy intro (although sometimes I prefer to use another part of the song, as I’ve noted below). To make it super-easy for you, I’ve included a tutorial on how to turn MP3s into Ringtones using just iTunes. Download the mix below and see the tutorial after the jump.
MP3 Phoenix – Consolation Prizes (intro)
MP3 M83 – Midnight City (intro)
MP3 Frank Ocean – Pyramids (begin at 1:12 when the electro synths come in)
MP3 New Order – Age of Consent (intro)
MP3 Jens Lekman – A Sweet Summer’s Night On Hammer Hill (intro)
MP3 Cut Copy – Feel The Love (intro)
MP3 Feist – Mushaboom (begin at chorus)
MP3 Cat Stevens – Here Comes By Baby (intro)
MP3 Kanye West – All Of The Lights (intro)
MP3 Curtis Mayfield – Move On Up (intro)
MP3 Beach House – Lazuli (begin at the “oh ohs” at :34)
MP3 Hot Chip – Boy From School (intro)
MP3 David Bowie – Sound and Vision (intro)
MP3 The Knife – Heartbeats (begin at drum fill at :42)
MP3 The Cure – In Between Days (intro)
MP3 M.I.A. – Bad Girls (intro or “chain hits my chest”)
MP3 Iggy & The Stooges – Search and Destroy (intro)
MP3 Daft Punk – Digital Love (begin at keyboard solo at 3:32)
Leave your favorite ringtone songs in the comments!
***
Here’s how you can easily make free iPhone ringtones using iTunes:
1. Right click on your selected track and select “Get Info”.
2. Go to the “Options” tab and go down to the “Start Time” and “Stop Time” checkboxes. Check both boxes and input the time you want your ringtone to start & stop. This has to be 30 seconds or less. You can add decimals if you want to get real precise with it. Click “OK” when you’re done.
3. Right click on the song and select “Create AAC Version” (if it says “Create MP3 Version” or something else you have to change this in the “Import Settings” in your Preferences). The version you create will use your new start and stop times.
4. After the song is done encoding, drag it to your desktop and change the extension from “.m4a” to “.m4r”.
5. Drag the ringtone to your Tunes Library (it will show up in the Ringtones section) and sync your phone. You did it!
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September 21st, 2012 at 12:57 pm
Love this playlist! Great idea. Mine is the little intro synth bit from Passion Pit’s “Little Secrets.”
September 21st, 2012 at 2:08 pm
Very much the same with the catchy-intro-for-ringtone. Had the intro to Matt & Kim’s ‘Daylight’ for the longest while now… which maybe gives me extra brownie points for actually featuring the line “and in the daylight I don’t pick up my phone”!?
September 21st, 2012 at 6:33 pm
The only song clip I’ve ever used for a ringtone was several years ago: Seven Nation Army intro by White Stripes.
Age of Consent may be my second.
September 21st, 2012 at 8:39 pm
Not a ringtone, but I use the refrain from Sleeping In by the Postal Service as my alarm.
September 22nd, 2012 at 12:23 am
I can’t use songs as my ringtone – I get sick of them and can’t listen to them for a long time afterwards (I’m still struggling to listen to BSS’s All to All).
However, yesterday I was in class with a girl whose ringtone was the Stones’ ‘Paint it Black’. So cool.
September 22nd, 2012 at 9:07 pm
In light of Bad’s recent re-release, here is the horn section from “Speed Demon”
https://www.dropbox.com/s/sso5meaa2wchizl/Speed%20Demon%20%28Horns%29.m4r
September 23rd, 2012 at 3:31 pm
I’ve been using the intro to “Shipping Up to Boston” and before that I used the intro to “Hong Kong Garden” by Siouxsie and the Banshees. Both work great for the 30 sec ringtones!
Great choices here! I just fixed myself up with an “Age of Consent” ringtone, looking forward to getting a call.
September 25th, 2012 at 12:02 am
i use the “sanford and son” theme and “the 900 number” by 45 king.
September 27th, 2012 at 1:35 am
I’ve been using By Your Hand (intro) by Los Campesinos! Like a catchy smoke alarm, except now everytime the I hear the son I think my phone is ringing, and I hate it when my phone rings…. Hmmmm
September 30th, 2012 at 9:03 am
ive converted the song to a 30 sec song and it shows in my iphone list, but cant find where or how to transfer to the ringtones section at all. It just oes back into my music file. what am i doing wrong?
October 1st, 2012 at 9:35 am
after you convert to a 30 second song you have to drag to desktop and change the file extension to .m4r to convert to a ringtone. then you when you drag it back to itunes it will show up in the Tones section.
October 3rd, 2012 at 11:09 pm
I’ve used the opening to the Jesus & Mary Chain’s “Just Like Honey” for years. It’s perfect.
October 4th, 2012 at 12:47 pm
I’ve thought about using “Just Like Honey”, but it always seemed like it was too slow building to make a great ringtone. Maybe I’ll give it a try!
October 16th, 2012 at 9:56 pm
Congrats on the i5. Mine is still in the mail.
My favorite ringtones feature an identifiable beat, start slow and pick up after about 15 seconds. :
Alkaline Trio – Radio (intro)
Taken By Trees -Sweet Child O’ Mine (Intro)
MGMT – Electric Feel (Intro)
Wu-Tang Clan C.R.E.A.M (outro instrumental)
Craig Mack – Flava In Ya Ear (Outro Instrumental)
I used to have one that was beastie boys ” The New Style” but I kept singing a long to the ringtone and not answering the phone.
October 23rd, 2012 at 7:20 am
The only one that I use is the intro to Eels – Mister E’s Beautiful Blues. Always puts me in a great mood. “Goddamn right, it’s a beautiful day!”
October 28th, 2012 at 2:14 am
I did all of the steps, and can even see the ringtone in the “Tones” folder of my iPhone 5 in iTunes, and it is a m4r file, but it doesn’t show up in my list of ringtones on my phone. All I can see are the standard iPhone ringtones. Is it because iTunes has a “Tones” instead of “Ringtones” folder? It is the most current version, but it is on a PC and not a Mac.
October 28th, 2012 at 1:17 pm
You have to sync the ringtone to your iphone in iTunes.
1. Check “Sync only checked songs and videos” on the Summary tab of your iTunes sync settings.
2. Confirm that you have checked the box next each of the ringtones that you want to sync to your phone in the Tones folder of your iTunes library.
3. Confirm that you have checked “Sync Tones” on the Tones tab of your iTunes sync settings.
November 2nd, 2012 at 11:55 am
I go to iTunes and Underneath the library it shows you like music, movies,TV shows, app, radio but it doesn’t show the ring tones how do you make it pop up wit the rest
November 5th, 2012 at 10:20 am
It won’t show up until you have some ringtones in your library.
November 5th, 2012 at 7:37 pm
how do you change the extension
November 6th, 2012 at 4:51 pm
How do you change the file extension to .m4r to convert to a ringtone?
November 10th, 2012 at 11:22 am
You edit the file name and change the “a” to an “r”
November 10th, 2012 at 7:43 pm
ha, ha.
Where do you edit the file name? I am using Windows 8 and can’t edit it like I used to with older windows versions.
November 10th, 2012 at 8:26 pm
figured it out, now I can’t syn tones in iTunes,
Yes, I am a noob.
November 13th, 2012 at 11:14 am
After you plug in your iPhone you gotta go to the tones tab in iTunes to sync them (just like you would sync music, photos, apps, etc)
December 24th, 2012 at 3:19 am
I tried everything in your instructions and i had the same problem as Ben. I can see the ringtone i want on my itunes in the “tones” file but it won’t appear on my phone for some reason. I checked all my synch settings too and they appear to be okay.
December 24th, 2012 at 3:34 am
Nevermind i figured it out. My problem was i was pasting the file straight from the desktop into the iphone tones file.
February 18th, 2013 at 11:00 pm
I did all the instructions, however, when I try to drag the file from my desktop to my iTunes it shoots back to the desktop. Why would that be happening?