Phones are changing a lot and just about all modern phones support MP3, WAV, and/or 3GP files as ring tones. This basically means people are going to make their own since just about any one can make these files with any average computer.  We’re all making our own play lists with CDs we buy for our iPods or music we purchase online, our own background screens for our desktops and phones, our own DVDs and movies with iMovie and MovieMaker. 

Different Ways to Make Your Own Ringtones
There are a couple of different ways to make your own ringtones for your phone. The first way is to use a program that will translate a tune into a MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface) format that can be understood by your phone. MIDI is a protocol that has been used by electronic musicians for over 20 years, and the bulk of cell phones use standard ringtones that understand some version of this protocol.

There are several shareware and freeware programs available on the web that allow you to write a melody and translate it for your phone. Different cell phones use different formats, though, so be sure you know what program you need to compose for your phone in particular. This information is available on the websites of most major cell phone manufacturers.

Types of Ringtones

There are typically two different types of ringtones: monophonic ringtones and polyphonic ringtones.

Monophonic Ringtones

Monophonic tones are simple tunes, most commonly compatible with today's cell phones. The majority of cell phones can only make a single tone at a time. The monophonic ringtone tune is comprised of a series of sequential tones at different frequencies.

Polyphonic Ringtones

Polyphonic tones are played on cellular phones that have the capability of playing up to 16 separate tones at once. The combination of tones creates a harmonic melody. Polyphonic ringtones are more musical than a monophonic ringtone. Newer phones support polyphonic ringtones.

It is likely that future cell phones will be capable of producing musical ringtones of CD quality.    top

Ringtone Composition

Frequently consumers will wish to compose personalized ringtones. Occasionally, cell phones can be programmed with ringtones by entering a series of buttons. Software is also available that allow consumers to create their own melodic ringtones. The software runs on a computer, and once the tune is perfected it can be transferred to the phone via a data cable.   top 

As of late, downloadable composers have gained in popularity.

In fact, because the popular multimedia messaging services are capable of attaching voice messages to pictures and text, the popularity of composing and mixing your own music and voice is going to raise further.

As an example, Kyocera provides MP3 software that enables you to mix and compose your own ringers.

Then there's Ringtone Ripper, software that allows you to make a 20 second ringtone out of any full-length MP3 song or CD track in your music collection.

In fact, you can make your own MP3 ringers with many audio editor tools out there, including freeware/shareware, such as Audacity, Switch, Cool Edit, RingtoneChopShop, Free-Ringtone-Maker, and Phonezoo, all of which are free downloads.   top

What You'll Need

1.  A cell phone that plays MP3's and supports custom tones.

2.  Audio-editing software that allows export to MP3. If you don't already have this, Audacity is a good open-source program you can download for free, and is available for Windows, Mac and Linux. (see separate instructions below) 

3.  A way to transfer the file to your phone using a cord, Bluetooth or an email to your phone.  Some phones have a little miniature version of a camera storage chip inside them, you can take these out and get a card reader for your computer and write straight to the card.   top

To make a voice ringtone you can simply record your voice, convert it to MP3 format and you're done:
E.g. on windows:
Select the Sound Recorder utility from: Start button, Programs, Accessories, Entertainment.
Press the record symbol, speak into your mic and click on stop when you're finished. Select Save As from the file menu, then look down the bottom of the window that opens for a button marked Change.
Select MPEG Layer-3 from the format drop down
Select 24 kBit/s, 16,000 Hz, Mono from the Attributes drop down
Click OK and the file type window disappears leaving you back at the "Save As" window where you can enter the filename, e.g. mysong.mp3   top

To create your ring tone from a CD, rip the song you want as a WAV (Windows) or an AIFF file (Mac).  You'll want to trim your song down to about 20 seconds.  You could transfer the entire song to your phone, but since your phone rings only for about 20 seconds, you'll waste a lot of memory space for no good reason.  You can clip any section of the song you like most, you don't have to necessarily start at the beginning of it.

If you're creating your ring tone from an MP3, just copy that MP3 into a new folder so that your ring-tone editing won't affect the version of the song in your digital music collection.

Once you have the song as a digital music file (whether WAV, AIFF or MP3), run your audio-editing software. I highly recommend Audacity for this task. It's free, it's open-source, it runs on all major platforms.  If you don't plan to use it, skip the rest of this tutorial and consult your software documentation.   top

1.  Download and install Audacity to your computer

2.  Download and install LAME

3.  From Audacity's Edit menu, choose Preferences.  On the File Formats tab, under "MP3 Export Setup", hit the Find Library button and browse to the LAME file you just downloaded.

4.  Make a copy of your MP3 file and save it in a temporary folder (My Music in Windows).  Drag and drop it onto Audacity to open it.

5.  Find the 20 seconds of your song you want to be your ringtone.  Use the select tool to highlight it and from the Edit menu, choose "Trim".

6.  From the File menu, choose "Export as MP3".  Save it as say, myringtone.mp3.

7.  Now transfer the tone to your phone using your computer, Bluetooth or by emailing it to your phone's address.

8.  After the file has been transferred to your phone, set it as your custom ringtone.  Consult your phone instructions to find out how as each phone is different.   top