iPhone tip: Use a Silent Ringtone to Screen Calls in Your Sleep

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Have you ever wished your iPhone would ring only when certain people call? Here’s how to do it:

  1. Download the “Silence” ringtone here: silence.m4r
  2. Copy this file into the Ringtones section of your iTunes. (Click to enlarge.)

    adding_ringtone_to_itunes
  3. Sync your iPhone with iTunes to load the ringtone.
  4. On your iPhone, change your ringtone to “Silence” (under Settings -> Sounds -> Ringtone). You’ll no longer hear your phone calls.

    2_iphone_silence_ringtone
  5. For each person whose calls you still want to hear, change his or her Custom Ringtone to something audible: Click the name in your contact list, choose Ringtone, then choose something besides Default

    3_iphone_important_caller 4_iphone_audible_ringtone

Now you can screen calls in your sleep. Because Sunday afternoons are for napping.

UPDATE (Apr 14, 2011): I haven’t used it, but MrNumber.com appears to be an interesting service for identifying phone numbers belonging to telemarketers and blocking them.

260 thoughts on “iPhone tip: Use a Silent Ringtone to Screen Calls in Your Sleep”

  1. Pingback: Unknown caller ringtone

    • couldn’t you make a contact with the name of, lets say, 8900 and set your unwanted calls to the silent ringtone? Ah, Mr. Miller can make it more automatic I bet. :)
      Reply ↓
  5. Hi
    I had gotten used to this feature on my previous Nokia phone and could not figure out how to do it on my iPhone.
    Great, this is so simple and works like a dream
    Thank you for making me a well slept man in the morning
    Reply ↓
  6. Sorry if someone already mentioned it, but…

    If you are willing to jailbreak, there is an awesome app called iBlacklist. It costs $12, but is incredible if you have people who you want to block. Any numbers you put on the blacklist won’t even ring in on the phone. The only way I even know I miss the calls is because I get a notification from google voice when the call is silently routed there. Even better (and something you can’t do simply by setting up a silent ringer), you can select for it to handle unknown and restricted callers in the same way. You can also set up a whitelist. Let’s say that you don’t want to be disturbed by anyone for the next few hours, but at the same time don’t want to miss a call from one or more specific people. Put them in your whitelist and enable it during that time. It’s very cool, if you aren’t afraid of jailbreaking.

    Reply ↓
  7. Wondetful for blocking telemarketers when your phone or service won’t block numbers. They can call, but you can’t hear them and they won’t disturb your day! Just another number on your recent list to be ignored.
    Reply ↓
  11. This is just what I was looking for. I have someone who is annoying the heck out of me and anytime she texts or calls I get major anxiety. Costs $35 to change my number and too many good contacts have it so didn’t want to have it changed. I tried jailbreaking my phone and installing MCleaner, BUT is crashes with my OS version 4.3.3. So I created a contact called ‘Blocked’, set the SMS notification to none and the ringtown to your ‘silence’. I have added other unwanted contacts (bank and other services marketing etc.) to the Blocked contact list so I don’t even see who is calling. So if Blocked comes up on SMS, I just delete it without reading, and if Blocked calls, I no longer hear a ring!! Best part too is that if ‘Blocked’ leaves me a message. I just click delete :) Might changed the name from Blocked to Satan Calling so it’s some sort of fun.

    Thanks!

    Reply ↓
  12. Until Apple adds “profiles” to iOS (eg: mute between midnight and 8am, quiet ring between 8am and 5pm, etc), this will do nicely.
    Reply ↓
  13. You sir are a life saver! I’ve just been woken up the last time by an idiot I’m trying to ignore who phones me at 4am all the time for no reason. Brilliant, thank you so much! (Also that iblacklist is apparently a total scam, if you read the reviews)
    Reply ↓
    • The iBlacklist in the AppStore is a total scam. It steals from the legitimate product by that name. The iBlacklist Joe was referring to is available only on jailbroken iPhones, either via Cydia (a AppStore-like interface that allows the downloading of apps from sources other than Apple) or by downloading the installation package using an online source and then transferring it and installing it onto the phone (not normally something I’d recommend an average user try).
      Reply ↓
  16. Thanks, this saved me from making one myself. I’ve use silent ringtones on previous phones with great success – each new annoying caller gets added to my “silent” contact with this ringtone already setup.
    Reply ↓
  17. I downloaded the ringtone and copied into my rintones section on iTunes and synced.. however ringtone not showing up on my iPhone.. any help?
    Reply ↓
  18. Which versions of Itunes will do this. My version 10.1 does not have ringtones anywhere in the menu. Am I mistaken? Please help
    Reply ↓
    • The ringtone section doesn’t appear on iTunes until you actually have a ringtone file (.m4r) present. After you download silence.m4r and click on it to open it, or drag it into iTunes, the ringtone section should appear. After that you can choose the option to sync it with your phone. Hope that helps!
      Reply ↓
  19. Thank you for this. I just installed it. I’ve had some tough financial issues and the calls are incessant. You’ve helped me gain some sanity.

    Much appreciated,

    Frank

    Reply ↓
  20. THANK YOU, THANK YOU
    I applied online for health insurance and made the mistake of entering my cell phone number. I must get 10 calls both night and day trying to sell me insurance. Your SILENCE is golden – and directions simple!
    Reply ↓
  21. I can’t thank you enough!! I am so tired of telemarketing calls on my cell phone and have been looking for a way to block calls – this will work great as now I won’t have to hear them!
    Reply ↓
  22. Perfect!!!
    With hotels/airlines I usually give my cell as a contact number- and I’ve been traveling a lot lately. Not sure what happened or who is responsible, but suddenly I’m getting these telemarketer/bull$hit/hang-up calls 2-3 times a day, from a over a half dozen (and growing) numbers-
    Now, I have a nice new contact called “Annoying Cr@p” (and a wonderful image of a stuffed dogtoy of poop that appears if I happen to see them calling!) with a silent ringtone and no text tone (haven’t gotten texts yet, thank goodness, but these calls are relentless).

    My husband saw it and thought it was great- thanks, Mr. Miller!
    One interesting item- sometimes, when I copy and paste a number into my “A.C.” contact, it doesn’t automatically get assigned to the “Silence” tone (Contact ringtone shows as “multiple”) so I have to manually switch it to the “Silence” ringtone. . . an extra step that I don’t mind, at all :)

    Reply ↓
  24. Thank you SO much!!!!!!
    I had stayed up till 2am doing homework and had just enough time to get 8 hours of sleep before class, unfortunately this annoying person called a 7:15, 8:20, 9:43, and then again right after 10…
    It is okay now that I know it will never happen again.

    Thank you again Sir, You, are Awesome!

    Reply ↓
  26. I have an iphone 3G, and a “blocked” number keeps calling me. How can I block them? I’m with AT&T and they have offered no help. I know you can block a call on a land line, but what about the iphone?
    Reply ↓
  27. I wish I could do the same for vibrate. I need vibrate for calls I want, but somewhat defeats the purpose of the silence ringtone for those I don’t. Any thoughts on this?
    Reply ↓
  28. You sir, are a true patriot and gentleman! A nice solution to these telemarketers who call to convince me that “mortgage rates are at an all-time low” or that male enhancement capsules will make me irresistible to women! Thanks much.
    Reply ↓
  32. Rich, Your ringtone is awesome! Thanks for coming up with a great solution for unwanted callers. I do have a suggestion. Maybe in your next update you can also make it so that the phone also turns off the vibrate mode for the numbers that we have designated in the silent ringtone, i.e., the irritating unwanted callers. This way, we wouldn’t ever notice if one of these callers called until much later when we checked our phones.

    Best regards,
    K

    Reply ↓
    • As far as I know you cannot do this for individual contacts. If you don’t want the phone to vibrate unless the silent switch is on, go into settings and then select sound. The first switch you’ll see is vibrate. Leave this one set to “on” if you want your phone to vibrate when you switch it to silent mode. If you scroll down you’ll see another vibrate switch just above the ringtone switch. Switch this to “off”. Now your phone will not vibrate when it’s not in silent mode.
      Reply ↓
      • Sarah,
        OK, since the new OS just came out for the iPhone, it allows custom vibrations for any contact. You can also completely turn of vibrations for any contact and keep vibration on for other contacts. This is sweet!
        Reply ↓
        • Really? Can you tell me how you did that? I’ve updated to the new OS but the settings for vibrate don’t seem to be any different for they were before.
          Reply ↓
          • A couple of different ways. Rixx has found way. But you can also go to Settings>Sounds and under you custom “silent” ring there should be a slide key that turns off the vibrate for all contacts set for Silent.

            You may also go to each contact hit edit and scroll down to vibration and and click None.

            See my instructions below to also ditch your collectors and telemarketers with an SIT (Special Information Tone) that is available as a way to stop unwanted robo auto dialers.

        • I have ios5 but can’t find where you can set custom vibrations by contact. Is it in the individual contact? I don’t see it. Perhaps it’s not enabled in older phone? I have 3GS.
          Reply ↓
          • Found it. Settings > General > Accessibility > Hearing > Custom Vibrations

            Turn on. Then the ability to set a vibration for each contact shows up when you edit contact.

            Brilliant! Adios telemarketers interruptions.

          • Cool, also, if you want to have telemarketers and collection companies robo dialers to stop calling you you can also go to a company that has a free voicemail that overrides your carriers. I’m using youmail just go to their dot com and sign up. They have specific outgoing messages for specific telephone # that you input. What happens with these specific outgoing message is that a SIT (special information tone) (defined on Wikipedia) that gets played. You know the one that you hear when you’ve reached a disconnected #. That specific tone tells the robo dialing computer that your phone # is no longer working. The calls stop almost instantly. It then has a message saying that your number is disconnected. It’s sweet, and fully programmable for a specific caller. Good luck
  35. Is there any way to group people, as in the older Nokia phones? For example, I could group Family and friends and only calls from those numbers would ring. The problem with silence, is that you would get called from a new spam number, and it would ring the default tone. With groups, you could set the phone to ring, say, while asleep, or busy only when a specific group person called you
    Reply ↓
  38. my gf call me every time nd becoz of her i silent my phone , bt nwi ataach this tune to her contact
    nd then enjoyyyyyyyyy……. :)
    thanx.
    Reply ↓
  39. Hi
    I have ben using your Silence Ring tone to great effect.
    However after upgrading to iOS 5 your ring tone no longer is availableIs there a fix to this
    Reply ↓
  40. I’ve just upgraded to iOS 5, and like Shuja, the silent ringtone has disappeared off the iPhone. It’s still in iTunes.

    Need a fix to this …!

    Reply ↓
    • Whenever the OS on phone is updated, purchased, borrowed, etc., any tone
      not included with ‘original’ tones are deleted by the update process. I’ve learned this the hard way after multiple experiences.
      Best to save ‘optional’ ringtones, answer tones, etc., in a directory on your hard drive. Then following any OS update you simply copy or drag your ‘optional’ tones into iTunes; then sync. ‘optional stuff’ will not appear in your phone settings.
      Reply ↓
  41. An Update: While the file is showing in iTunes the actual file was missing. I had to relocate the file on my hard disk and re-add it to iTunes.

    Then sync’d it across to my iPhone and now all working properly. Whew!!

    So, Shuja, looks like all you have to do is download the file again, and add it to iTunes

    Reply ↓
  42. Niel
    Thanks down loaded the Silence ringtone again and just had to select it again in the iTunes ringtone section and sync again Voila it works again
    Thanks again for the tip
    Reply ↓
  43. I had a silent ringtone until I upgraded to the iOS5 on my i4
    I followed the steps above and it’s in the phone but doesn’t show under ringtones.
    Any ideas?
    Thanks, Michael.
    Reply ↓
  45. I just update to Iso5 and having a problem locating th file on my phone. It is not there.. I tried dragging it to itunes and still dont see it on my phone. Please help..
    Reply ↓
  49. Hi Richard. I downloaded the silent ringtone and that worked but when I selected the audible tone for selected contacts the phone still stays silent. Do I have to download from I tunes a ringer to be paid for, for this to work properly? Thank you very much ahead of time for your help.

    Bill

    Reply ↓
    • Hi Bill, you don’t need to buy anything on iTunes to make this work. There must be some other reason that audible tones aren’t working for selected contacts? Do they work when the silent ringtone isn’t your main ringtone?
      Reply ↓
  50. For a smartphone, the iPhone’s phone functions are severely limited. My old SE K700i from years ago was able to create profiles and filter calls from the address book. Why is it so difficult for Apple to add these features? I’m sure these features have been requested since the first iPhone.
    Reply ↓

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