How to put your iPhone on vibrate, ring, or silent mode

The Ring/Silent switch is on the left side of your iPhone. You can use it to control which sounds play through your iPhone speaker.

Turn Ring/Silent mode on or off on your iPhone

In Ring mode, you hear ringtones and alerts. In Silent mode, you don't, but your iPhone can still play sounds, like when you play music or videos.

Use Ring mode

To put your iPhone in Ring mode, move the switch so that orange isn't showing.

Use Silent mode

To put your iPhone in Silent mode, move the switch so that orange is showing.

Change ringtones, sounds, and vibrations

  1. On iPhone 7 and later, go to Settings > Sounds & Haptics. On earlier iPhone models, go to Settings > Sounds.
  2. Choose what you want to adjust, like Ringtone or New Mail.
  3. Tap the alert tone that you want. You can also tap Vibration and choose a vibration pattern or make a custom vibration.

iPhone showing how to change ringtones

Change ringtone and alert volume with buttons

If you want to control your ringtone and alert volume separately from other apps, turn off Change with Buttons. Then you need to manually adjust your ringtone and alert volume in Settings > Sounds & Haptics or Settings > Sounds.

Choose when your device vibrates

  1. On iPhone 7 and later, go to Settings > Sounds & Haptics. On earlier iPhone models, go to Settings > Sounds.
  2. You can choose if you want your iPhone to vibrate when set to Ring or Silent mode. If you turn off both settings, your iPhone won't vibrate.

Create a custom vibration

  1. Go to Settings > Sounds & Haptics or Settings > Sounds.
  2. Select an option under Sounds and Vibration Patterns.
  3. Tap Vibration, then tap Create New Vibration.
  4. Tap the screen to create a pattern, then tap Stop.
  5. Tap Play to test your vibration.
  6. Tap Save and name your pattern. You can also tap Record to redo the custom vibration.

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