Recording your voice on iPhone is pretty easy with Apple’s Voice Memos, a free app that lets you record audio on iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch. This voice recorder application features a simple, streamlined design with record and edit functionality while also supporting exporting audio recordings to other services for backup, sharing, or more advanced editing.

How to Record Using the Voice Memos App

Recording audio with the iPhone Voice Memos app is fairly straightforward. Here’s how to record voice on iPhone with it.

The Voice Memos app is installed on all iOS devices, but you can reinstall it from the App Store for free if you’ve deleted it.

  • Open the Voice Memos app on your iPhone or other iOS device.
  • Tap the red record button at the bottom of the screen to start a new voice recording.
  • Just a quick tap is fine. You don’t need to hold it.
  • Tap the small red horizontal line as you record to view more options. You can pause the recording and resume it to keep multiple recordings within the same sound file on the screen that opens.
  • Tap the red stop button when you want to stop recording.
  • Select New Recording at the top of the screen and type a name for the recording. The recording is saved under the name you type.

How to Trim a Voice Memo on iPhone

Apple’s Voice Memos app includes only basic editing functionality. Here’s how to trim a voice recording in the app.

Open the Voice Memos app on your iPhone or other iOS device.

Tap the red record button at the bottom of the screen to start a new voice recording.

Just a quick tap is fine. You don’t need to hold it.

Tap the small red horizontal line as you record to view more options. You can pause the recording and resume it to keep multiple recordings within the same sound file on the screen that opens.

Tap the red stop button when you want to stop recording.

Select New Recording at the top of the screen and type a name for the recording. The recording is saved under the name you type.

  • Tap the audio recording you want to edit on the Voice Memos opening screen.
  • Tap the ellipsis.
  • Tap Edit Recording.
  • Tap the crop icon.
  • Drag the yellow handles at the bottom of the screen to enclose the section of the recording you want to keep.
  • Tap Trim to remove any part of the recording outside the trim handles.
  • Tap Save to confirm the changes.
  • To delete a section of the audio, tap the crop icon, choose a part of the timeline, and tap Delete. Finally, tap Save.
  • When you’ve finished making all of your edits to the audio file, tap Done.

How to Delete an iPhone Voice Memo

To delete an audio recording in the Voice Memos app, tap the recording, then tap the trash can next to it.

Tap the audio recording you want to edit on the Voice Memos opening screen.

Tap the ellipsis.

Tap Edit Recording.

Tap the crop icon.

Drag the yellow handles at the bottom of the screen to enclose the section of the recording you want to keep.

Tap Trim to remove any part of the recording outside the trim handles.

Tap Save to confirm the changes.

To delete a section of the audio, tap the crop icon, choose a part of the timeline, and tap Delete. Finally, tap Save.

When you’ve finished making all of your edits to the audio file, tap Done.

You won’t receive a confirmation prompt, but you can get it back if you accidentally delete a recording. Tap the Recently Deleted category, tap the file’s name, then tap Recover > Recover Recording.

How to Send Voice Memos on iPhone

Once recorded, you can send audio files in the Voice Memos app to a wide variety of apps and services.

  • Tap the file you want to send.
  • Tap the ellipsis.
  • Tap Share.
  • Tap a contact to send it to a contact or export it to an app.
  • You can also scroll down to back up the Apple Voice Memo recording via a cloud storage service like Dropbox or tap Save to Files to save it to your device.
  • If you encounter any errors when exporting or backing up your recording, try sending it to yourself as an email, open the file on your computer, and then send it to your preferred service or contact from there.

Voice Memos App Tips

The voice recorder iPhone app, Voice Memos, can be helpful for conducting interviews or taking notes. You can even use it to record phone calls.

Tap the file you want to send.

Tap Share.

Tap a contact to send it to a contact or export it to an app.

You can also scroll down to back up the Apple Voice Memo recording via a cloud storage service like Dropbox or tap Save to Files to save it to your device.

If you encounter any errors when exporting or backing up your recording, try sending it to yourself as an email, open the file on your computer, and then send it to your preferred service or contact from there.

Here are some valuable tips to get the most out of it.

  • Check your storage: While Voice Memos recordings can technically go for as long as you want, they are restricted by the amount of free space on your device. If needed, you can free up some space.
  • Do a test recording: Before doing an important long-form interview, do a quick 10-second test recording to ensure that everything’s working fine and that background noise isn’t too loud.
  • Use a microphone: You don’t need to use a mic, but connecting one to your iPhone can significantly improve audio quality. Note that you may need a dongle.
  • Back up your recording immediately: As a precaution, it’s a good idea to email yourself a copy of the voice recording as soon as it’s finished or back it up to a cloud service like OneDrive or Google Drive. This way, your essential audio won’t be lost if you lose or break your iPhone.

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