How to Create iPhone Voice Memos in OS 3.0

11 June 2009 by Vinay 13 Comments

iPhone OS 3.0 contains a new Feature/App Voice Memos. The new native app will be Voice Memos and it will allow the user to record and save audio files as well as send them by email or MMS. The Voice Memos app will work with either the iPhones built-in microphone or an external microphone. Users will also be able to trim the recording, just in case you only wanted to save or share a specific portion. In short Voice Memo application lets you record voice memos for yourself, which can then be trimmed and sent to friends, family, or coworkers via email of MMS.

Step One : Press to launch the new Voice Memos application from the Springboard

Step Two : When the voice memo app opens you will see a microphone and a VU meter. At the bottom left there is a red record button. At the bottom right there is a list button. To record a new voice memo press the Record button.

Step Three : You will see a status bar along the top display the elapsed time.You can use the Pause button at the bottom left of the screen to pause then restart recording. Once you are done recording your voice memo press the Stop button at the bottom right of the screen.

Step Four : Press the list button at the bottom right to view your previously recorded memos.

Your previously recorded memos will be ordered by the time recorded. You can also see the duration and date of each memo.Press to select a memo for playback. You can use the Speaker button at the top left to listen to memo over the loud speakers.

Step Five : To share a memo with a friend press the Share button at the bottom of the screen. Press the large Email Voice Memo button to open a new Mail message with the memo attached as a m4a audio file. From the Voice Memo list you can also use the delete button at the bottom of the screen to delete a voice memo. Press the large Delete Voice Memo button to confirm the deletion.

13 Comments »

Scotty said:

I got an alert saying that my 24 minute voice memo is too large to email. Any idea how to get the file off the iPhone without chopping it into little 2 minute bits?

# 12 June 2009 at 10:10 am

Scotty said:

Solved – Access through iTunes.
http://www.apple.com/iphone/how-to/#voice-memos.syncing-voice-memos

# 12 June 2009 at 6:50 pm

paul playe said:

The app did not download with my upgrade to 3.0- where do I get the app?

# 18 June 2009 at 11:40 pm

Marrthy said:

Tried to send a memo to a Windows user. They could not listen to it. Any suggestions?

Thanks

# 22 June 2009 at 3:30 am

Vinay (author) said:

@ Marrthy Ask him to install iTunes to play voice memos.

# 22 June 2009 at 6:25 pm

Cynthia said:

What is the maximum length you can record?

# 24 June 2009 at 11:57 pm

Kevin M. said:

Is there a way to use a voice memo as a ringtone on the iPhone?

Thanks!

# 26 June 2009 at 9:09 pm

Stig said:

I set my iPhone in Airplane Mode (to not have calls coming in) while recording a long business meeting using the new Voice Memos application under iPhone OS 3.0 with my one year old 3G. When I stopped recording the counter showed that I had been recording for about 3 hours and 13 minutes.

I labeled my recording “Meeting” and it shows that my recording started 26/06/2009 at 13:30 (1:30PM).

I was looking forward to become able to transfer my recording to my iMac or MacBook PRO.

However, next time I opened the Voice Memos application and find my file correctly labeled Meeting 26/06/2009 13:30, the counter at the right (in front of the error) simply says 0s. Trying to play anything back produces no result, because the data seems to be gone (despite that the file name and date/time remains).

Do anyone here have an idea of what could have happened? Maybe I ran into some kind of maximum recording time limit? But even so, I would have expected the recording to remain up to that time limit.

As it is, the entire exercise was useless and ended in big disappointment.

My confidence in this application is currently zero.

# 27 June 2009 at 5:16 pm

Daarken said:

Have you tried to sync it with itunes?
In itunes, goto your iphone, then goto music, select Voice Memos, and then click sync.
Check your voice memos and all your files should be there.
Good Luck

# 1 July 2009 at 2:03 am

hydrophilic said:

See here for solution: http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=9727495

# 14 July 2009 at 4:24 pm

amalee said:

i can see my memo recording, but when i go to the list of recordings, my recording is present in the list, but won’t play back. it shows the duration as “0″ and i get nothing. any ideas…?

# 3 January 2010 at 6:35 am