How to Make Sound Effects for a Video
You want to make sound effects for a video: a whoosh when the scene changes, a thud when a box lands, rain behind an outdoor scene. Sound libraries have hundreds of options, and scrolling through them for the one that fits takes ages.
Written by AI Sound Effects Team7 min readUpdated
Most guides jump straight to dragging a sound file into your video editor. They skip the harder part: getting the right sound. That’s why sound effects often feel off in a video: they last too long, they don’t match what’s on screen, or a scene that needs sound has none.
To make sound effects for a video, watch it with the sound off and write down every moment that needs a sound, like a door closing or a scene change. Then make each sound by recording a real object or typing a description into an AI sound effect generator. Keep each sound as long as its moment: 1 to 2 seconds for a door slam, the whole scene for rain.
What Sound Effects Does Your Video Need?
Most videos need three kinds of sound: sounds for actions on screen, sounds for scene changes, and background sound under each scene. Listing them before you make anything keeps you from making sounds you won’t use.
Watch your video once with the sound off and write down every moment that should make a noise, with the time it happens.
Actions. Anything that touches, lands, opens or breaks on screen: a phone set on a desk, a door closing, a ball bouncing. Each one gets its own short sound that starts exactly when the action happens.
Scene changes. A whoosh or swipe when the video jumps to a new place or topic, or when text pops up. Use them sparingly: a whoosh on every change gets tiring fast.
Background. Rain, a busy café, wind, a city street: a quiet, steady sound that makes a scene feel like a real place. It plays for the whole scene.
Recording, Libraries, or AI: Three Ways to Make Sound Effects
Once you have your list, there are three ways to get each sound: record it yourself, download one from a sound library, or generate one from a description. Record when you have the object at hand, download when a common sound will do, and generate when you need something specific or impossible to record.
Recording is how films do it. According to Berklee College of Music, Foley artists, who create the everyday sounds in movies, use props to record footsteps, a sword being drawn from a sheath, or clothing swishing as people walk past. Their tricks are surprising: pinecones for cracking knuckles, inflated kitchen gloves slapped together for flapping wings. The CBC points out that the velociraptor hatching in Jurassic Park is a Foley artist squishing an ice cream cone.
Libraries are the fastest, but every sound in them was made for someone else’s scene. Berklee notes that even with libraries of thousands of sound effects, editors still struggle to create sounds that must perfectly match the action on screen. Generating fills that gap: you describe the exact sound you need and get one made for that sentence.
How to Make a Sound Effect for Each Moment
Each sound takes four steps, and the description you write in the first one does most of the work.
Name the source, the action, and the place.
“Mug set down on a wooden desk in a quiet office” tells you, or an AI, what to make. “Thud” doesn’t. The surface and the room change the sound as much as the object does.
Record it or generate it.
To record, pick a quiet room, switch off fans and the fridge, and hold your phone or mic close to the prop. To generate, type the same description into a sound effect generator. That sentence is exactly what you’d give AI Sound Effects.
Make a few versions.
Record or generate each sound two or three times. Real sounds never repeat exactly, so the second or third version often fits better, and spares keep repeated footsteps or clicks from sounding copied.
Play it with your video.
Listen to the sound while the video plays, not on its own. A sound that’s great alone can feel too loud, too clean or too slow once it’s under the picture.
How Long Should a Sound Effect Be?
A sound effect should last as long as the moment it goes with: about 1 second for a tap or click, 1 to 2 seconds for a door slam or a whoosh, and the whole scene for background sound. The times you noted while watching give you the exact length.
Leave a little extra at the end of a slam or a crash so it can fade out naturally instead of stopping dead. A sound that cuts off suddenly sounds like a mistake, unless the silence is the point.
When a scene is longer than your sound, make the background in parts, or pick a sound that can repeat without anyone noticing, like steady rain or a fan humming, and loop it. Add one-off moments like a thunderclap or a passing car as separate sounds on top.
How to Make Background Sound for a Video
Background sound, often called ambience, is the quiet layer that tells viewers where a scene happens: rain on a window, a café’s murmur, wind across a field. Without it, jumping from a kitchen to a beach can feel like nothing changed.
Describe the place plus one or two details: “busy café with soft chatter and cups clinking” or “night forest with crickets and a distant owl.” More than two extra sounds crowd one clip, so make those separately and layer them in your editor.
Keep it low. Background sound should sit under dialogue and music, so viewers notice it only when it stops.
How AI Sound Effects Helps with Video Sound Effects
Take a line from your list, like “mug set down on a wooden desk in a quiet office,” type it under Describe your sound on the Generate screen, and tap Generate. The sound appears under Your sound, ready to play. For a starting point, Try an idea has ready-made prompts like Thunder, City and Ocean.
Set Duration from 1 to 12 seconds to fit the moment, 1 second for the mug and longer for background sound, or leave it on Auto Duration. Lower Creativity when the sound has to match your words closely. Every sound is saved to your Library, so you can compare versions, then use Save to Files or Share to send the one you keep to your video editor.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can I make sound effects on my phone?
Yes. You can record sound effects with your phone’s voice memo app by holding it close to a prop in a quiet room, or generate them from a description with an app like AI Sound Effects on iPhone or Android. Recording captures the real object; generating is faster when the sound is hard to perform, like a spaceship door or a magic spell.
Is there a free sound effect generator?
Yes. AI Sound Effects is free to try on iPhone and Android with limited free credits, and Pro adds unlimited sound effects and better sound quality. You type a description such as “glass bottle rolling across a tiled floor,” pick a length from 1 to 12 seconds or let the app choose, and get a new sound you can save or share.
Can I use AI sound effects in my videos?
Sound effects generated in AI Sound Effects may be used for personal and commercial purposes. Other generators and sound libraries set their own terms, which can differ between free and paid plans, so check them before you publish a video that uses their sounds.
Sources and further reading
These links are for further reading.
- Foley Artist (Berklee College of Music)
- Film 101: Need to break some bones? Or hatch a dinosaur egg? Call the foley artist! (CBC Arts)
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