The Default iPhone Ringtone Has a New Sound in iOS 26
Despite a lengthy WWDC keynote, Apple didn’t have time to advertise each and every new feature shipping with iOS 26. As such, we continue to learn about new features and smaller changes as beta testers explore the new OS. These testers have sniffed out one new addition that is small, but fun: Your iPhone is getting a new ringtone.
Technically, it’s getting a different version of an existing ringtone. At least, that’s how Apple apparently sees things: Following the release of iOS 26 beta 2, Apple has, for the first time, added an alternate version of one of its signature ringtones—specifically, “Reflection,” the default iOS ringtone that Apple originally introduced with the iPhone X. Provided Apple doesn’t change things between now and the release of the final version of iOS 26, once you’ve upgraded you’ll find a drop down arrow next to “Reflection” in your phone’s ringtones settings. Tap that, and you’ll see two options: “Default,” which is the familiar tone, and “Alt 1.” That’s your new ringtone.
What’s perhaps more interesting than the tone itself is the fact that keen beta observers actually found it buried in the first beta for iOS 26: While Alt 1 wasn’t an option in the Ringtones settings, the sound file itself was present in the IPSW file for the operating system, as this X user discovered on June 18. You can hear the ringtone itself in the embedded post:
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I do hear similarities between the Alt 1 and Default versions of Reflection, but, to be honest, Alt 1 sounds unique enough to my ear to deserve its own entry. Apple could have called this “Rumination” or “Refraction” or anything really, and I don’t think many would have complained that it sounded too close to the existing default ringtone.
What do you think so far?
To be fair, though, Alt 1 is a pretty cool name for a ringtone. And who knows—Apple could change the name or make it a separate entry before the OS is officially released. It could also add more alternate tones, or delete Alt 1 entirely. We won’t know until the final version of iOS 26 rolls out this fall.
