Customise your Shoretel Handset Ringtone – Single Handset

ShoreTel (Mitel) IP phones support fully custom ringtones per handset, on top of the built-in default tones — useful for helping people identify their own extension in a busy open-plan office by ear.

Steps

1. Log on to your ShoreTel HQ server as an administrator.
2. Navigate to:

   C:\inetpub\ftproot

3. Create a new folder here called ringers.
4. Convert your custom audio into the correct ShoreTel WAV format first — standard WAV exports from other tools generally aren’t in the exact format ShoreTel phones expect, so this conversion step isn’t optional.
5. Copy your converted WAV file(s) into the ringers folder.
6. Create a plain text file in the root of ftproot named:

   shore_001049xxxxxx.txt

   where xxxxxx is the last six digits of the target handset’s MAC address.
7. Paste the following into that text file, adjusting the IP address and filename:

WaveRinger1 L/r12 xx.x.x.xx/ringers/yyyyy.wav
WaveRinger2 L/r13 xx.x.x.xx/ringers/yyyyy.wav

Where xx.x.x.xx is your ShoreTel HQ server’s IP address and yyyyy.wav is your custom ringtone file’s name.

8. Save the file and log off the HQ server.
9. Reboot the target handset — it will pull the new configuration and ringtone on next boot.

If you’re rolling this out to many handsets rather than just one, look at ShoreTel’s bulk/multi-model ringtone customisation approach instead, since this per-MAC-address method doesn’t scale well past a handful of phones.

Worth Knowing Before You Do This Today (Updated for 2026)

This still works the same way on current ShoreTel (Mitel MiVoice Connect) deployments, but it’s worth knowing where the platform stands: add-on and security-patch sales for MiVoice Connect stopped at the end of 2024, extended licence/design support ended at the end of 2025, and full support is scheduled to run through 2029. None of that affects this per-handset ringtone customisation directly, but it’s a reasonable point to start planning a longer-term migration if you haven’t already.

Resources

• guide
• Convert Shoretel WAV Files