Make Siri say whatever you want every time you plug your iPhone into a charger

Whenever your iPhone is in ring mode, you’ll hear Apple’s iconic “Plug in Power”beep every time you plug it into a wired or wireless power source, which tells you charging has begun. There’s no way to turn off the sound without turning on silent mode, but there’s a way to have Siri automatically say whatever you want after a successful connection.

We’ve previously used this trick to play a custom sound or song whenever the iPhone is connected to or disconnected from the charger. But getting your iOS device to say a word or phrase every time power is detected can be an even better addition to Apple’s “connect_power.caf”charging beep.

Anything you can think of could be what your iPhone says out loud to you when plugged in or unplugged. It could be a funny line from a popular movie, lyrics from your favorite song, or an inspirational quote that you wish you could hear multiple times a day. This effect works even when your iPhone is in silent mode, so you don’t even have to listen to the beep with it.

Setting it up is as easy as creating automations in shortcuts. And it also works on iPadOS, so your iPad can speak on command while charging.

Requirements

• iOS 14 or later: This guide is based on the automation feature first introduced in iOS 14, so if you’re on iOS 14 or iOS 15, you’re good to go.
• Shortcuts App: If you uninstalled it for some reason, reinstall it from the App Store.

Launch new automation

Go to the Automation tab in the Shortcuts app, then click the plus sign (+) and then Create Personal Automation to get started. If you don’t see a plus (+), just click “Create Personal Automation”.

Select the “Charging”trigger.

You need a trigger to trigger an action, and in this case, that happens whenever you plug your iPhone into a power source. Scroll down the list of triggers, select “Charger”, then select one of the following options depending on what you want to achieve:

• Check Connected only if you want Siri to speak on first charge.
• Check the Disabled box only if you want Siri to speak when you stop charging.
• Check both if you want Siri to tell you when charging starts and stops.

Click “Next”to continue.

Add a Speak Text Action

All that’s left is to add an action to your automation so that Siri will speak every time the device is connected to the charger, unplugged, or both.

Click Add Action or the search bar, then type Speak. You should see Speak Text at the top of the list; tap it to add an action.

In the Speak Text action box, tap the blue Text circle to choose what you want Siri to say when the automation starts. It can be as short as you like. Capitalization doesn’t change Siri’s speech, so you can write in both uppercase and lowercase. However, punctuation matters. For example, use commas to create a short pause or a question mark to make it sound like a question.

If you want to customize the voice, change the language, or adjust the speed and pitch of how your iPhone speaks to you, tap the Show More (iOS 14) or arrow icon (iOS 15) and customize them to your liking. You can press the play button to see how it will sound.

If you want the automation to do more, you can add more actions. For example, you can have Siri speak and then immediately play a song or sound effect. Or you can add a “Wait”action to have Siri speak a set number of seconds after the power is connected or disconnected.

Turn off “Ask before launch”

When you’re done configuring your action(s), click next, disable “Ask before launch”and confirm by clicking “Don’t ask”in the prompt. This way shortcuts won’t ask you to run an automation every time it fires, which defeats the purpose of most automations. In iOS 15.4 and later, also make sure the “Notify at startup”setting is also disabled so that unnecessary alerts are not displayed.

Finally, click Finish and your automation is complete.

Connect your iPhone to a power source

Whether you connect your iPhone to a Lightning cable or wireless charger, or if your iPhone is set to “Silent”or “Ring”, you will hear Siri’s voice whenever you connect to a power source, disconnect from a source food, or both (depending on which you choose). A notification will appear alerting you that the automation is running, followed by whatever you typed. Below you can see the automation in action when connected to a Lightning cable connected to a power adapter.

Finding a problem

• Problem: Speak Text volume is barely audible when plugged into charger. This can happen even if the automation preview sounds fine, and even if you have your media and ringer/alert volume set high so that Siri sounds fine when you ask her questions. Solution: Ask Siri to “Volume Up”and then adjust the volume using the slider that appears.
• Problem: When connected to the charger, the word or phrase you select sounds like there is interference, such as an interrupted radio transmission or other type of interference. Solution. Update iOS to the latest version supported by your device.