Fade in and fade out explained

A fade changes the volume gradually instead of starting or stopping abruptly. Fades hide hard edges, prevent clicks and make a cut clip feel finished. The audio cutter lets you add both, in seconds.

What a fade does

A fade in starts at silence and rises to the original volume over the time you choose. A fade out lowers the volume to silence at the end. In Sound Trimmer the level changes evenly across the fade, from zero to full or full to zero. If you set a fade to 0, there is no fade at that end.

Why a very short fade helps every cut

When you cut audio in the middle of a sound, the waveform can stop at a point that is not silent. That sudden jump is heard as a small click or pop. A fade of just 0.02 to 0.05 seconds at each end removes it without being audible as a fade. If your trimmed clip clicks at the start or end, this is the fix.

How long should a fade be?

Use	Fade in	Fade out
Any cut, to avoid clicks	0.02–0.05 s	0.02–0.05 s
Ringtone or alert	0.3–0.5 s	1–2 s
Speech or voice memo	0.1–0.3 s	0.3–0.5 s
Podcast intro music	0.5–1 s	2–4 s, under the voice
End of a song excerpt	none or short	3–8 s

These are starting points. Preview the clip and adjust by ear.

Tips for natural-sounding fades

Start a fade out on a phrase or bar line in music rather than mid-word or mid-note.
Keep fades shorter than about a third of the clip. Very long fades on a short clip make it sound quiet all the way through.
Speech rarely needs long fades. Trim close to the first and last words and use short fades.
Fade in and fade out can overlap on a very short clip. Where they overlap, both reductions apply, so the middle will be quieter than the original.

Fades and looping

A ringtone or background loop repeats from the end back to the start. A short fade out followed by a short fade in makes the repeat smooth. Without fades, the jump between the last and first sample can click on every repeat.

Reviewed October 2026 · How we write our guides · Suggest a correction