Noise removal · Mac and iPhone
How to remove background noise from a video on iPhone or Mac
Viewers forgive rough video long before they forgive rough audio, and a hum under your voice is the most common reason a good take sounds homemade.
Remove Noise and Polish Voice do different jobs and stack. Remove Noise takes away what is behind your voice; Polish Voice shapes the voice that is left. On a noisy take, run both.
- Mac and iPhone
- Free on every tier
Quick answer
To remove background noise from a video on iPhone or Mac, run Zella's Remove Noise: it strips steady background sound such as a fan, air conditioning, room hum or mic hiss from behind your voice, on your device. On iPhone it uses Apple's Voice Isolation engine and can be applied to one selected clip; on the Mac it is one click in the sidebar. To make the voice itself sound better afterwards, pair it with Polish Voice, the voice enhancer. Free on every tier.
How to do it in Zella
-
Step 1: Open the clip in the editor
Record or import the take you want to clean.
-
Step 2: Mac: click Remove Noise
In the sidebar, Remove Noise sits in the EVERY VIDEO band. One click cleans the steady background under your voice.
-
Step 3: iPhone: tap Remove Noise
Select a clip to clean only that clip, or run it on the whole video. It uses Apple's Voice Isolation engine without the studio voicing on top.
-
Step 4: Add Polish Voice
Run Polish Voice to de-ess, compress and bring the voice to about -14 LUFS. On the Mac the noise gate runs after the loudness stage, so raising the volume does not raise the hiss.
-
Step 5: Or do it all in one tap
Auto-Polish removes noise and polishes the voice as part of its full edit, once every cut is in place, so the clean audio lines up with the final timeline.
Why do it this way
Aimed at the steady stuff
Fans, air conditioning, room hum and microphone hiss are what Remove Noise is built to take out.
Clean one clip, not all
On iPhone, apply Remove Noise or Polish Voice to a single noisy clip and leave the rest of the edit alone.
Private and free
Audio processing runs on your Mac or iPhone. Nothing is uploaded, and it is free on every tier.
What you need
- macOS 14 Sonoma or later (Apple Silicon or Intel), or iPhone on iOS 18 or later
- Free on every tier: no watermark, exports up to 2 minutes at 1080p
Questions
What is the difference between Remove Noise and Polish Voice?
Remove Noise strips the steady background behind your voice. Polish Voice shapes the voice itself: rumble control, de-essing, compression and an even loudness of about -14 LUFS. On a noisy take, run both.
Can it remove music or other people talking?
Remove Noise is built for steady background sound such as fans, hum and hiss. How much it reduces music or other voices depends on the recording, so check the result before you export.
Is my audio uploaded?
No. Noise removal runs on your device on both platforms.
Does it work on Intel Macs?
Yes. Remove Noise and Polish Voice behave the same on Intel and Apple Silicon Macs.
Related tools