Uploading MP3 Files to Waze's Custom Voice Navigation Feature Without a Smartphone (2024+)

[pipeeeeees]

Uploading mp3 files to Waze has been attempted for well over a decade now. For me personally, it started with trying to get Morgan Freeman's voice back on my iPhone 5 in 2014 by jailbreaking the device and using ifunbox to swap audio files. It worked, but times have changed. Jailbreaking is harder these days. Nobody wants to go through the hassle. Plus new features such as the now mature Custom Voice Directions in Waze has made sharing voices extremely easy with the share of a link. There are some limitations though. Namely:

1. you cannot upload mp3 files in the mobile app. To do it the normal way, it must be recorded with your mobile device microphone (which could be crappy).
2. the app also heavily compresses the audio file which makes playback sound muffled.

Old tutorials are outdated and no longer work. There are a slew of people over the years who have attempted to get it working and do, but lose passion over the years and go internet quiet (I'm starting to become that way with my involvement with the Waze voicepacks area)... then no longer work and the cycle continues... so I decided to create this internet discussion post for those present and future to read and learn from. Without further ado, here is how you can upload MP3 files onto Waze without a smartphone

What you will need

1. a computer with OS capable of running an android emulator (so at least a dual core processor, 8GB ram but more is recommended, an OK GPU)
2. internet connection
3. patience

Overview

The process is as follows:

1. Download an android emulator on the PC that is capable of rooting. Bluestacks 5 (NOT 10) is capable of this and is what I use.
2. Root the android emulation to grant you access to the root files.
3. We will want to download an app from the playstore in the emulation to allow us to navigate the root file system (I use the solid explorer app... there is a free trial and I paid for it after... use whatever root fs you want for this as long as you can copy paste files).
4. Download the waze app in the emulation and make a new custom voice (no need to log in, and best if you do not - you can screw up your personal account in unexpected ways I found).
5. Fill every voice line with like 1 second of audio. I found it helpful to make a macro to auto record 1 second audio for all phrases just because ive done this hundreds of times. This step can be mindless and time consuming otherwise. After recording every phrase with some short audio, SAVE and name the pack to what you want. (This uploads valid audio files to Waze's servers and "makes room" as I call it). DO NOT FORGET: if you want the voice to have both miles and meters unit directions available, you need to save and go to settings and change the metric from meters to miles / vice versa and go back to record 1 second of audio for miles or meters.
6. Next (and this is important) open back up your custom voice pack for editing/recording and leave it running in the background. This menu gives the mp3 files write access for you to swap the mp3 files so it must stay running in the background on the editing menu. Otherwise it won't work
7. while step 6 is running in the background, switch to your root file system app and go to the following directory: root/data/user/0/com.waze/waze/custom_prompts_temp
8. in that directory are all the 1 second audio files we just recorded and will want to replace. with write access enabled in step 6, go ahead and use your root file system explorer app to replace those mp3 files with the desired mp3 files you want (and only those mp3 files matched with exact same naming. if you add extras, it will likely not work... for instance if you did not record 1 second audio for the 200.mp3 or any other mile mp3 file and then add it in without the 1 second audio files first being present on Waze's servers, the waze app will catch the discrepancy and reject your changes.. from my experience). A full list of all phrase file names are here.
9. go back to the waze app which should have had the edit screen up in the background and just scroll from top to bottom to top again. I think this step is important as updating the screen elements while scrolling seems to save the files during write access, but I do not remember if this really matters or not. Just do it if you're not trying to start back to step 5 again... but you may be ok not scrolling top to bottom to top.
10. save the voicepack.
11. you should be able to share the pack now.

• If the share button goes gray and you cannot share the pack OR if you can share it but only the 1 second audio clips are playable from another device using the share link, then you have screwed up the upload to Waze's servers. They rejected your new mp3 files. The most common reason for this is the collective filesize of all mp3 files is too large. 0.8MB is the limit their servers will accept for the aggregate filesize of all mp3 files in a custom voicepack. If all of the uploaded files exceed this, usually their server rejects your modified mp3 files and the share button will go gray right after saving. The share link may turn blue when leaving and that menu and returning and sharing the link, but you will find the voicelines do not download to anyone else using the line.
• This is why I made this python script to optimize the filesizes of each mp3 to maximize audio quality while staying under that 0.8MB aggregate filesize limit: https://github.com/pipeeeeees/waze-voicepack-links/blob/main/conversion/converter.py - other ways for less python/code savvy users is to reduce the bitrate of each audio file (try limiting to 50k bitrate... anything below 32k becomes hard to listen to) or shortening the long audio files with a computer app like Audacity (there is no limit on length of mp3s per voice phrase that I found... but longer mp3's have a much larger filesize)

Important thing to keep in mind is Waze offers this Custom Voice Direction feature FOR FREE. So please do not abuse this. Storing all of our audio files to their servers is not free for them... this is why they compress and make the audio quality so bad to save storage space and save money. If they were to get upset, they have fiscal justification already to axe this feature. They have a track record of making this process of uploading mp3 files backdoor style harder already, so yeah. Be appreciative, fellow wazers!