How to Take a Slofie on an iPhone

A slofie is a selfie video recorded in slow motion, usually on a smartphone with a front-facing camera with a slow motion feature enabled. The term is a combination of selfie and slow motion and really only came into common usage when Apple began marketing the slo-mo feature on the iPhone 11, 11 Max, and 11 Pro Max handsets in late-2019.

While also a fun way to pass the time, slofies are mostly used as a popular way to spice up social media posts or to create an entertaining and attention-grabbing profile video on social networks such as TikTok and Facebook.

How to Make a Slow Motion iPhone Selfie Video

Making a slofie is fairly straightforward with the process being familiar to anyone who has ever recorded a front-facing video on their iPhone before.

To make a slo mo selfie the official Apple slofie way, you’ll need a slo mo iPhone model such as the iPhone 11, iPhone 11 Max, or an iPhone 11 Pro Max. The iOS 13 operating system or higher is also required.

A woman in a yellow top taking a slow motion selfie/slofie on her iPhone. — GettyImages/Westend61

Here’s how to make a slow motion video iPhone slofie.

Open the Camera app on your iPhone.
Tap the rotate icon to switch to the front-facing iPhone camera.
Swipe along the menu at the bottom of the screen until you get to the Slo-Mo setting.
Record your video as usual. Once you’re done, your slofie video will be available within the Photos app and can be edited, watched, or shared just like other videos you’ve made.

How to Make a Slofie Without a Front-Facing Slow Motion Camera

If you don’t have a slofie iPhone 11 smartphone model and you still want to create a slow motion selfie video, there’s actually a really simple alternative; use the rear-facing camera.

The rear-facing camera is the one that points away from you when you’re taking a regular photo on your iPhone.

iPhone models from the iPhone 5S up to the iPhone X all have slo-mo options for the rear-facing camera and all you need to do is ask a friend to record a slo-mo video of you and frame it as if it was a selfie. You can even pretend to hold onto the phone while it’s recording to really create the illusion of you taking the video yourself.

How to Make a Slofie on an iPhone Without Any Slow Motion Cameras

If your iPhone model doesn’t have any slow motion cameras, all hope isn’t lost. You can still record a video selfie and then convert it into slow motion afterwards by using the free iMovie app.

Converting a regular video into a slo-mo one can result in a jittery final product as videos recorded at regular speed have less frames than those recorded in slow motion.

Here’s how to make a video slow motion on iPhone models without the slow motion front-facing or rear-facing camera.

Open the Camera app and record your selfie video as usual.
Once you're done, close the Camera app and open iMovie.

iMovie comes pre-installed on most Apple devices so you should already have it somewhere on your iPhone. If you can’t find it, say “Hey, Siri. Open iMovie.”
Tap + to start a new project.
Tap Movie.
Tap on the video you want to edit.
Tap the video timeline to bring up the edit tools.
Tap the clock icon.
Drag the speed marker towards the tortoise to create the slo mo camera effect.

Alternatively, you can move it towards the hare to speed the video up.
Tap Done.
Tap the share icon to send your new slofie to an app or to save it to your device.

How Do You Pronounce Slofie?

The correct pronunciation is “slo-fee” due to it being a combination of the words “slo-mo,” itself an abbreviation of “slow motion,” and “selfie.”

Of course, if you feel silly saying the word out loud, you can always refer to these videos as “slow motion videos” or “slow motion selfies” and no one will think badly of you.