An ambient sound mixer for sleep, focus and calm
This ambient sound mixer lets you build your own background soundscape: gentle rain sounds, rolling thunder, wind, ocean waves, a crackling fire, forest birds, the murmur of a café, a steady fan, and white, pink or brown noise. Switch on as many as you like, set each one’s volume, and the mix plays continuously without loops or gaps you can learn to hear.
Use it to fall asleep, mask a noisy flat or office, help a baby settle, or stay focused while you study or work. One tap starts a preset — Sleep, Focus, Storm, Beach, Campfire or Forest — and the sleep timer fades everything out gently so the sudden silence does not wake you.
Nothing is streamed: every sound is generated live in your browser with the Web Audio API, so the page uses almost no data and keeps working if the connection drops.
How to use the Ambient Sound Mixer
- Press a Preset, or tap any sound card to switch it on. Playback starts on your first tap.
- Drag each card’s slider to balance the mix. Moving a slider up also switches that sound on.
- Set the overall level with Master volume; Mute silences everything without losing your mix.
- For sleep, choose a time under Sleep timer and press Start timer. The last part fades out, then the sound stops.
- Your mix and volumes are remembered in this browser, so next time you only need to press Play.
Ambient Sound Mixer features
Eleven generated sounds
Rain with individual droplets, thunder with distant and close strikes, gusting wind, surging waves, fire with pops, three kinds of birdsong, café chatter with cup clinks, a fan with mains hum, and three noise colours.
Never the same twice
Random events — each raindrop, crackle, bird call and thunder roll — are scheduled fresh, so there is no repeating loop for your brain to latch onto.
Six presets
Sleep, Focus, Storm, Beach, Campfire and Forest are starting points; adjust them and your changes are saved automatically.
Fading sleep timer
From 5 minutes to 8 hours. The fade lasts one tenth of the time, at least 10 seconds and at most a minute.
Tiny data use
With no audio files to download, an hour of rain costs no more data than loading the page once.
Calm visual
Soft coloured waves move with the overall level; they stop when you pause and stay still if you prefer reduced motion.
White, pink and brown noise compared
The three noise colours contain every audible frequency but in different proportions. Which one feels best is personal; many people find pink or brown noise less harsh than white noise for sleep. For a single noise with more colours and an EQ, try the noise generator.
| Noise | Spectrum | Sounds like | Often used for |
|---|---|---|---|
| White | Equal energy per hertz (flat) | Hiss of an untuned radio | Masking speech, tinnitus relief |
| Pink | −3 dB per octave | Steady rain, rustling leaves | Sleep, focus, audio testing |
| Brown | −6 dB per octave | Deep roar, distant waterfall | Deep sleep, low-frequency masking |
How the sounds are synthesised
Rain is pink noise shaped by filters, with a stream of tiny filtered noise bursts for the drops, timed randomly at about 32 per second. Thunder is brown noise under a falling low-pass filter with several rolling peaks. Waves raise and lower the volume and brightness of brown noise in slow cycles of 7–12 seconds, with a hiss of foam at each crest. Fire combines a low roar with sharp crackles and occasional pops, and birdsong is made from rapid sine-wave chirps, trills and two-note whistles.
The café murmur comes from five “talkers” — band-limited noise with a speech-like rhythm — plus the odd cup clink; no real conversation is recorded, so nothing can be understood. The fan adds a 100 Hz hum (the second harmonic of 50 Hz mains used in India, the UK and Europe).
Tips for better sleep and focus
- Keep the volume low — softer than a quiet conversation — and measure it at your pillow with the decibel meter.
- For study sessions, pair a Focus mix with the Pomodoro timer.
- On phones, keep this tab in front and the screen on, or the browser may pause audio.
- Ambient sound is not a medical treatment. For persistent sleep problems or tinnitus, talk to a doctor.
Ambient Sound Mixer FAQ
Is this ambient sound mixer free?
Yes — free, without an account, ads in the player or limits on listening time.
Can I play rain sounds all night?
Yes. Leave the timer off and the rain keeps playing until you pause it. On phones, keep the screen awake and the tab open; some browsers pause audio when the phone locks.
Does it use a lot of data?
No. There are no recordings to stream — the sounds are generated on your device — so once the page has loaded, listening uses practically no data.
Which sound is best for sleeping?
Pink or brown noise, steady rain and a fan are popular because they are smooth and continuous. Thunder and birds have sudden events, which some people find relaxing and others find distracting.
Why did the sound stop by itself?
Either the sleep timer ended, or your phone suspended the browser when the screen locked. Press Play to start again.
Is it safe for babies?
Keep the volume low and the speaker well away from the cot. A 2014 study in the journal Pediatrics found that many infant sleep machines can exceed the 50 dB limit used for hospital nurseries, and advised placing them far from the baby at low volume. Ask your health visitor or paediatrician if unsure.