Brown noise for sleep

How sound masking works

A quiet room makes every new sound stand out. A steady background sound reduces the contrast between that baseline and intermittent noises around you. Brown noise emphasizes lower frequencies, so many listeners find it softer than the brighter hiss of white noise.

This is masking, not soundproofing: it changes how prominent another sound seems, but it does not remove the sound itself.

What the evidence says

Research specifically testing brown noise for sleep is limited. Evidence about other steady sounds cannot establish that brown noise improves sleep or that it works better than white noise, pink noise, or silence. The most accurate reason to try it is personal preference: a continuous low sound may make your room feel more consistent.

For an independent clinical overview, see the Cleveland Clinic’s guide to brown noise.

Set up the sound before settling down

• Start with Deep Brown at a low, comfortable volume. Leave Movement off if you prefer a fixed tone.
• Listen from your usual position. Adjust Depth or Texture before raising the volume to cover the room.
• Choose a finite timer if you want sound only while settling down, or Endless if you want to stop it manually.
• Open Settings → Fade and choose Fade In and Fade Out. For example, a 10-second fade-in and a 5-minute fade-out make the start and ending gradual.

Using Brown FM at night

Brown FM generates continuous noise on your iPhone while you listen. You can adjust depth, texture, space, and movement, save a preferred sound, and set a timer from the app, a widget, Control Center, Siri, or Shortcuts. There is no repeating recording or track boundary.

Save your preferred tone in Sound so you can return to it without adjusting every slider. A bedtime shortcut can apply your sound and timer together.

Before a long session, check that playback continues with your screen locked and that your speaker or headphones have enough power. See the offline access requirements if you plan to leave the phone disconnected.

For traffic or voices, use the noisy-room guide. For other routines, return to the listening guide.