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Suomi
No single sound is best for sleep. Choose one you stop noticing, keep it just loud enough to soften the room, put the speaker across the room, and decide whether it should fade out on a timer or play until morning.
Pick a sound you stop noticing
A good background sound fades from attention. Steady sounds with nothing happening in them, such as noise or a fan, are easier to stop noticing than sounds with events in them, such as thunder, birdsong or waves that break unevenly.
Darker or brighter
Dark sounds put their energy low and sound soft; bright sounds hiss. Between 2 and 12 kHz, Deep brown falls 3.4 dB per octave, while White static rises 1.6 dB per octave. Both are free in Hush, so it is easy to try one of each on different nights.
Keep the volume low
The sound only needs to soften other noise, not cover it completely. Keep it at a comfortable level, put a speaker across the room rather than beside the pillow, and avoid sleeping in headphones at a high volume.
Decide how it ends
Some people use a timer with a fade so the sound ends after they fall asleep; others leave it playing until morning. If you wake when a sound stops, playing it until you stop it may suit you better.
Steady or moving
Steady sounds, the noise colours and fans, give you nothing to follow, which helps if your mind tends to latch on to sounds. Moving sounds, rain and surf, give you something to listen to, which some people find soothing and others find keeps them awake. If you are unsure, try one of each on different nights.
Longer reads
The blog goes further into the most searched choices: what colour noise is best for sleep, pink noise and what the studies tested, whether brown noise is good for sleep and green noise for sleep.
