The short version
| Color | Sounds like | Energy | People often use it for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Brown | Inside a plane at night, distant surf, a low rumble | Mostly low notes | Falling asleep, covering traffic and a neighbor's bass |
| Pink | Steady rain, wind in the trees | Even across the range | Sleep, a calm background |
| Green | A soft, rounded hush | The middle notes | A calm room, reading |
| White | A fan, TV static, a hiss | Mostly high notes, to our ears | Covering voices, a bright masking sound |
White noise
White noise has equal energy at every pitch. Because our ears hear many more high pitches than low ones, white noise sounds bright and hissy. Think of an old TV between channels, or a fan on high.
It's the classic sound machine sound, and it's good at covering voices and chatter, because speech sits in the middle and upper range. The downside: many people find it harsh. Words like “tinny,” “sharp” and “grating” come up again and again when people describe it.
Pink noise
Pink noise turns the high end down, so every octave has the same energy. It sounds balanced: softer than white, brighter than brown. People compare it to steady rain. It's the color sleep researchers have studied most. Here's what they found.
Brown noise
Brown noise turns the highs down even further. Most of its energy is in the low notes, so it sounds deep, round and soft. People describe it as a hotel air conditioner under a thick blanket, or the back seat of a car on a night drive. It went viral on TikTok in 2022, and it's the favorite for sleep among many people who find white noise too harsh. More on brown noise for sleep.
Green noise
Green noise is a newer name for noise centered on the middle of the range. It has neither the deep rumble of brown nor the bright hiss of white. Some people find it the calmest of all.
Which one covers what?
- Low rumbles (traffic, a neighbor's music, a washing machine, snoring): brown covers these best, because its energy sits in the same low range.
- Voices and TV: pink or white. In office studies, filtered pink noise covered nearby conversation and people liked it (Acta Acustica, 2011).
- Sudden sounds (a door, a car horn, a dog): any steady sound helps, because it makes the jump from quiet to loud smaller (Sleep Medicine, 2005).
- A mix of everything: try a blend between brown and pink.
Is one color better?
No study shows one color is better for everyone. A 2025 study found no difference in alertness between brown, pink and white noise (a 2025 preprint from University College London, not yet peer reviewed). Studies of focus suggest background noise affects people differently: some focus better, some worse (PLoS One, 2014). And no sleep lab has tested brown noise itself yet.
So the honest answer is: pick the one you like. If you can listen to it for an hour and stop noticing it, that's your color.
Why “made live” matters for every color
Most noise apps and videos play a recording on repeat. However good the recording, it has to end and start again, and at that seam many people hear a click, a gap or a repeating pattern. Brown Noise works out each tiny slice of sound just before you hear it. Nothing is a recording, so there's no loop to hear, in any color.
Hear them side by side
Reading about sound only gets you so far. Our free web player has one slider that blends from brown through pink and green to white. Slide it slowly while something noisy is going on around you, and stop where the noise disappears. That's your setting.