pink noise generator

what does pink noise sound like?

pink noise sits between the bright hiss of white noise and the low rumble of brown. it carries equal energy in every octave, so each step down in pitch holds as much power as the one above it. to most ears that comes out as steady rain on a roof, wind moving through trees, or surf heard from further up the beach. it is gentler on the ears than white noise and has more body in the middle range than brown.

how does the browser make pink noise?

the page starts from white noise, a new random value for every sample, and runs it through a small bank of simple filters, each one smoothing a different stretch of the spectrum. summed together, they tilt the sound so its power drops by about 3 decibels per octave, the signature of pink noise. the recipe is a well-known approximation shared by the audio programmer Paul Kellet, and it runs inside your browser's own audio engine, so nothing streams from a server while you listen.

how loud should you play pink noise?

aim for a level that softens background chatter without drowning it out completely. for comparison, the US National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health sets its workplace limit at 85 decibels averaged over an 8-hour day, and a background sound for reading or sleeping has no reason to get anywhere close to that. if you would need to raise your voice to talk over it, it is too loud. on headphones, start the slider near the bottom and nudge it up.

pink noise or brown noise?

mostly taste. people who find brown noise muddy or boomy often settle on pink, and people who find white noise sharp often land here as the middle option. pink noise also turns up in some small sleep studies, though those findings are early. the quickest way to choose is to switch colors with the buttons under the player and keep whichever one you stop noticing first. brown vs pink vs white noise compares all three properly.