Brown Noise vs White Noise
Brown noise vs white noise comes down to where the energy sits: white noise spreads it evenly across every frequency and sounds like bright hiss, while brown noise piles it into the bass and sounds like a low rumble. You can hear both side by side in our Noise Generator. Pink noise sits between them. Which one suits you depends mostly on what you're trying to cover up and how much treble you can put up with.
If you want the background on brown noise itself (where the name comes from, how it's built), start with What Is Brown Noise?. This article is about comparing the colours and picking one.
White vs pink vs brown noise at a glance
| White noise | Pink noise | Brown noise | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Spectrum | Flat: equal power per hertz | Falls 3 dB per octave | Falls 6 dB per octave |
| Power law | Constant | 1/f | 1/f² |
| Where the energy sits | Weighted toward the treble (each octave up holds twice as many hertz) | Equal energy in every octave | Concentrated in the bass |
| Sounds like | Hiss, radio static, a fan up close | Steady rain, wind through trees | Distant waterfall, heavy surf, an aircraft cabin |
| Masks best | Speech, sharp and high-pitched sounds | A broad mix of everyday noise | Low rumble: traffic, HVAC, a neighbour's bass |
| Listening feel | Bright; some people find it harsh | Balanced | Soft and dark |
The decibel figures are per octave, the musical unit where each step doubles the frequency. If the arithmetic is unfamiliar, What Is a Decibel (dB)? explains why a 6 dB drop means a quarter of the power.
How the spectrum differs
All three colours are random noise covering the whole audible frequency range. What changes is the tilt.
White noise has the same power in every 1 Hz slice. That sounds neutral, but your hearing works in octaves, and the octave from 10 kHz to 20 kHz contains 10,000 hertz while the octave from 20 Hz to 40 Hz contains only 20. So white noise ends up sounding treble-heavy to a human listener.
Brown noise is tilted the other way, losing 6 dB with every octave you climb. The bass dominates and the top end is faint. In bass, mid and treble terms it's nearly all bass.
You can see this for yourself. Play each colour from the Noise Generator into the Audio Spectrum Analyzer through your speakers and microphone. White noise reads roughly flat, and brown noise slopes steeply down toward the treble. The mic and the room will colour the picture a little, but the difference is obvious.
Pink noise vs brown noise: the middle option
Pink noise drops 3 dB per octave, half of brown's slope. That works out to equal energy in every octave, which is close to how we hear, so it tends to sound balanced. There's still some hiss on top, but it isn't harsh.
When people compare pink noise vs brown noise, the question is usually how much high end they want. Pink still has enough treble to cover voices reasonably well. Brown gives that up for a smoother, deeper sound. If white is too sharp and brown feels muffled, try pink.
Which masks what
Masking works best when the noise has energy in the same frequency range as the sound you want to hide.
- Voices and conversation. Most of what makes speech intelligible sits in the mids and upper mids. White and pink noise put real energy there, so they tend to cover chatter better than brown does.
- Sharp, high sounds. Clinking dishes, a beeping appliance, a squeaky door. Again, white has the most energy where these live.
- Low rumble. Road traffic, an air conditioner, a fridge hum, footsteps or bass through a ceiling. Brown noise is strong in exactly that range, so it can cover these at a lower overall volume.
- Snoring. Snoring is mostly low-to-mid frequency, so brown or pink is worth trying first. Results vary from person to person.
Which sounds louder at the same volume
At the same volume setting, white noise usually sounds louder and more intrusive than brown. Human hearing is most sensitive in the upper mids, roughly 2 to 5 kHz, and white noise has far more energy there than brown does. Brown puts its energy into the bass, where our ears are less sensitive.
In practice, then, don't compare colours at the same slider position. Set each one to whatever level just covers the sound you're dealing with, and keep that level as low as works.
Brown noise vs white noise for sleep
There's no settled answer to which colour is better for sleep. Research on steady noise and sleep exists, but it's limited and the results are mixed, and some of the studies most often cited look at pink noise rather than brown or white. None of these is a medical treatment. If you have ongoing trouble sleeping or with your hearing, talk to a doctor.
What tends to matter more than the colour:
- Choose by the noise you're masking. Traffic or HVAC rumble points to brown. A partner talking or TV through the wall points to pink or white.
- Choose by comfort. Many people find brown easier to fall asleep to because it lacks the hiss. Others find it too boomy and prefer pink.
- Keep the volume moderate. You're listening for hours, so set it no louder than it needs to be.
- Use a timer. If you only need help falling asleep, there's no reason to play noise all night.
Making brown noise from white noise
Brown noise is, mathematically, the integral of white noise: each sample is the last one plus a small random step. The Noise Generator works this way. It feeds white noise through a leaky integrator, a random walk that's gently pulled back toward zero so it can't drift away. Pink noise uses a different filter, Paul Kellet's refined design, to get its −3 dB/octave slope.
If you only have white noise, you can get a darker sound by cutting the highs with EQ or a low-pass filter. That won't match brown noise's exact slope across the whole range, but it moves the sound in the same direction.
Trying them in the Noise Generator
The Noise Generator synthesises all three colours in code, so it doesn't fetch an audio file to play, and your audio never leaves your device. Brown is selected by default.
- Colour: switch between white, pink and brown to compare them directly.
- Volume: a slider to set the level.
- Soften highs: a low-pass filter slider from 300 Hz up to 20 kHz (where it reads Off). Pull it down to darken any colour, so you can make white noise softer or brown noise even deeper.
- Sleep timer: Off, 15, 30 or 60 minutes.
- Playback: a seamless 12-second loop, so there's no audible seam.
- Export: save a loopable clip of 30 seconds, 1, 5 or 10 minutes as WAV, MP3 or Opus. Opus depends on your browser.
A good way to choose: start on brown, switch to pink, then white, each at a level that just covers the sound in your room. Most people know within a minute which one they can live with.
Frequently asked questions
Is brown noise or white noise better for sleep?
Neither is proven better. The research on noise and sleep is limited and mixed, and noise isn't a medical treatment. Many people find brown noise more comfortable because it has no harsh hiss, while white noise can do a better job of covering voices. Pick the one that masks your particular noise at a moderate volume, and use a sleep timer.
Which masks voices and snoring better, brown or white noise?
White and pink noise usually cover voices better because they have more energy in the mid and upper frequencies where speech sits. Snoring and other low rumble are mostly lower in pitch, so brown or pink noise is often the better first try.
Is pink noise in between brown and white noise?
Yes. White noise is flat per hertz, pink noise falls 3 dB per octave and brown noise falls 6 dB per octave. Pink has equal energy in every octave, so it sounds more balanced than white and brighter than brown.
Why does white noise sound louder than brown noise at the same volume?
Human hearing is most sensitive around 2 to 5 kHz, and white noise has much more energy in that region than brown noise does. Brown noise puts most of its energy in the bass, where the ear is less sensitive, so it tends to sound quieter and softer at the same setting.
Can I make brown noise from white noise?
Yes. Brown noise is white noise integrated over time, a random walk where each sample adds a small random step to the last. Cutting the highs from white noise with a low-pass filter or EQ also darkens it, though that only approximates brown noise's exact slope.