Noise for Tinnitus

What works for tinnitus, briefly

The most evidence-supported non-medication approach to tinnitus is sound therapy paired with cognitive-behavioural therapy. Sound therapy reduces the perceptual contrast between your tinnitus and the silent environment, giving your auditory system something else to attend to. CBT addresses the distress component, which is often the part that interferes most with sleep and concentration. Either alone helps some people; the combination helps more, in most clinical studies. None of it cures tinnitus — the goal is reducing the impact, not eliminating the sound.

For acute or worsening tinnitus, see an audiologist or ENT first. The information on this page isn't a replacement for a clinical evaluation. If your tinnitus is sudden, asymmetric (one ear worse than the other), or accompanied by hearing loss, that's worth getting checked out promptly.

Why pink noise is the usual starting point

Pure white noise (flat across the spectrum) sounds bright and hissy. Most people find it harder to tolerate for long sessions, especially before sleep. Pink noise rolls off at −3 dB/oct, putting more of the energy into mid and low frequencies where the human ear is less sensitive to fatigue. It feels more like rainfall or a steady waterfall. For overnight tinnitus relief, pink is the most common starting point in clinical settings.

If your tinnitus is high-pitched (most common — often described around 4 kHz to 8 kHz), pink masks it well because pink still has audible high-frequency energy. If your tinnitus is low-pitched, brown noise (−6 dB/oct, deeper rumble) may suit better. Try both. Listen for the level at which the tinnitus becomes less prominent without you having to "push" the volume up.

How to use this page

1. Press play. Pink is selected by default.
2. Adjust the volume slider so the noise sits at or just below the perceived level of your tinnitus — not louder. This is the mixing point, the level audiologists usually recommend.
3. Use the warm ↔ bright slider to match your tinnitus character. High-pitched, hissy tinnitus often masks better with the slider toward bright. Low-pitched, rumbling tinnitus often masks better with the slider toward warm.
4. Try the brown preset if pink doesn't suit. Try the Velvet or Cathedral themed soundscapes if pure noise feels clinical — both are reverberant variants that some tinnitus listeners prefer.
5. If you want the page to listen to your room and tune itself, tap tune to your room. The mic listens for ten seconds, the audio is analysed locally, and the recording is discarded immediately.

How long should I listen?

Most sound-therapy protocols recommend 30 to 60 minutes per day initially, with many people gravitating toward continuous overnight listening. The key constraint is volume: keep it at or below your tinnitus level, ideally below 60 dB SPL for prolonged exposure. Headphone listening at higher volumes for many hours is the main hearing-protection concern. If you're sleeping with earbuds in, especially.

Habituation — the process where your auditory system stops giving the tinnitus extra weight — takes weeks to months. The first few sessions might feel disappointing; the cumulative effect over weeks is what most people describe as helpful.

Why procedural matters for tinnitus

Recorded sound-therapy tracks loop. Most YouTube and Spotify "tinnitus relief" tracks are short audio files (often 8 to 30 minutes long) repeated to fill the listing duration. Once your brain learns the loop point — which it will, especially over weeks of nightly listening — the loop becomes part of the foreground rather than masking the tinnitus.

NoiseMoon's audio is generated continuously on your device, sample by sample. There is no loop. Every minute is unique. The masking effect doesn't decay because there's nothing to memorise. We measured 19 popular YouTube "white noise" videos and found 6 of them had detectable loops — the very thing the procedural alternative removes.

Notched-filter therapy and personalisation

Some tinnitus protocols use notched-filter therapy, where a narrow band of frequencies centred on the patient's tinnitus pitch is removed from a noise stream. The theory is that the auditory cortex responds to the contrast and gradually de-emphasises the affected band. Studies on this have produced mixed results, but it's a real option for people working with an audiologist who can identify the pitch.

NoiseMoon doesn't currently offer per-frequency notch filtering — that's on the roadmap. The closest thing today is the tune to your room calibrate flow, which adjusts the spectral tilt to mask your specific environment. If notched-filter therapy is what you need, your audiologist can recommend a clinical app or device that supports it.