The White Noise Generator fills the room with continuous noise — white, pink, or brown — layered with looping ambient sounds: a low HVAC hum, occasional rain, distant activity, keyboard typing, and a ticking clock, mixed through a simulated room so the result sounds like a real space instead of a flat speaker. Use it to cover distracting sound in an open office, or build a steady, adjustable background for work, study, or reading.
Before you start
- A way to hear it. Speakers or headphones — this effect is audio-first; the on-screen display is a visual reference, not the point.
- No microphone required. It only plays sound; it never asks for microphone permission.
- A click or keypress to start audio. Browsers block audio from starting on page load, so playback begins with the Play button or Space bar, not automatically.
Set it up
- Open the White Noise Generator effect. The screen shows a Play button in the center with a note that pressing Space also starts it.
- Select Play, or press the Space bar. Noise starts immediately, and the Spatial Radar appears showing where each ambient sound sits in the room, with a live waveform ring around it that traces the real-time audio output.
- Open the settings panel and use the Custom tab — it's selected by default, since this effect has no Brightness or Color Temperature controls to switch away from.
- Pick a Noise Type (White, Pink, or Brown) and set Volume for the base layer, or select a Preset to load a full mix at once.
- Raise HVAC, Rain, Activity, Typing, or Clock only for the ambient layers you want; leave the rest at 0.
- Drag any colored dot on the Spatial Radar to move that sound source around the room.
You'll know it worked when the base noise plays right away, and — if you raised any ambient slider above 0 — isolated sounds like a rain drop, a keystroke burst, or a distant thump fade in over the next several seconds from the direction of their dot on the Spatial Radar, which ripples as each one fires.
To stop, select the pause button in the bottom-right corner, or press Space again.
What each control does
| Control | Range | Default | What it changes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Power | On/Off | Off | Starts or stops the generator. Pausing suspends the audio engine rather than closing it, so pressing Play again resumes instantly. |
| Presets | Custom, Deep Code, Cozy Read, Hyperfocus, Grand Library | Custom | Loads a bundled combination of every setting below in one step. |
| Noise Type | White, Pink, Brown | Brown | The base noise's frequency balance. White is even across all frequencies and reads as harsher; Pink softens the highs; Brown cuts them further for a deep, low rumble. |
| Volume | 0–100 | 50 | Level of the base noise layer. The response isn't linear — moves near the bottom change the level less than the same move near the top. |
| Size | 0.1–5.0 | 1.5 | Length of the room's reverb tail in seconds, labeled Booth / Studio / Hall / Cathed as you raise it. Longer tails feel larger and more reflective. |
| Dampening | 1,000–10,000 | 4,000 | How much high frequency is filtered from the room's reflections, labeled Soft / Neutral / Hard. Soft mutes reflections quickly; Hard leaves more audible. |
| HVAC | 0–100 | 20 | Volume of a constant low hum positioned at the HVAC Vent dot. |
| Rain | 0–100 | 0 | Volume of randomized rain-drop bursts near the Rain (Window) dot. Higher values make drops more frequent as well as louder. |
| Activity | 0–100 | 0 | Volume of occasional distant thumps and rustles near the Activity dot, on a random interval of roughly 2–10 seconds. |
| Typing | 0–100 | 0 | Volume of short keyboard bursts (3–8 strokes at a time) near the Keyboard dot, on a random interval of roughly 1–6 seconds. |
| Clock | 0–100 | 0 | Volume of an alternating tick-tock at the Wall Clock dot, once per second. |
Common setups
- Deep focus coding session. Select Deep Code — Brown noise at 60, a small Booth-size room with Soft dampening, and Typing pushed to 70 so the keyboard layer sits under your own.
- Reading or a quiet evening. Select Cozy Read — Pink noise at 20, a mid-size room, Rain at 80 and HVAC at 40, with a little Activity and Clock mixed in.
- Blocking sudden noise for hard focus. Select Hyperfocus — White noise at 80 in a tight, Hard-walled Booth, with Clock at 60 for rhythm and every other layer silent.
- Large, busy background. Select Grand Library — Brown noise kept low at 10, a Cathed-size room with Hard dampening, and Rain, Activity, and Typing all layered in.
Troubleshooting
No sound plays when I open the page. Browsers block audio until you interact with the page, so loading the effect — even with #fullscreen on the end — never starts sound on its own. Select Play, or press Space once the page has focus.
I raised Rain, Activity, Typing, or Clock but don't hear anything. These aren't continuous tracks — they fire on a random timer, so Activity can take up to 10 seconds and Typing up to 6 seconds between bursts. Give it a few seconds, and check that the base Volume isn't burying a low ambient level.
The mix sounds distant, muddy, or like it's echoing. That's Size and Dampening working as designed, not a bug. A large Size (Hall or Cathed) with low Dampening (Soft) produces a long, washed-out reverb tail. Lower Size toward Booth or Studio, or raise Dampening toward Hard, for a tighter, more direct sound.
The Presets dropdown jumped back to "Custom." Expected. Moving any slider after loading a preset relabels the mix as Custom without undoing your change. Reselecting the same preset resets every value to its defaults.
My mix is gone after reloading the page. Noise type, volume levels, room settings, and presets aren't saved anywhere — they reset to the default mix (Brown noise, Volume 50, HVAC 20, everything else silent) every reload. Note the values you like, or start from the closest preset and adjust each session.
Next steps
Pair it with Countdown Timer for timed work or study sessions, or run Reading Light on a second screen for even, eye-friendly light while you read.