White
0 dB / octave
Equal energy at every frequency. Because we hear in octaves, it sounds bright and hissy — the classic "TV static".
Sounds of space.
Space is silent, yet scientists can still let us hear it. Listen to a black hole, a pulsar, Earth’s chorus, Saturn and the Sun, and see how each signal becomes sound.
Now playing
Deep sleep
Listen to space
Tap a picture to play it, and again to pause. These are our own recreations, made after the published sonifications by NASA and others; headphones bring out the detail.
Why space is silent, and how we hear it anyway
Sound is molecules pushing on each other. Air at sea level holds about 25 billion billion molecules in every cubic centimetre; the space between the planets holds about five particles. With almost nothing to pass the push along, sound cannot travel: in space, nobody hears an explosion.
What spacecraft and telescopes record instead are other signals: radio waves, changes in a magnetic field, the flicker of a star, the glow of hot gas. Some of these already vibrate as fast as the sounds we hear and only need a loudspeaker; others are far too slow, and are sped up or shifted up by many octaves until they fall into our range.
Good to know
- There is one place where sound really travels in space: the thin, hot gas of galaxy clusters. Around the black hole in Perseus it carries pressure waves about 57 octaves below middle C.
- Whistlers were heard long before spaceflight: in the First World War, soldiers listening on field telephones caught falling tones from distant lightning.
- A pulsar is a precise clock: the Vela pulsar turns 11.2 times a second, and each turn sweeps its radio beam across Earth.
- What you hear here is our own synthesis modelled on those recordings, not the data itself; the rates and pitches follow the published numbers.
| What was measured | How it became sound | |
|---|---|---|
| Black hole in Perseus | Pressure waves in the hot gas around it, seen in X-ray images | Raised by 57 and 58 octaves |
| Vela pulsar | Radio pulses from a spinning neutron star, 11 a second | Each pulse played as a click, at its real rate |
| Earth’s chorus | Radio (plasma) waves in Earth’s magnetic field | Already at audio frequencies: played through a speaker |
| Lightning whistlers | Radio waves from lightning, spread out on the way along the magnetic field | Already audible: played as received |
| Saturn’s radio waves | Radio emission from Saturn’s auroras, recorded by Cassini | Shifted into the range of hearing |
| The Sun | Its surface rising and falling, about every five minutes | Sped up 42,000 times |
Is there sound in space?
Not as we hear it: there is too little matter to carry a sound wave. The exception is the hot gas in galaxy clusters, which carries pressure waves far too deep to hear.
Are these real recordings?
They are recreations. Scientists turn real measurements into sound; on this page we synthesise sounds that follow their published sonifications.
What does a black hole sound like?
NASA’s version from the Perseus cluster is a deep, eerie moan: pressure waves raised by 57 and 58 octaves so that we can hear them.
Mixes
Pick what you need. One tap to start, change anything and save it as your own.
Focus timer
Work in waves.
The Pomodoro rhythm: focus with calm sound in your ears, then take a real break. A soft bell marks every change, so you never watch the clock. Every fourth break is a long one.
Every fourth break is twice as long.
25:00Focus · 1 of 4
Sound while you work
Breathe
Slow your breathing down.
Follow the circle and the sound: it rises as you breathe in and falls as you breathe out. Choose a rhythm, or set your own, and pick what plays underneath.
Ready
Sound while you breathe
Noise generator
Any color of noise, from deep brown to bright violet — and everything in between.
Brown noise
Spectrum · 20 Hz – 20 kHz
Sound science
The colors of noise
Same randomness, different tilt. Each color shifts energy between low and high pitches — here is what that sounds like.
Pink
−3 dB / octave
Equal energy in every octave, so it sounds even to the ear. Steady rain, rustling leaves. A favorite for focus.
Brown
−6 dB / octave
Deep and warm, like a distant waterfall or a plane cabin. Masks voices and traffic without any hiss.
Grey
Equal-loudness curve
Shaped around how our hearing works, so every pitch seems equally loud. Balanced and soft.
Blue
+3 dB / octave
The mirror of pink: more treble than bass. Airy, crisp, like a light spray.
Violet
+6 dB / octave
Mostly treble, like hissing water. Sometimes used to mask high-pitched ringing.
Calm
Gentle tones to settle into: singing bowls, a slow warm drone, wind chimes tuned so every note fits.
Frequencies
Famous tones on pages of their own: hear them side by side, with honest facts.
Sound phenomena
How sound bends, shifts, rings and fools the ear, and why space is silent: hear it for yourself.
Nature
Rooms & travel
Animals & countryside
A purring cat, whales and dolphins, a nightingale in the dark, cowbells on a summer pasture. Wonderful in stereo.
For babies
Womb sounds are what a baby heard for nine months: a deep rush of blood flow, and the heartbeat.
Hearing and speaker tests
Check your ears, headphones and speakers, each test on a page of its own with a live picture.
Ear Age · 60 seconds
Test your ears.
Our ears lose the highest pitches first, and it starts early. Find the highest tone you can still hear and see the typical age for it.
- Headphones on, quiet room
- Set a comfortable volume on the 1 kHz tone
- Don't turn it up when a tone disappears — that's the point
Step 1 · Volume
Play the reference tone and set your volume so it's clear but comfortable. Leave it there.
Step 2 · Listen
8,000Hz
Your result
8k12k16k20k
A rough guide, not a diagnosis. Your phone, headphones and even this browser can cut the highest tones. Worried about your hearing? See an audiologist.
More ear tests
Check your headphones, find the deepest bass your setup can play, or play any pitch you like.
Headphones check
Left & right
Each ear should get its own side. It matters for 8D, binaural beats and every stereo sound here.
Headphones on, then tap a side.
Bass test
How low can you go?
Deep tones from 200 Hz down to 20 Hz, the bottom of human hearing. Mostly it tests your speakers or headphones.
200Hz
Your setup plays down to
Tone generator
Any pitch, 20 Hz – 20 kHz
Hz
Start quiet: high tones and square waves get tiring fast.
Take it to bed
An app without the app store.
Add Ears & Waves to your home screen and it opens like any app — full screen, with its own icon. Everything it needs is saved on your device, so it keeps playing on a plane, in a tent or with Wi-Fi off.
Preparing offline mode…
- Works offlineNo streaming. Sound is computed on your device, forever.
- Screen offKeeps playing with the phone locked. The timer fades it out gently.
- PrivateNo account, no ads, no cookies. Your mixes stay on your device.
