When I first became a father, quite a few people suggested white noise, wave sounds, etc. to me as a means of settling our baby, prompting me to do a fair bit of research. I was amazed I could hardly find any free resources and those I could find were terrible (or short).
I set out to make some MP3s I could use, they were VERY effective so I’ve uploaded for others to use, click here to jump to the downloads.
I decided to use the sound of crashing waves as the basis for the white noise but found that the volume undulated too much. I then took the wave sound, split it on to two stereo channels and offset the waves so that as one wave was decreasing in volume (e.g. on the left channel) the other was increasing in volume (e.g. on the right channel).
I also wanted to the MP3s to be long so I could set it going and not worry about it – I made two MP3s which are both 2.5 hours long. One MP3 stays at full volume for the entire 2.5 hours (and so can be set to repeat for continuous noise if you wish) and the other fades out over the 2.5 hours, giving your infant time to settle but removing the noise from the environment.
Hardware
The setup we used which worked great for us was to use to portable passive speakers (speakers that don’t require batteries), the ones we used were Sony SRS Portable Speakers. We then plugged these in to a SanDisk Sansa Clip+ 2 (Black) which gave us house of play time and only one device to charge – brilliant!
If you opt for a powered speaker, I highly recommend the Anker SoundCore range which also have bluetooth capability.
If we were out and about and the baby needed a nap, we’d put the speakers on the canopy of her pushchair and she’d nod straight off.
The Downloads
If your browser starts playing the white noise MP3 when you click the links below, right-click them instead and select Save Link As (or Save Target As depending on your browser). These are by no means a guaranteed fix – they worked wonderfully for our first born but had no affect whatsoever on our second child! As with any downloads here, these MP3s are provided ‘as is’ with no claims, warranty or testing other than my own experiences outlined above.
Free Baby Waves White Noise MP3 (2.5hr Constant).mp3 (79mb)
Free Baby Waves White Noise MP3 (2.5hr Fadeout).mp3 (81mb)
Hi Bob,
I just wanted to thank you for you white noise download. I have a 4 week old baby who doesn’t dig the sleeping and often gets overtired so I tried your MP3 for the first time today. A tight swaddle, the sweet oceans waves and it literally took her only 4 minutes to pass out when she usually fights sleep. Almost 2 hours later she’s still kipping. I could kiss you 🙂
Thanks again, awesome download.
Cheers,
Rupert
Hi Rupert,
Congratulations on your new addition buddy! I’m really glad the MP3 worked for you, I still believe to this day it saved mine and my wife’s sanity! I can’t recommend the Sandisk MP3 players enough either as they are cheap enough to have one dedicated for just this hooked up to a couple of passive speakers.
Wonderful yet tiring times, all the best to you and yours!
Bob
biggest bob McKay fan ever here commenting,
I just wanted to say CONGRATULATIONS on your new addition coolio! I’m really glad the MP3 worked for you too Bobby, I still believe to this day it saved my sex fun. Fed for just this hooked up to a couple of passive speakers and it was double loud. THanks again
The number 1 greatest life feeling, as well as number 1 greatest bye bye times, all the happiest to you and yours!
Hey Stonavic,
Thanks for the comment! LOL – made me laugh this morning! I’m glad this helped buddy. Likewise all the best to you and your family!
Hi,
Sorry for my bad English…
If you need some machine-sounds for mixing together with white noise, this little dirty lua-script will create them randomly.
http://www.erbsenkopf.de/noi.zip
A lua-interpreter (lua.org) is needed and something that can handle .raw-audio-files (ffmpeg&ffplay for example).
Call
lua noi.lua
to get a 5 second long out.raw with a random machine sound.
The random-seed-number is displayed after running noi.lua. Note this number, if you like the sound, and run
lua noi.lua (soundnumber)
to create it again for 5 seconds.
If you want a big long file for post-audio-processing/recording/etc., type
lua noi.lua (soundnumber) (seconds)
That’s it. 🙂
It is just a little dirty hack and of cause for free and without any copyright – do with it what you want.
I really use it for my own sounds for sleeping and concentrating while the people arround me shout …and only god knows what they doing else… :-/
PS: Machine-sound is created by a simple speech-synthesis-function and phoneme sounds. Also included are plossives (b, d, g, k, p, t) for click/knock sounds (some machines do this and I think this could help sleeping in some situations – no, not all sounds are with clicks – if you don’t want clicks, just try another sound by running the script again).
Sample rate is only 14,4kHz (and mono), but this should be enough for a basic sound. After up-sampling, mixing with white noise, filtering and making it stereo, it should sound great. 🙂
Have fun and a good nap! 🙂
Mike
PS: Maybe the sound is to technical for babys… I don’t know. …can’t remember. 🙂
I love it helps thank you 4 this?????????
Hey Marlene,
I’m glad it helps!!
All the best
Bob
Hi Bob! I just found your work via Google, it’s 2021 and I’m also playing it for my 2 mo on a pair of Sansa Clip+ 2.
7 years since your post and this MP3 player is even rocking the next generation now 😀
Thanks for the comment Benjamin! – likewise we’ve still got a few going strong!