Boring sounds to fall asleep to.

Why it works

There are two kinds of boring. One is a featureless hum, and this page has that: a steady cabin drone in which nothing ever occurs. The mind tires of it in minutes and goes off to find its own entertainment, usually the day's regrets. That is the wrong kind of boring, the kind that leaves you alone.

The right kind is mildly interesting and entirely inconsequential, like a long documentary about canals. It holds a little of your attention and never raises your pulse. Lullable stories are written to that description. The second fader plays the opening of one over the hum.

What you are hearing

• Cabin hum. Pink noise low-passed at 700 Hz over two faint steady tones at 100 and 200 Hz. Shaped after the inside of an aircraft at cruise; it is not a recording of one.
• The voice. The first four minutes of Aristotle, the Greatest Philosopher, a Lullable story, in a synthesised voice. It only plays if you bring it in.
• The ending. The preview lasts four minutes. Its last ten seconds are a straight fade to silence, so it never stops abruptly.

For a real recording that runs forty minutes, the Lullable iPhone app has rain, waves, a campfire and plain noise, with no voice and no music.