TL;DR: Blankie is a free, open-source ambient sound mixer for Mac, iPhone, iPad and CarPlay; no ads, IAPs, or subscriptions. 24 mixable sounds, saved presets, custom audio import, menu bar control. Stacked against Noizio, Dark Noise, myNoise, and Endel, all of which charge something for depth or convenience Blankie gives away for free.

I'm not usually one to complain about app pricing, but I make an exception when it feels like someone is misrepresenting the complexity of something simple to justify a monetization strategy. Ambient sound apps, at their core, are well-organized loop players, and nothing about them justifies subscriptions, tiered unlocks, and $50 lifetime passes. You get rain, waves, white noise and a coffee shop hum with variations. That's the whole package.

Enter Blankie, a free and open-source ambient sound mixer from developer Cody Bromley that gives you everything you need without insulting your intelligence or your wallet. It also respects your privacy by not collecting any data. It's inspired by Blanket, a Linux app in the same category. Blankie avoids ads, IAPs, subscription tiers and paywalls. It's just free, forever. Better yet, it works on your Mac, your phone, your iPad and your car.

How it works

With Blankie, it's easy to construct custom loops and recall them at will. You get 24 sound elements to experiment with, including several added in the most recent updates: rain, storms, wind, ocean waves, a running stream, birds, forest, crickets, a train, boat, airplane, city hum, coffee shop, fireplace, fan, laundry room, plus a few music-adjacent layers (piano, lo-fi beats, guitar, ambient synth) and the full noise family (white, pink, green, brown).

App Store link

The features that matter

  • Per-sound volume control: every layer has its own slider on top of a master volume, so you're not stuck with someone else's idea of "coffee shop" balance.
  • Saved presets: build a mix once for deep work, another for sleep, and switch between them instead of re-tuning sliders every time.
  • Bring your own audio: you can import your own sounds or voice notes, and Blankie loudness-matches them automatically so nothing jumps out of the mix. I experimented with the sound of my own box fan and it worked!
  • Sleep timer with fade-out: it winds down and stops instead of just cutting off, which matters more than it sounds like it should at 11pm.
  • Menu bar control: as of version 2.0 there's a menu bar popover for quick mix and timer changes, plus an option to hide the Dock icon entirely, both added directly in response to user feedback on the App Store.

Do you need an app for this?

One of the under-publicized features available in macOS Accessibility settings is a control for background sounds. You can get a flat layer of white noise without installing anything. If that does the trick to drown out your office mate's Zoom calls, then you're golden. If you want actual combinations you can control, layering rain with a fireplace, mixing to your own balance, saving distinct presets, and importing your own recordings, Apple's built-in version doesn't do any of that.

The apps I complained about

I've tried Noizio and Endel. They work, but they cost more than they're worth.

  • Noizio ($9.99 one-time, Mac App Store, also on Setapp) has 40 sounds behind the paid tier versus 5 free, and I covered it here previously; it's the closest direct comparison and the app several Blankie reviewers say they're switching from.
  • Dark Noise now runs $2.99/month or $19.99/year for full access after moving off its original one-time-purchase model in 2023, with a free tier limited to eight sounds; there's still a $49.99 lifetime option for people who want to opt out of the subscription entirely.
  • myNoise is free to download with a $19.99 in-app purchase ("Full Access") that unlocks its full 300+-soundscape library; it's a much deeper catalog aimed partly at tinnitus masking and therapeutic use, not just background focus noise.
  • Endel If you want the adaptive end of this category, runs $19.99/month or roughly $89.99/year (with a ~$249 lifetime option), and generates sound algorithmically rather than letting you hand-build a mix; different product, This may be the most over-priced app I've even seen.

Unless otherwise noted, the alternate apps mentioned above are based on research and not individual testing.

Bottom Line

Use Blankie if you want a free, privacy-respecting sound mixer that doesn't hold features hostage behind a subscription, and you're fine with a smaller sound library (24) than the subscription apps offer in exchange for owning the whole thing outright. If you own something else already or you just really need hundreds of soundscapes and don't mind paying, go with myNoise.

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