FYI, there's been tons of research of the effects of noise on sleep from different sources. There have been studies ranging from in-lab experiments, to in-home experiments with artificial and natural sources. If you're interested, some resources:
Acoustical Society of America Lay Language Papers: https://acoustics.org/lay-language-papers/ (search for "sleep" -- the ASA has a full library of more detailed research but the documents cost money unless you're an ASA member)
A lot of the stuff that posters are asking for have in fact been done, it just takes some digging through the research sites to find them. There's a lot of variation in the data, the hypothesis is that sleep sensitivity varies a lot based on various physical factors (age being a big one).
ChuckMcM 2 hours ago [-]
Interesting, perhaps age related deafness contributes.
Ntrails 33 minutes ago [-]
I'd expect the relationship goes the other way around. Most old people I know sleep lightly comparatively
mmh0000 2 hours ago [-]
I’ve spent years “fixing” my sleep. Things I recommend:
Although, I would wait on getting sleep ear buds, Anker just announced a new model with ANC and a similar price.
timeattack 1 hours ago [-]
Any advice on how to eliminate noisy neighbours that would randomly drop their shit at random intervals in the middle of night and let their child to stomp around every late evening?
trollbridge 33 minutes ago [-]
Unfortunately, the best way to cure this is "don't live underneath other people".
rwyinuse 6 minutes ago [-]
I second this. If you really have to live in a flat, top floor is always the superior option.
scythe 4 minutes ago [-]
You know, I work in hospitals all day and people are always stomping around and moving heavy equipment. But you never hear anything coming through the ceiling.
Contact your state representative and ask them to do something about the building codes. It's a completely voluntary problem. American buildings are noisy because we decided that was okay.
Terr_ 55 minutes ago [-]
> Any advice on how to eliminate noisy neighbours
... Not from a Jedi. :p
grg0 29 minutes ago [-]
No need for fancy light sabers, put them to the sword.
cooppearson 37 minutes ago [-]
Would like to second ear plugs, it took some testing to find the right softness/size because I have very small ear canals, but these slim-fit earplugs have been life-changing for my sleep: https://a.co/d/38Kftbm
The earplugs don't completely cut out environmental noise, but they dampen it enough that I don't find myself being awakened by any bumps in the night.
And snipping down the tail ends of the earplugs with scissors helps reduce pressure if you're a side sleeper.
4b11b4 40 minutes ago [-]
I may suggest custom ear buds. Best $200 you'll spend. The original method is a wax form, but now there is a 3D scanning tool to map the shape of your ear.
LouisSayers 6 minutes ago [-]
... or just buy silicone ones from the pharmacy (the ones for swimmers).
I keep some of these on me at all times in case I end up next to any loud speakers.
LargoLasskhyfv 5 minutes ago [-]
I can't stand earplugs, and think of ear buds as counter-productive. I've used (silken) eye masks, but have no use for them anymore, because successfully blacked out everything.
Don't know what to make of white-noise, do purring cats count? Or really relaxed snuggling with sexy gals after having fucked each others brains out? Or both?
yukIttEft 1 hours ago [-]
I have a street in front of my bedroom and I'm wondering how well ANC earbuds work in that case. Will it be completely silent or will there still be some kind of whoosh-sound?
delecti 15 minutes ago [-]
A large quantity of disposable earplugs is so cheap that I'd recommend you try that before investing time and money into ANC earbuds.
My spouse snores loudly, and a $15 container of 50 pairs has lasted more than 2 years, and saved our ability to co-sleep (I was only a couple nights away from moving to our guest room). We're also on a street with a very permissive speed limit, and we're under the approach path of the nearby airport, and it's never a problem.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0051U7W32 I got these, $15 for 50 pairs; the GP comment is $40 for 200 pairs which is a better value but more investment if you wind up dissatisfied
layer8 6 minutes ago [-]
It won’t be completely silent, if only because ANC always comes with low-level white noise.
I second the disposable earplugs recommendations.
codybontecou 1 hours ago [-]
Appreciate the list. How do you eliminate fridge noise (besides replacing the fridge entirely)?
socalgal2 2 hours ago [-]
I don't know how to state this well but I find the fact that nearly all new apartment buildings in California are only allowed to be built on busy streets very frustrating. I'm guessing it's part nimby-ism and part zoning but every time I see a new apartment complex it's next to the busiest streets in the city (LA, SF). It's like many things, if you want health you must be rich. If you can't afford a house then F.U. You get a loud apartment with constant traffic noise.
I *almost* feel like it should be illegal to build them next to the freeway like
I don't actually think I think they should be illegal but dang it, I wish there were more options for new apartments. In LA there are lots of older apartment buildings in quiet residential neighborhoods built 50+ years ago.
Check out the location of these condos in downtown Toronto built alongside the Gardiner Expressway, a very busy 90km/h (~55mph) highway: https://maps.app.goo.gl/TGLCBJGbrSEkAm7W6
Years ago I lived near a busy four-lane road with what seemed like a reasonable 60km/h speed limit. However, when it rained, the noise from the car tires on the wet road made it difficult to hear music from my radio. It was very unpleasant to leave the balcony doors open, as the constant din starts to work its way into your brain and make it very difficult to focus.
sjs382 2 hours ago [-]
> only allowed to be built on busy streets
Is this true or a misleading observation?
I can see some argument about it, increasing traffic in areas that aren't equipped for it if the building is large enough. But it might just be market forces, too: in larger cities, it's often more desirable to be near a major artery. Earplugs (if the noise bothers you) vs a longer commute.
aegypti 2 hours ago [-]
It is quite literally illegal to build anything but detached single family homes on 95.8 percent of the total residential land area in California / 75% of the residential land area in most major American cities.
trollbridge 31 minutes ago [-]
"Residential land area"? Much of California's land has no zoning at all. Of course, it's not near any cities either (or near any road noise).
aegypti 22 minutes ago [-]
It is illegal to build housing without a permit, and you will not be issued a permit on much of California’s land.
Residential land area = land you can build housing on
They will be allowed by right near any type of transit stop if SB79 goes through!
kjkjadksj 2 hours ago [-]
This entrenches that behavior because the transit stops are often on arterials.
aegypti 1 hours ago [-]
Hopefully the legislators have thought of this and extended the downzoning to half a mile even for BRT stops in the middle of the sunset district :)
amanaplanacanal 2 hours ago [-]
Streets are much quieter at lower speed limits. There is definitely room for improvement here from the traffic engineers.
gowld 2 hours ago [-]
Downtown is very low speed but very noisy.
kjkjadksj 2 hours ago [-]
Say what you will about the suburbs but the grass and landscaping on each and every property is like noise cancelling foam being applied compared to the hardscaping downtown.
bluefirebrand 16 minutes ago [-]
This is why I moved to suburbs tbh
Compared to the city it's so quiet and peaceful. My sleep is much better
quoxi 37 minutes ago [-]
I was looking for an apartment on the SF Peninsula a couple years back. Nearly all apartment buildings constructed in recent years are right next to the freeway or right next to the CalTrain train tracks. Lots of air and noise pollution, and it feels like borderline hostility towards renters. Lived there for a short while and ultimately moved out of the Bay Area because of the poor options for renters in that area (although it gets better the further south you go) and of course the sky-high housing prices.
gowld 2 hours ago [-]
That's not a problem with the location. That's a problem with building materials. I've lives on the busiest street in town, with well insulated walls and windows that block out street noise. And I've lived in poorly -constructed suburban houses that admit noise from across the neighborhood.
layman51 1 hours ago [-]
I disagree. The location is definitely a factor. If you live within 300 feet (about 100 meters) of a multi-lane highway, then depending on the wind patterns, you are definitely getting more exposure to pollutants that come from cars, trucks, or their brakes and tires. But no one in California is ready to talk about addressing this because it would require radically changing the status quo.
bumby 4 hours ago [-]
A couple things:
1) I’d like to see additional measures beyond dB. A 50dB consistent white noise does not bother me (and may even enhance my sleep) but an intermittent off/on sound of the same magnitude has a very different effect
2) what is the accuracy of the consumer metrics compared to medical benchmarks? In other words, how reliable are the sleep measures of consumer devices? Anecdotally, I’ve noticed my watch thinks I’m sleeping sometimes when I watch a movie, and I’ve heard MDs say the metrics aren’t accurate enough to make strong conclusions.
brandonb 3 hours ago [-]
#1 is a great idea for follow-up -- looking at variance, 90th percentile vs median, and so on. There's probably some very salient measure of sleep-affecting noise that we can derive from the data.
On the accuracy of sleep metrics, when Apple Watch makes an error, it tends to misclassify deep or REM sleep as core (light) sleep, or waking as light sleep. It's relatively rare to misclassify deep or REM sleep as awake, or deep as REM (and vice versa). That's partly why we focus on those specific sleep metrics. You can see a full confusion matrix here: https://www.empirical.health/metrics/deep-sleep-percent#accu...
bumby 3 hours ago [-]
Thanks! That’s great information. Do you have any data on how that performance compares to medical-grade devices?
brandonb 3 hours ago [-]
The confusion matrix linked above compares the Apple Watch to polysomnography equipment (which is the medical device used in a sleep lab). It doesn't _quite_ answer your question, since we're assuming the polysomnography equipment is ground truth, but it at least gives an idea of the discordance between a consumer device and a medical device.
garyfirestorm 2 hours ago [-]
There is a field dedicated to this called as psychoacoustics.
Sound pressure level (SPL) alone won’t work for this experiment like you said.
There are other metrics like steady state and transient noise, masking from different frequencies having different effects on humans.
It is definitely doable but far more complicated than the tweets seem to make it sound.
thesuitonym 4 hours ago [-]
It would also be interesting to see the effects of intermittent noise when there is ambient background noise.
wkat4242 4 hours ago [-]
Yes i always sleep with a nature sound generator. It's comforting.
willsmith72 4 hours ago [-]
yes, that would be nice to have. but surely the data we have already would suggest for the benefit of our entire society, especially children (with the link between good sleep and mental development), we should incentivise thicker windows, better sills and other quick wins now
bumby 3 hours ago [-]
To the point above, we should be careful about making strong conclusions if there is a lot of uncertainty in the underlying data.
willsmith72 2 hours ago [-]
On the contrary, we gain more by making faster decisions than we do by being 100% precise
bumby 1 hours ago [-]
Nobody claimed we need 100% precision (or, more to the point, 100% certainty). But I would argue the level of our convictions should be proportional to the risk and level of certainty.
To the point being made, for most Americans the cost of updating your building envelope and fenestration is relatively high. Yet if we look at the accuracy of the data (compared to the medical device standard), it’s moderate accuracy. So we’re taking a high risk for something that we’re only moderately confident will work. That’s not a good tradeoff. There may be interventions that are lower risk that make for a more balanced approach.
“Move fast and break things” as a general philosophy is a risk-blind approach.
conradev 4 hours ago [-]
A lot of folks are talking about the “consistency” of a sound (constant white noise vs random sounds) and its volume, but I feel like the nature of the sound matters a lot more.
I’ll respond much differently to my bedroom door opening or a voice speaking than I do a bus outside.
It reminds me of the anecdote where human researchers rang bells near bears (human sounds) and the bears didn’t care, but if they broke a large bundle of branches (bear sounds), the bears went berserk.
I feel like our subconscious is a lot more involved here than we give it credit for.
mmahemoff 3 hours ago [-]
This is especially true for sleep since we can be pretty good at incorporating external sounds into our dreams. It's been shown in controlled experiments. Seems likely that certain noises are generically easier to integrate into dreams than other noises, which could just cause you to wake up or have your sleep otherwise impaired.
alexyaseen 3 hours ago [-]
why don't more hotels seem to understand this? so often I find that even nice hotels have very minimal background noise but poor soundproofing of the doors. so hallway noise disrupts sleep so much
gowld 2 hours ago [-]
Because good materials cost more than "fancy" decorations.
3 hours ago [-]
globular-toast 1 hours ago [-]
The last time I lived in a flat the guy downstairs got up at 6am and used an iPhone. I know that because I could hear his alarm through the floor. Couldn't have been anywhere near 60dB in my room, but it would wake me up every damn time. Oddly, even today I am absurdly sensitive to that awful Apple alarm sound.
YossarianFrPrez 4 hours ago [-]
Some days I joke that there should be a set of Nobel prizes for making machines quieter. Categories could include: air-conditioning units and mini-fridges, construction and landscaping equipment, old university buildings, pump-housings, etc. The quality of life of many would be improved if we had quieter machines. It boggles my mind that a) in many hotel rooms one can hear a good deal of machine noise and neighbors' televisions, and b) that some sort of noise score (as calculated from DB meter measurements) isn't more widely available for things like apartment rentals, conference room bookings, etc.
willsmith72 4 hours ago [-]
what about a noise tax? my city has some electric buses and some ancient buses - the difference obviously is absolutely huge, but right now the financial incentives aren't there to upgrade the whole fleet
sidewndr46 3 hours ago [-]
Noise from construction machines is actually a feature. They all have added backup beepers at this point as required per OSHA guidelines. Audible for well over a mile in normal conditions
arp242 3 hours ago [-]
> Audible for well over a mile in normal conditions
Tesco delivery trucks have them here in Ireland; it's pretty good stuff. Still quite loud/noticeable when you're up close, while at the same time not being completely obnoxious to everyone in a kilometre radius.
sidewndr46 2 hours ago [-]
They have to be loud enough to be heard through hearing protection. The amplitude is a feature.
It's a "solved problem" in the sense that nuclear energy is a solved problem. There's no mandate to actually see widespread roll out of anything that may be a better solution.
There's a construction site near me at present. There is always 1 machine in reverse, at all times. The utility of having a backup beeper or any noise making device on that site is thus zero. It is the single largest source of noise pollution, larger than the roadway
bumby 34 minutes ago [-]
>The utility of having a backup beeper or any noise making device on that site is thus zero.
This strikes me as an odd take, maybe from someone who has never worked on a construction site.
Our auditory sense is more than just a binary “present/not present” detection. We can sense distance and direction. Just because there is a backup beeper somewhere on site does not mean there is no value to any other auditory signal.
Think about when you’re in a congested city. There’s probably a lot of ambient car noise, including horns, in the background. That doesn’t mean you’re unable to react to a honking car in your immediate vicinity.
gowld 2 hours ago [-]
Those beepers should be directional. I don't need to hear the beep opposite the direction of movement.
stronglikedan 4 hours ago [-]
> making machines quieter
It's already possible, just not profitable.
lm2s 5 hours ago [-]
Would love to know what kind of noise and sound level was used for this test. Was it a continuous monotonous noise (such as white/pink/brown noise) at a fixed volume? Or was it some random noise that would "pop-up" randomly?
Does anyone know?
I would imagine that a noise that would randomly "pop-up" would be worse. But would be curious if that's not the case.
cheeseomlit 5 hours ago [-]
That's also what I was wondering- I sleep with a fan on for the white noise, otherwise I sleep very poorly if at all. I wonder if that sort of 'covers up' the spikes in noise you'd be hearing if the room were otherwise silent
brandonb 5 hours ago [-]
This was ambient noise in the room, as measured by an Apple Watch. So “random,” real world noises that pop up, as opposed to a controlled level of white noise.
maerF0x0 4 hours ago [-]
+1 also thought about this.
Something like the variability of noise (eg, maybe figure out the 25th percentile dbs across the night, and then count the spikes above that? or maybe count the number of times the slope goes above a certain value indicating sharp rises in volume that would disturb someone?)
I also would love to simply see the data based on the average of "N loudest moment(s)" during the sleep. eg: treat the dbs score for that night as the average of the N loudest moments over the night, and plot a series of graphs that show various values of N. (or make it 3d, but i've found many folks are not capable of reading those kinds of graphs)
uludag 3 hours ago [-]
I've been using earplugs practically every night for the past three years and I can't recommend them enough. While the particular kind I use (Mack's ultra soft) don't block out all the noise, there is a wide variety of noises that used to wake me up which don't anymore. If you haven't tried them I would highly recommend giving sleeping with earplugs a shot. It only takes a few days or so to get used to them.
In terms of downsides, only once in the past three years did I get some earwax clogged in some part of my ear which was easy to remove with some special spray (went to urgent care). Also, I have a very hard time sleeping without them anymore so I always make sure to have a pair at hand. Also, you may have to experiment with various brands and types as some brands are really uncomfortable and hurt my ear.
octo888 3 hours ago [-]
3M 1100 work great for me. You can get a box of 200 pairs
Unfortunately they changed a bit the past few years to be slightly less comfortable but I still find them the best overall
Arainach 2 hours ago [-]
Foam are significantly less comfortable for side sleeping and block less noise than Silicone (Mack's) which still come in large sets for well under $1/pair.
jagaerglad 1 hours ago [-]
I don't know about the 1100 but I have another model (ear classic), just simple foam earplugs, of the same manufacturer. Having gone through many different foam, silicon etc plugs from the pharmacy and grocery shop, the 3M are undeniably the best I've ever had. No pain from the foam expanding bigger than the ear canal (although it's initially bigger), no itching from sweat etc, no pressure on the eardrum when side-sleeping (that tinnitus feeling from some foam earplugs). They are literally perfect, and the noise blocking is the best I've experienced. I don't know what it is but perhaps they have some foam patented that only they use (probably poisonous or something in true evil company fashion though)
The only reason I tried them is that I found myself in a situation where my standard silicone earplugs were gone and where somebody gave me a box of hundreds of earplugs they didn't manage to sell at a concert. I was bracing myself for a terrible night of ear pain, but was pleasantly surprised of how superior they were to anything I had tried, still using earplugs from the very same box as my night-to-night noise relief
octo888 2 hours ago [-]
Ear plugs are highly personal I find. People need to find what works for them. I can't stand wax or silicone earplugs for example. I sleep on my side
roamerz 3 hours ago [-]
That’s all great until something happens while you are sleeping that needs your attention. I’d love to be able to use something like that but being responsible for my family’s safety says I cannot.
Maybe there is room for a device that recognizes those types of sounds and maybe triggers a watch vibration would be a solution.
uludag 2 hours ago [-]
That's a valid point. Alarms of all sorts do still wake me up, along with crying babies. It worked well when my wife and I were taking shifts being with the baby. When it was my turn to rest, using earplugs definitely made my sleep time more effective.
2 hours ago [-]
codyb 4 hours ago [-]
I can't tell you what sirens outside do to my sleep, but I can tell you they can be very agitating when I'm trying to fall asleep.
It's funny though how during the recent heat dome I could barely sleep after sealing the windows cause of just how dang quiet it was!
Fickle mistress sleep be.
compumike 1 hours ago [-]
Interesting! It could be a confounder as well. For example, maybe people who live in dense (loud) urban dwellings also tend to have more day-to-day life stress generally, leading to reduced sleep quality. (Of course, reduced sleep quality could also be a source of more life stress...)
Would your userbase be up for a little experiment: adding white/pink/rainfall/etc noise at various volumes? I bet you'd see an inverted U shaped curve, with sleep quality increasing at relatively low volume levels, and then hitting some maximum and decreasing when it gets too loud! (Agree with other comments about looking at intra-night variance in noise level.)
stavros 4 hours ago [-]
I've been having issues sleeping lately, and a few days ago, the flat below us started demolishing walls at 8am. This has been going on for a week, and I've never slept better. It sounds like they're demolishing the floor I'm sleeping on, but somehow I can just ignore it and sleep soundly, whereas normally I wake up with the smallest sound, like a dog barking outside my soundproof windows.
Very odd.
lurking_swe 31 minutes ago [-]
Maybe record it for an hour or so. Then after the construction stops you can play it back as “soothing” sleep noise. ;)
jabo 5 hours ago [-]
Wonder if white noise counts as noise from this perspective. Or if it’s mainly unexpected noises that make sleep quality worse.
rybosworld 4 hours ago [-]
In many animals, hearing gets less sensitive in general when they sleep. I think it's common for people to be surprised by that, but it works that way to maximize sleep function.
Dog's are thought to be an exception, because part of their domestication involved selection for the offspring that was more alert (watch dogs).
The brain is thought to be hyper sensitive to a certain subset of sounds while sleeping, such as babies crying.
White noise is thought to work by drowning out the sounds we are most sensitive to.
todotask2 2 hours ago [-]
I have even worse noise in my area — a widespread ground vibration across a few kilometers, like a constant loud 50Hz hum that causes a tingling sensation in my body. You can’t even block it by covering your ears. I've been experiencing this frequently, both thru the night and during the day, for the past five years here in Singapore has affected my sleep rhythm, can't sleep with that noise. I've unemployed for the past 5 years.
octo888 1 hours ago [-]
Low frequency noise is the worst! Probably a stupid question but do you know anyone else that can hear it? I had a low-frequency version of tinnitus and I spent weeks thinking it was some external noise
todotask2 60 minutes ago [-]
My mum hears it too, but the local authorities simply claimed they couldn't hear anything during that brief moment. They’d have to stay overnight to really hear and feel it — inside a room, not just in a public space. It even vibrate my eardrum like I'm sitting on an F16 pilot seat.
I don't hear it in other districts.
I wish there were an expert or researcher interested in these areas: residential buildings, shops, parks, churches, and schools.
lurking_swe 32 minutes ago [-]
i’d try getting this in front of a journalist or news station. They may be more excited to investigate “weird” claims like this one. Sorry to hear about your situation.
Nevermark 1 hours ago [-]
That sounds terrible.
I am imagining some kind of vibration dampening layer under a bed, with an acoustic foam shell around/over the bed.
Drastic measures might be worth trying.
todotask2 56 minutes ago [-]
That could be hard — my building is vibrating as well. It might be due to major underground train construction. The authorities either couldn’t pinpoint the source of the noise or just claim they don’t hear it.
mmahemoff 3 hours ago [-]
I wish someone could solve the problem at the receiver end, i.e., invent noise-cancelling headphones/earplugs that actually cancel noise as effectively as eye-masks cancel light.
In addition to sleep needs, the world has gotten noisier now that people are habitually using speakerphones in public in the most obnoxious ways.
Gets you some pretty good quiet for sleep. It's not active noise cancelling, but they work pretty well.
Anecdotally if you wear a pair of westone solids, and then a pair of earmuffs on top of that, you are basically just hearing through your bones, which can't be avoided (with passive or active).
Magi604 3 hours ago [-]
My apartment is along a corridor that is frequented by emergency vehicles, so sirens are frequent during normal sleep hours, and my apartment windows face the sunrise. I've adopted a number of things over the years to combat all of this:
- Blackout curtains
- Earplugs
- White noise maker (just an air purifier but it does the same thing)
- 3mg Melatonin
octo888 2 hours ago [-]
Low frequency noise is the worst. Extremely difficult often impossible to eliminate without a lot of expense. Travels long distances. Absolute nightmare for people sensitive to noise
tobyhinloopen 5 hours ago [-]
I find this hard to believe this is universally true. I sleep much worse without noise. I use a fan or a speaker to add noise to the room. If I don't, I wake up constantly.
mrob 5 hours ago [-]
That could be because your added noise is masking other noise with worse effects.
hugeBirb 4 hours ago [-]
White noise and wave sounds != A motorcycle with the loudest exhaust imaginable blasting by your house going 100mph at 3am
brandonb 5 hours ago [-]
This is an interesting hypotheses—I think we could test it by looking at intra-night variance in noise. I’ll try to do a follow up!
foobarian 5 hours ago [-]
> threshold effect: keeping bedroom sound levels beneath the low-60s dB (roughly the volume of normal conversation)
A common source matching this description would be having a TV on in the bedroom.
mancerayder 1 hours ago [-]
Incredibly, the noise insulation between floors and ESPECIALLY walls in both hotels around the world and even expensive, modern apartment buildings in Manhattan is absolutely atrocious. So I end up booking Airbnb's when I travel and renting top floors whenever I can.
I find the build quality of new buildings (again, even uber luxury apartment condos) in the U.S. absolutely crap compared to Europe (I'm thinking especially of France and Germany).
Over here on HN you have a strong contingent of people who push pro-density, pro-city, and anti-car. But some people (like myself) who suffer from a sensitive sleep are deeply affected and consider moving to the woods away from people just for this problem. I find the 'SLAM' sound of doors (in New York there's a spring loading per building code), the stomp stomp of upstairs, and the bass music of adjacent neighbors to be deeply disruptive from a psychological perspective.
thm 4 hours ago [-]
Advertorial w/ PG name-drop.
emsign 2 hours ago [-]
I'm using pink noise to suppress my REM phase and get more deep sleep when my body needs extra regeneration at the expense of mental regeneration. Luckily there's none of that random street noise in my neighborhood.
There might be some other factors in that situation that prevent one from having a restful night.
cwmoore 3 hours ago [-]
Might be! And some people might not deserve sleep! But
"every half hour with pipe-like electronic devices that cause loud clanging noises"
seems to be the specific relevant factor.
"Stanford University sleep medicine professor who says in a court-filed declaration that Lipsey “is exposed to unrelenting noise that is out of his control that can further (fuel) his insomnia and potentially worsens his health.”
proee 5 hours ago [-]
So just use some good quality earplugs?
kogus 5 hours ago [-]
I personally would not be able to sleep well with earplugs. The feeling of pressure in my ears, combined with the 'pushing' of the earplug if I rolled over to lay on my side would be very uncomfortable.
ay 5 hours ago [-]
Try “3M earplugs yellow” on amazon. They are pretty much fully immersed in the ear (for me), and the insulation is very good. The pressure - yeah it took maybe a few days to get used to, but…
The effects for me (living in Brussels city centre, so quite noisy - police, ambulance, sometimes loud tourists past midnight, and a bit of construction at 6am nearby to keep it real :-) ) were very pronounced:
From needing 9 hours and feeling groggy in the mornings anyway, to easily going on 7-8, feeling very refreshed and alert each day.
A cool side effect was that this superpower works also while traveling - so, I no longer care how noisy the airco is in the hotel room, being next to the lift, or having the window above the lively bar.
The only downside with those earplugs that they are good maybe for 3-4 nights and then are too squished to be useful; but the upsides more than make it up for me.
rickydroll 3 hours ago [-]
I've tried the squishy foam earplugs, and they always fall out. Other suggestions, such as silicone and custom earplugs, are something I'm going to try. Let's see if they help.
However, what destroys my sleep is the light from early morning, streetlights, and the neighbor's porch light. Unfortunately, our bedroom faces southeast and features French doors that open onto an east-facing three-season porch, allowing sunlight to stream in. Yeah, I've got curtains everywhere, and I have room-darkening curtains on order. If those don't work, the next step is putting solar panels over my bedroom windows. I figure if I'm going to keep light out, I might as well put it to work some other way.
As an experiment, I'm using my car camping mattress in my office, which is the quietest room in the house, and I'm blocking the light from the windows with curtains and cardboard. So far, it's the best sleep I've had in years. There's a bit of domestic disharmony now, but hopefully my partner and I can work out a compromise on light-blocking curtains and keeping them fucking shut.
plorkyeran 3 hours ago [-]
Have you tried a blackout sleep mask? I had to try a few to find one which consistently stays in place overnight and doesn't put any pressure on my eyes, but once I found one it solved all light-related problems for me.
rickydroll 40 minutes ago [-]
I've tried them, and they don't work for me. They trigger a bit of claustrophobia. I sleep with a full-face CPAP mask, and I'm not sure I can take anything more strapped to my face.
thinkharderdev 3 hours ago [-]
My wife started snoring pretty badly while she was pregnant so ended up buying these earplugs https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DPH7HNT1. I've never been able to sleep in the foam earplugs as they either fall out or the pressure starts to really irritate after a while, but these don't put pressure and they stay in all night. They're also really block out noise.
rickydroll 38 minutes ago [-]
Thanks, adding them to the list of things to try
jks 2 hours ago [-]
These custom earplugs are the most comfortable I've ever worn:
Nice. Which model do you use? And do they sell them in the U.S.? Not that I would mind making a trip overseas and getting away from the insanity here for a little while, but it adds to the cost.
modo_mario 4 hours ago [-]
It's rare for me to encounter another Belgian on HN but I'll definitely try this.
Sleeping roadside till i have my upper floor renovated has been a disaster for my sleep and functioning.
zeta0134 5 hours ago [-]
I've found success with silicon plugs, typically marketed at swimmers. They're like little balls of soft material that you roll up and squish over the entrance, without inserting into the ear. They lay pretty flat and I can sleep on my side with them in. Now that my third neighbor in a row has acquired the loudest, most constantly barking outdoor dog imaginable, I functionally cannot sleep without them.
kevlened 4 hours ago [-]
This was my experience until I purchased custom molded earplugs a year ago. It's one of the best purchases I've made. They're superior to off-the-shelf plugs in many ways:
1. They don't fall out, because they "hook into" the shape of your ear.
2. They sit much closer to the inner ear, so they feel invisible when side-sleeping.
3. It's a perfect fit every time, so you don't have to worry about noise leakage or discomfort caused by pressure.
If you don't want to spend $200 on a pair of plugs from an audiologist (I'd strongly urge you to reconsider!), the best off-the-shelf alternative for me was silicone plugs. To solve the side-sleeping problem with silicone plugs, you can tear them in half or use children's versions depending on your ear canal size.
MengerSponge 3 hours ago [-]
+1 to "get custom molded earplugs"
If enjoy and pay to see live music, you should spring for a set of "musician's earplugs". They're molded just like safety/sleeping earplugs, but they use a flat 10-15dB attenuating filter. They make the music quieter without distorting it.
Symphony players wear them because brass/percussion is loud enough to cause hearing damage with hours of exposure. I've sung in mine for Easter morning services where I was wedged between a celebratory trumpet and an organ with all the stops out.
They're not cheap, but they're not very expensive in the world of Ticketmaster fees.
FuriouslyAdrift 3 hours ago [-]
Having ear plugs in for that long feels like an ice pick digging into my skull. Don't know about anyone else.
darajava 2 hours ago [-]
Probably a size issue. I had earplugs that were too big that start hurting after a while. I’ve since found smaller ones that work perfectly.
etrautmann 4 hours ago [-]
I’ve found that I need to use low profile earbuds (max rock) with brown noise to both block sounds and mask them. It’s helped a ton for sleep quality.
Havoc 4 hours ago [-]
Even really cheap foam ones make a massive difference. They go iffy after a couple nights though
maerF0x0 4 hours ago [-]
thoughts on the safety of that wrt firealarms / home security?
Also similarly for parents? (kids/baby crying)
I've mostly been YOLOing it so far, but worry that once I'm not single (no kids) it won't be acceptable.
uludag 3 hours ago [-]
Having been using earplugs sleeping for the past three years, you will definitely hear things like alarms. Even our babies crying will consistently wake me up. With our baby, when it was my time to rest, having earplugs made a huge difference in terms of sleep quality.
mmahemoff 3 hours ago [-]
I think you'll still hear any relevant alarms. Earplugs are better than nothing, but really aren't fabulous at blocking noise the way eye-masks are.
For hearing-impaired people, there are alarms based on flashing and vibration which you could look into if it's a concern.
WhereIsTheTruth 4 hours ago [-]
I find it fascinating that as a society, we allowed automobiles to pass close to homes
I'm glad we are finally going to transition to EVs.. about time
rebeccaskinner 2 hours ago [-]
Unfortunately even without engine noise people will still install gigantic subwoofers in their car and roll around rattling windows. This has consistently been the biggest problem with my sleep for years, and nothing I've been able to do (including trying to move to different locations) has helped because they are so incredibly loud and prevalent these days.
anal_reactor 2 hours ago [-]
I bought an apartment next to a cycling path that connects the area to the city centre and that was singlehandedly the biggest mistake of my life, because the path also allows mopeds, which have engines orders of magnitude louder than loudest cars. This is insanity. Thankfully, the city is planning to ban fossil-fuel mopeds within five years. They already started phasing them out, you can't register a new one, only old ones are allowed. These are going to be five very long years though.
Also, it's a mostly black area, which means people hanging out and talking right in front of the apartment building, even though there's a public park five minutes of walk away. When I was searching for an apartment to buy, there was one on tenth floor, and I regret not buying that one, because I'd be shielded from all the noise on the street.
I was fully conviced that I'd be able to stomach living in poorer area and wait for gentrification to happen. I can live with trash on the street. I can live with vandalism. I can live with beggars by the supermarket. I can live with theft and other crime. But the noise. The noise is fucking unbearable.
My dream is to wait until the apartment doubles or triples in value, then sell it, and move to rural shithole where nobody lives.
didn't you get the memo that wanting peace and quiet is racist and classist now?
anal_reactor 1 hours ago [-]
1. Diversity and inclusivity does not work. People segregate themselves into groups because it's easier for them to communicate. White people will always prefer to hang out with other white people, and black people will always prefer to hang out with other black people. This is clearly visible in my city - all the black people are concentrated in a ghetto, and on the street you never see mixed-race groups. Similarly, at work when I go for lunch I notice that people tend to gravitate towards same or similar nationalities.
2. I am a full-blown classist and I see no problem with that. I grew up in a small village and everyone who escaped poverty hates poor people.
adonovan 2 hours ago [-]
Yeah, it is sad to think how different things could have been, especially when you consider how loud/dangerous/toxic early cars were.
On the other hand, before that, we (humans) allowed horses to shit (and decompose) in the streets, and long before that, we invited livestock to spend the winter in the same room. So the past wasn't idyllically clean or well organized either.
7jjjjjjj 3 hours ago [-]
At a distance, most of the noise from a car is road noise, not engine noise.
Institute of Noise Control Engineering Digital library: https://www.inceusa.org/publications/ince-digital-library/ (papers older than 10 years old are available free)
Federal Interagency Committee on Aviation Noise: https://fican1.wordpress.com/findings/ (focuses on aviation noise)
Acoustical Society of America Lay Language Papers: https://acoustics.org/lay-language-papers/ (search for "sleep" -- the ASA has a full library of more detailed research but the documents cost money unless you're an ASA member)
World Health Organization guidelines on noise - https://iris.who.int/bitstream/handle/10665/343936/WHO-EURO-... (doesn't get into specifics on research on sleep, but does refer recommended limits to sleep disturbance)
NIH has done a bunch of research on sleep disturbance from noise, you would need to search through their library
edit (one more): TRB/National Academies https://nap.nationalacademies.org/search/?rpp=20&ft=1&term=n...
A lot of the stuff that posters are asking for have in fact been done, it just takes some digging through the research sites to find them. There's a lot of variation in the data, the hypothesis is that sleep sensitivity varies a lot based on various physical factors (age being a big one).
* a sleep tracker. I love AutoSleep - https://apps.apple.com/us/app/autosleep-track-sleep-on-watch...
* Any kind of white noise. I use an air purifier at home, and a little pocket size white noise machine when I travel.
* find and eliminate any noises in your home. Computers, fridges, squeaky doors, etc.
* find and eliminate any lights. Especially stupid power and status LEDs. Bedroom should be pitch black at night. Electrical tape works well for this.
* Blackout curtains
* cheap eye mask
* Magnesium Glycate supplement
* Earplugs- https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B0015TBGR6
* And finally, a recent addition that I’ve fallen in love with is sleep ear buds: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DT9GBFQ2
Although, I would wait on getting sleep ear buds, Anker just announced a new model with ANC and a similar price.
Contact your state representative and ask them to do something about the building codes. It's a completely voluntary problem. American buildings are noisy because we decided that was okay.
... Not from a Jedi. :p
The earplugs don't completely cut out environmental noise, but they dampen it enough that I don't find myself being awakened by any bumps in the night.
And snipping down the tail ends of the earplugs with scissors helps reduce pressure if you're a side sleeper.
I keep some of these on me at all times in case I end up next to any loud speakers.
Don't know what to make of white-noise, do purring cats count? Or really relaxed snuggling with sexy gals after having fucked each others brains out? Or both?
My spouse snores loudly, and a $15 container of 50 pairs has lasted more than 2 years, and saved our ability to co-sleep (I was only a couple nights away from moving to our guest room). We're also on a street with a very permissive speed limit, and we're under the approach path of the nearby airport, and it's never a problem.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0051U7W32 I got these, $15 for 50 pairs; the GP comment is $40 for 200 pairs which is a better value but more investment if you wind up dissatisfied
I second the disposable earplugs recommendations.
I *almost* feel like it should be illegal to build them next to the freeway like
Those ones just north of SFO next to the 110: https://maps.app.goo.gl/sAkUMhmnutZ1jFd27
The ones in downtown LA next to the 110: https://maps.app.goo.gl/4mBVLo12hLR4EwU16
The ones north of LAX at Howard Hughes: https://maps.app.goo.gl/Z8bnB7wR5jDBddhg6
I don't actually think I think they should be illegal but dang it, I wish there were more options for new apartments. In LA there are lots of older apartment buildings in quiet residential neighborhoods built 50+ years ago.
https://maps.app.goo.gl/KMLav1zLiQZK6T8L6
https://maps.app.goo.gl/aUH52rBAbaHExjzB6
They are no longer allowed to be built AFAICT.
The satellite view shows many units in multiple buildings directly next to this highway with no noise protection: https://maps.app.goo.gl/JA4jMPSSYsDBq5my5
Years ago I lived near a busy four-lane road with what seemed like a reasonable 60km/h speed limit. However, when it rained, the noise from the car tires on the wet road made it difficult to hear music from my radio. It was very unpleasant to leave the balcony doors open, as the constant din starts to work its way into your brain and make it very difficult to focus.
Is this true or a misleading observation?
I can see some argument about it, increasing traffic in areas that aren't equipped for it if the building is large enough. But it might just be market forces, too: in larger cities, it's often more desirable to be near a major artery. Earplugs (if the noise bothers you) vs a longer commute.
Residential land area = land you can build housing on
https://belonging.berkeley.edu/single-family-zoning-californ...
They will be allowed by right near any type of transit stop if SB79 goes through!
Compared to the city it's so quiet and peaceful. My sleep is much better
1) I’d like to see additional measures beyond dB. A 50dB consistent white noise does not bother me (and may even enhance my sleep) but an intermittent off/on sound of the same magnitude has a very different effect
2) what is the accuracy of the consumer metrics compared to medical benchmarks? In other words, how reliable are the sleep measures of consumer devices? Anecdotally, I’ve noticed my watch thinks I’m sleeping sometimes when I watch a movie, and I’ve heard MDs say the metrics aren’t accurate enough to make strong conclusions.
On the accuracy of sleep metrics, when Apple Watch makes an error, it tends to misclassify deep or REM sleep as core (light) sleep, or waking as light sleep. It's relatively rare to misclassify deep or REM sleep as awake, or deep as REM (and vice versa). That's partly why we focus on those specific sleep metrics. You can see a full confusion matrix here: https://www.empirical.health/metrics/deep-sleep-percent#accu...
To the point being made, for most Americans the cost of updating your building envelope and fenestration is relatively high. Yet if we look at the accuracy of the data (compared to the medical device standard), it’s moderate accuracy. So we’re taking a high risk for something that we’re only moderately confident will work. That’s not a good tradeoff. There may be interventions that are lower risk that make for a more balanced approach.
“Move fast and break things” as a general philosophy is a risk-blind approach.
I’ll respond much differently to my bedroom door opening or a voice speaking than I do a bus outside.
It reminds me of the anecdote where human researchers rang bells near bears (human sounds) and the bears didn’t care, but if they broke a large bundle of branches (bear sounds), the bears went berserk.
I feel like our subconscious is a lot more involved here than we give it credit for.
That doesn't strike me as a feature.
Also a solved problem: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6rwJ5NCf1Vw
Tesco delivery trucks have them here in Ireland; it's pretty good stuff. Still quite loud/noticeable when you're up close, while at the same time not being completely obnoxious to everyone in a kilometre radius.
It's a "solved problem" in the sense that nuclear energy is a solved problem. There's no mandate to actually see widespread roll out of anything that may be a better solution.
There's a construction site near me at present. There is always 1 machine in reverse, at all times. The utility of having a backup beeper or any noise making device on that site is thus zero. It is the single largest source of noise pollution, larger than the roadway
This strikes me as an odd take, maybe from someone who has never worked on a construction site.
Our auditory sense is more than just a binary “present/not present” detection. We can sense distance and direction. Just because there is a backup beeper somewhere on site does not mean there is no value to any other auditory signal.
Think about when you’re in a congested city. There’s probably a lot of ambient car noise, including horns, in the background. That doesn’t mean you’re unable to react to a honking car in your immediate vicinity.
It's already possible, just not profitable.
Does anyone know?
I would imagine that a noise that would randomly "pop-up" would be worse. But would be curious if that's not the case.
Something like the variability of noise (eg, maybe figure out the 25th percentile dbs across the night, and then count the spikes above that? or maybe count the number of times the slope goes above a certain value indicating sharp rises in volume that would disturb someone?)
I also would love to simply see the data based on the average of "N loudest moment(s)" during the sleep. eg: treat the dbs score for that night as the average of the N loudest moments over the night, and plot a series of graphs that show various values of N. (or make it 3d, but i've found many folks are not capable of reading those kinds of graphs)
In terms of downsides, only once in the past three years did I get some earwax clogged in some part of my ear which was easy to remove with some special spray (went to urgent care). Also, I have a very hard time sleeping without them anymore so I always make sure to have a pair at hand. Also, you may have to experiment with various brands and types as some brands are really uncomfortable and hurt my ear.
Unfortunately they changed a bit the past few years to be slightly less comfortable but I still find them the best overall
The only reason I tried them is that I found myself in a situation where my standard silicone earplugs were gone and where somebody gave me a box of hundreds of earplugs they didn't manage to sell at a concert. I was bracing myself for a terrible night of ear pain, but was pleasantly surprised of how superior they were to anything I had tried, still using earplugs from the very same box as my night-to-night noise relief
Maybe there is room for a device that recognizes those types of sounds and maybe triggers a watch vibration would be a solution.
It's funny though how during the recent heat dome I could barely sleep after sealing the windows cause of just how dang quiet it was!
Fickle mistress sleep be.
Would your userbase be up for a little experiment: adding white/pink/rainfall/etc noise at various volumes? I bet you'd see an inverted U shaped curve, with sleep quality increasing at relatively low volume levels, and then hitting some maximum and decreasing when it gets too loud! (Agree with other comments about looking at intra-night variance in noise level.)
Very odd.
Dog's are thought to be an exception, because part of their domestication involved selection for the offspring that was more alert (watch dogs).
The brain is thought to be hyper sensitive to a certain subset of sounds while sleeping, such as babies crying.
White noise is thought to work by drowning out the sounds we are most sensitive to.
I don't hear it in other districts.
I wish there were an expert or researcher interested in these areas: residential buildings, shops, parks, churches, and schools.
I am imagining some kind of vibration dampening layer under a bed, with an acoustic foam shell around/over the bed.
Drastic measures might be worth trying.
In addition to sleep needs, the world has gotten noisier now that people are habitually using speakerphones in public in the most obnoxious ways.
https://bioears.co.uk/products/bioears-ear-plugs
Very effective, but eventually they made me just focus on my tinnitus.
I now live in a quieter place and use some white noise from a speaker - ocean sounds.
https://www.elacin.com/your-perfect-fit/leisure/relax-sleep/
Currently I use Ozlo Sleepbuds which are not quite as comfortable and a little finicky to operate, but I like the masking noise.
https://westone.com/defendear-sleep
Gets you some pretty good quiet for sleep. It's not active noise cancelling, but they work pretty well.
Anecdotally if you wear a pair of westone solids, and then a pair of earmuffs on top of that, you are basically just hearing through your bones, which can't be avoided (with passive or active).
- Blackout curtains
- Earplugs
- White noise maker (just an air purifier but it does the same thing)
- 3mg Melatonin
A common source matching this description would be having a TV on in the bedroom.
I find the build quality of new buildings (again, even uber luxury apartment condos) in the U.S. absolutely crap compared to Europe (I'm thinking especially of France and Germany).
Over here on HN you have a strong contingent of people who push pro-density, pro-city, and anti-car. But some people (like myself) who suffer from a sensitive sleep are deeply affected and consider moving to the woods away from people just for this problem. I find the 'SLAM' sound of doors (in New York there's a spring loading per building code), the stomp stomp of upstairs, and the bass music of adjacent neighbors to be deeply disruptive from a psychological perspective.
https://amp.sacbee.com/news/california/article240396741.html
EDIT/TLDR: highly effective
"Stanford University sleep medicine professor who says in a court-filed declaration that Lipsey “is exposed to unrelenting noise that is out of his control that can further (fuel) his insomnia and potentially worsens his health.”
The effects for me (living in Brussels city centre, so quite noisy - police, ambulance, sometimes loud tourists past midnight, and a bit of construction at 6am nearby to keep it real :-) ) were very pronounced:
From needing 9 hours and feeling groggy in the mornings anyway, to easily going on 7-8, feeling very refreshed and alert each day.
A cool side effect was that this superpower works also while traveling - so, I no longer care how noisy the airco is in the hotel room, being next to the lift, or having the window above the lively bar.
The only downside with those earplugs that they are good maybe for 3-4 nights and then are too squished to be useful; but the upsides more than make it up for me.
However, what destroys my sleep is the light from early morning, streetlights, and the neighbor's porch light. Unfortunately, our bedroom faces southeast and features French doors that open onto an east-facing three-season porch, allowing sunlight to stream in. Yeah, I've got curtains everywhere, and I have room-darkening curtains on order. If those don't work, the next step is putting solar panels over my bedroom windows. I figure if I'm going to keep light out, I might as well put it to work some other way.
As an experiment, I'm using my car camping mattress in my office, which is the quietest room in the house, and I'm blocking the light from the windows with curtains and cardboard. So far, it's the best sleep I've had in years. There's a bit of domestic disharmony now, but hopefully my partner and I can work out a compromise on light-blocking curtains and keeping them fucking shut.
https://www.elacin.com/your-perfect-fit/leisure/relax-sleep/
1. They don't fall out, because they "hook into" the shape of your ear.
2. They sit much closer to the inner ear, so they feel invisible when side-sleeping.
3. It's a perfect fit every time, so you don't have to worry about noise leakage or discomfort caused by pressure.
If you don't want to spend $200 on a pair of plugs from an audiologist (I'd strongly urge you to reconsider!), the best off-the-shelf alternative for me was silicone plugs. To solve the side-sleeping problem with silicone plugs, you can tear them in half or use children's versions depending on your ear canal size.
If enjoy and pay to see live music, you should spring for a set of "musician's earplugs". They're molded just like safety/sleeping earplugs, but they use a flat 10-15dB attenuating filter. They make the music quieter without distorting it.
Symphony players wear them because brass/percussion is loud enough to cause hearing damage with hours of exposure. I've sung in mine for Easter morning services where I was wedged between a celebratory trumpet and an organ with all the stops out.
They're not cheap, but they're not very expensive in the world of Ticketmaster fees.
Also similarly for parents? (kids/baby crying)
I've mostly been YOLOing it so far, but worry that once I'm not single (no kids) it won't be acceptable.
For hearing-impaired people, there are alarms based on flashing and vibration which you could look into if it's a concern.
I'm glad we are finally going to transition to EVs.. about time
Also, it's a mostly black area, which means people hanging out and talking right in front of the apartment building, even though there's a public park five minutes of walk away. When I was searching for an apartment to buy, there was one on tenth floor, and I regret not buying that one, because I'd be shielded from all the noise on the street.
I was fully conviced that I'd be able to stomach living in poorer area and wait for gentrification to happen. I can live with trash on the street. I can live with vandalism. I can live with beggars by the supermarket. I can live with theft and other crime. But the noise. The noise is fucking unbearable.
My dream is to wait until the apartment doubles or triples in value, then sell it, and move to rural shithole where nobody lives.
didn't you get the memo that wanting peace and quiet is racist and classist now?
2. I am a full-blown classist and I see no problem with that. I grew up in a small village and everyone who escaped poverty hates poor people.
On the other hand, before that, we (humans) allowed horses to shit (and decompose) in the streets, and long before that, we invited livestock to spend the winter in the same room. So the past wasn't idyllically clean or well organized either.