Guide

How Hush Hour works

Start in one tap

Press the big play button on home. The first time, soft rain on the roof plays. The line under the time says what plays and how long until it fades out.

Sounds

Scroll down to the sound tiles. Tap a tile to add its sound to the mix, tap it again to take it out. A tile that is on glows in its colour, gets a bright edge and a dot in the corner. You can play up to eight sounds at once.

Rain: Rain on a yard, rain on the glass (Window), on the roof, on a tent, a mountain downpour, and a storm with far thunder now and then.
Water: Waves on the shore (Ocean) and a river murmur (Stream).
Woods and night: Birds in the trees (Forest), wind in the leaves, and crickets on a summer night with an owl now and then.
Fire: A campfire and a fireplace, with a log popping now and then.
Noise: A bedroom fan, and white, pink and brown noise. White is bright like a hiss, pink is softer like steady rain, brown is deep and low.

Rare moments (thunder, the owl, a pop in the fire) can be turned off in Settings, Sound.

Your mix

Under the tiles, each sound in the mix has its own slider, and a cross to take it out. The Overall level slider sets the whole mix. Keep it low: soft enough that you could talk over it.

Tap Save this mix, give it a name and tap Save. Your mixes are on the Mixes page (the stacked layers button at the top left of home), with nine ready made ones like Rainy cabin, Storm at sea and Deep focus. Tap a mix to play it. The cross on your own mixes deletes them.

The sleep timer

The chips on home set the timer: 15 or 30 minutes, 45 (the default), 1 hour, 1 hour 30, 2 hours, or All night. The timer starts when you press play. Near the end the sound fades out slowly, over 10 minutes by default; pick 5 or 20 in Settings, Sleep timer.

Why a timer by default? Steady sound helps most while you fall asleep, and one study found noise left on all night took some dream sleep. All night is there if you want it.

The night scene

The scene behind home shows what you hear: rain falls for the rain sounds, drops gather on the glass for Window, the clouds light up softly when the storm's thunder rolls, the sea fills the valley, a campfire burns with embers rising, fireflies come out over the crickets and the forest, mist moves with the wind, and noise hangs an aurora in the sky.

It only moves while you look at it. With the screen off or the app in the background nothing is drawn. If you like it calm, turn on Settings, Look, Still scene. With animations turned off in Android, it stands still too.

Dim the screen

Tap the moon button at the top of home. The screen goes black with only the time, in a dim grey, and the brightness drops to the lowest. Tap anywhere, or press Back, to wake it.

With the screen off

Sound keeps playing with the screen off. The notification and the lock screen show what plays, with pause and stop. A call or an alarm pauses it, and it comes back after. If headphones come out, it pauses so the sound never jumps to the speaker (you can turn that off in Settings, Sound). To play under a podcast or audiobook, turn on Play along with other apps.

The widget

Settings, Home screen, Add the widget. Or touch and hold your home screen, pick Widgets, then Hush Hour. The widget shows the mix and plays or pauses it with one tap. Tap its words to open the app.

Settings

Look: Night, a deep midnight sky, or True black for OLED screens and dark rooms. Still scene stops all motion.
Sleep timer: How long the fade at the end takes.
Sound: Rare moments on or off; Keep it quiet, a soft ceiling on loudness (on by default); pause when headphones come out; play along with other apps.
Help: This guide, the report page and the privacy policy.

Accessibility

Every control has a TalkBack label, and each sound tile is read as a switch that is on or off. Touch targets are at least 48 dp, text grows with the phone's font size (the tiles get wider as it does), and text keeps a 7 to 1 contrast in both themes.