The Best Music and Sounds to Help You Focus

Listening to music—particularly songs without lyrics—can help with repetitive tasks, increase focus, and boost productivity. But do you know what doesn't do any of that? Wasting 30 minutes trying to find some tunes.

Despite millions of content choices at our fingertips, we often spend too much time browsing, believing in vain that perhaps the next tap or swipe will produce the perfect song. Knock it off and get down to business with one of these options.

AI Music

If you haven't started listening to music produced by computers, there's a good chance you will soon—it's a hot commodity in the music industry. The beauty of music made by artificial intelligence is that it can extend indefinitely and incorporate your personal data to match your circumstances in real time. Apps can access your location and health data, for example, to determine where you are and what you might be feeling at a particular moment.

Endel is a new darling in the AI music space because of its simple interface and effective, scientific-based music offerings. It provides pre-set soundscapes like Focus, Relax, and Sleep to quickly match your surroundings. It's also available on a dizzying array of platforms, including Twitch. Brain.fm provides similar preset moods, but extends to guided and unguided meditation music.

The best AI-crafted music will (eventually) cost you. Brain.fm offers five free sessions, but is then $6.99 per month or $49.99 per year for unlimited and offline access. Endel is free on the web, but is available via in-app purchases on mobile starting at $5.99 per month.

Melodia, meanwhile, doesn't produce original sound, but tries to smartly manage your music listening by incorporating data like location and activity. The goal is to learn your listening habits and genres by time of day to soundtrack what you're doing at any point in an intelligent manner. It's available for free on iOS.

Soundtracks

If you want something familiar, but aren't sure where to start, revisit your favorite shows, movies, and video games via their soundtracks.

Netflix's Stranger Things now has three volumes of original scores on music-streaming services like Spotify, Apple Music, and Amazon Music. The music is synth-y with a dynamic range—from bouncy and nostalgic to haunting and creepy; it's great.

Star Wars fans can travel the galaxy without leaving their keyboards. Music from The Rise of Skywalker and The Mandalorian keep things fresh.

Personally, I like listening to orchestral performances of James Bond movie themes. There are plenty of songs from the 24 movies and lots of variations from different recorded performances around the world.

Another option is video game soundtracks. These days, developers hire talented composers to score their epic titles, and they're worth a listen even if you're not a gamer. Some of the most popular game soundtracks include Monument Valley 2, Journey, and music from the Final Fantasy series.

Playlists

The most popular music-streaming services have countless playlists that go beyond the day's top pop songs to include nature sounds, classical music, and more niche selections. Apple Music, for example, has a Focus section under Music by Mood to help you concentrate, while Amazon Music has a Work, Study & Reading section under playlists.

On the niche end, Spotify has playlists dedicated to the sounds of mechanical keyboards. Most people will use this to get a sense of the sound before making a purchase, but at 46 minutes long, the soothing sound of typing might be just the ticket to locking in and focusing.

Don't be fooled by the name: Rockabye Baby! turns music from your favorite artists into instrumental lullabies. Albums range from The Beatles to Jay Z and mix the familiar with calming, work-friendly tones. The latest additions include Snoop Dogg, Tom Petty, Katy Perry, and Imagine Dragons.

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If you want more variety on a regular basis without the work of constantly searching for something new, Flow State is a daily newsletter for "work music" that comes highly recommended. A few other mostly instrumental artists I regularly enjoy are: Tycho, Teen Daze, and The Album Leaf.

White Noise

While music is great, sometimes you just need some white noise. Standalone machines of the past have now become apps, with the added benefit of being able to create your own, personal environments. Because sometimes you just want to hear rain, a train, a cow, and campfire crackles simultaneously.

Noizio offers sounds like Deep Space, Summer Night, Blue Whales, and Coffee House. The free, Lite version (Mac App Store, Android) offers five sounds (Campfire, October Rain, Sea Waves, Sunny Day, Thunderstorm), while the pro version has 40 options on Mac for $9.99 and 35 on Android for $2.49. You can save and recall past mixes as well as set a timer if you're using it for sleep.

If you're specifically looking for rain and thunder, check out Thunderspace, which has fantastic, bi-aural sound quality for $2.99 on iOS. On Android, Relax Rain offers similar features.

Binaural, meanwhile, is a sound app that won't be for everyone. It's tailored to hardcore noise enthusiasts, and allows you to select different sound frequencies, such as 9.5Hz, which the app says is good for relaxation and dreams. For problem solving, it recommends a higher pitch of 39-50Hz. The interface is minimal, but you can mix in rain sounds on top of the frequencies. It's free to download on iOS and Mac; pay a few bucks to unlock more features.

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