Can You Use Ambient or Sleep Sounds in YouTube Videos?

Well, it depends!

Ambient sounds and sleep-focused audio are widely used on YouTube, both as background elements in videos and as the main content itself. In most cases, yes, you can use these sounds safely, as long as the source is clear and intentional. But brown noise, rain, and “drone ambient” music is frowned-upon… as endless people have entered these sounds into YouTube’s Content ID, as bad actors.

The biggest risks come from:

• Re-uploaded audio with unclear ownership

• “Free” sounds pulled from anonymous sources

• Content that’s later registered by a third party (as mentioned above).

Sleep noise sounds are especially sensitive because they’re often used in long-form videos that run for hours. And rain sounds like rain on another person’s channel, brown noise sounds like brown noise on another person’s channel. If a problem appears later, it can affect entire channels or playlists. That’s why it’s important to use audio that’s released specifically for this purpose and clearly labeled for creator use. Music is often a safer bet.

When ambient or sleep sounds (musically) are designed for video use, they typically:

• Avoid abrupt transitions

• Maintain consistent tone

• Support long runtimes

• Stay neutral and unobtrusive

• they don’t drone, but they are original, distinguishable works

This makes them safer not only for viewers, but for creators building long-term content libraries.

In general though, it’s not safe to use “rain” or “noise” sounds, because they’re largely indistinguishable between sound designers. YouTube’s Content ID avoids these sounds.

We encourage people to use our albums or playlists on DSPs such as Spotify, to sleep or relax to. But, we don’t offer those functional content sounds as downloads, because again, all that stuff does tend to sound exactly the same… so, we don’t want you to get false claims on your videos, if you want to use our sleep sounds. Just play them from our playlists (if you have a premium subscription, you’ll never have those albums interrupted by ads).

-Rory & Chris
aka StreamKitty / SleepKitty