Whether you prefer to drift off to music, a guided meditation, a Sleep Story, or background nature sounds, Calm has features to help you fall asleep peacefully.
Important Tip: Conserve Your Battery
For any of our programs, please be sure to lock your phone screen after beginning your session. This will help to conserve your phone's battery as the session plays.
Choose your preferred listening experience below for specific setup instructions:
Option 1: Using Calm Music (The Music Sleep Timer)
If you would like to listen to a music selection as you are falling asleep, we recommend using the dedicated Music sleep timer.
Steps to set a Music timer:
Start playing a music track.
Tap the player bar at the bottom of the screen to open the full player.
Tap the Clock icon located just above the pause button.
Select the amount of time you would like the music to play.
What happens next: The Calm app will close when the music timer ends. Additionally, by using the app's autoplay settings, you can choose whether to play the same song on repeat or advance to the next song on the album or playlist.
Option 2: Using Meditations or Sleep Stories (The Scene Timer)
If you would like to listen to a meditation or Sleep Story as you fall asleep, you can adjust your background Scene settings.
Note: Individual Sleep Stories themselves do not have a sleep timer function. Instead, you use the "Play sounds outside the app" setting to control the amount of time that your chosen background Scene sound will continue playing after your meditation or Sleep Story has ended.
Steps to adjust the Scene timer:
Tap the Mountain icon on the top left-hand corner of the home screen to open the Scenes menu.
Find the “Play sounds outside the app” setting listed at the top.
Choose the amount of time you would like Scenes to play after your story or meditation has ended.
For more detailed instructions, see our help article on the Scene settings here.
Option 3: Using Curated Sleep Playlists
You can seamlessly listen to hours of our most popular Sleep Stories with our curated Sleep Playlists. Each playlist is about 3-5 hours long, and some include a soothing soundscape at the end.
Steps to use a Sleep Playlist:
Go to the Sleep content library.
Tap on the “Playlists” tab.
Select a playlist and ensure your autoplay settings are turned on correctly so the tracks play continuously.
Using a timer with playlists: You can also set a sleep timer so the playlist will stop after a certain amount of time. Just make sure your sleep timer is set for a shorter amount of time than the playlist's actual length.
Option 4: Using Background Scenes to Fall Asleep
If you only want to listen to a background "Scene" (like rain or white noise) without a story or music:
Open the Scenes menu (the Mountain icon).
Set the “Play sounds outside the app” timer to the amount of time you would like your Scene to play.
Turn your screen off. The background sounds will continue to play until the timer ends.
For more detailed instructions, see our help article on the Scene settings here.
Recommendations & Feedback
Need suggestions? If you'd like some recommendations for content to fall asleep to, please see this article.
Have feedback? Have questions or feedback about Calm's sleep stories? Share your feedback for our team to review by reaching out to us here.
Further Reading on the Calm Blog
Calm's Blog also includes articles and resources on setting yourself and your bedroom up for a successful night's sleep:
The Sleep Superpower Playbook
We've also created The Sleep Superpower Playbook, which includes some tips and techniques, as well as answers to common questions that may come up on your journey to better sleep. You can download the playbook on our blog here.