Binaural Beats: For Sleep, Focus, Anxiety, & More

By Charlie Huntington, M.A., Ph. D. Candidate
​Reviewed by Tchiki Davis, M.A., Ph.D.
Binaural beats are sounds that are scientifically proven to affect how we think and feel. Read on to learn about how binaural beats work and how you can use them.
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Have you ever heard of the Mozart effect? It was a widely reported finding from a single psychological study, published in one of the most prestigious academic journals that seemed to show that listening to Mozart made people better at certain tasks they completed immediately afterward (Rauscher et al., 1993). Could listening to Mozart make you smarter?
In a large review of all the research that followed this initial finding – because plenty of scientists were skeptical that the effect was real – Pietschnig and colleagues (2010) found that there might be a positive effect of listening to music on our overall functioning, but that Mozart himself probably wasn’t the secret ingredient.

What is it about music, then, that makes it an effective psychological intervention? What about listening to music promotes wellness? One form of exposure to sound for which there is clearly evidence of effects is the phenomenon called binaural beats. Maybe you have heard about binaural beats, but you’re not sure what they are, how they might help, and if there is really evidence that they do help. This article will answer those questions and more for you.

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What Are Binaural Beats? (A Definition)

Binaural beats are what happens when two equally loud sounds, at just slightly different frequencies (or tones), are presented at the same time, one sound to each ear (Goodin et al., 2012). For example, you might put on headphones and have two tones that are 10 Hertz (the measure of frequency, abbreviated as Hz) apart broadcast to you, with each tone being delivered to just one ear. If those tones are at 300 Hz and 310 Hz, your brain will integrate the two sounds so that you hear a single sound that is at 305 Hz (Lentz et al., 2014). This processing pattern in your brain is referred to as binaural integration (Garcia-Argibay et al., 2019). At the same time, your brain will perceive this single sound as moving back and forth in the range between 300 Hz and 310 Hz.

So how does this affect your brain? There are brain waves of varying frequencies occurring in your brain at all times. When two tones that are close in frequency are presented simultaneously to you, as happens with binaural beats, then waves of a certain frequency – the distance in frequency between the two tones, to be exact – are generated. To use our example, hearing tones at 300 Hz and 310 Hz will generate waves with a frequency of 10 Hz.

These waves, being the same frequency as some of the brain waves already happening in your head, can influence how you think and feel (Goodin et al., 2012). Scientists use the word entrainment to describe how this happens. Entrainment is the process of your brain waves changing to align themselves with the binaural frequency to which your brain is being exposed. Since certain frequencies of brain waves are associated with certain states of mind and emotions, listening to binaural beats may cause our brains to shift toward those states of mind and emotions.

Binaural Beats Frequencies

Binaural beats range in frequency from as small as 0.5 Hz to up to 40 Hz. Binaural beats generated in the range in which brain waves vibrate (i.e., 0.5 Hz to 16 Hz) may induce our brains to produce more of those waves. For example, listening to binaural beats with a frequency of 10 Hz may increase your brain’s production of alpha waves, which are associated with rest and meditation (Kasamatsu & Hirai, 1966). Similarly, listening to binaural beats at 7 Hz for as little as six minutes – although longer listening increases the effect – can stimulate more theta waves in your brain (Ala et al., 2018), which may cause you to feel more relaxed.

Binaural Beats for Sleep

​Binaural beats may have an effect on our sleep patterns. Binaural beats can be generated that have a frequency similar to that of delta waves, the brain waves that are most prominent when we sleep deeply. They can also be used to mimic theta waves, which are associated with lighter sleep stages. Although there is more research on other outcomes of binaural beats, there is early data to suggest that listening to certain kinds of binaural beats can improve people’s ability to fall asleep, as well as their sleep quality (Dabiri et al., 2022; Lee et al., 2019).

Binaural Beats for Focus

There are now dozens of studies indicating that listening to binaural beats can improve one’s focus (Basu & Banerjee, 2022). For example, one study found that people who listened to binaural beats for fifteen minutes experienced less mind wandering afterward than people who did not listen to the beats (Kirk et al., 2019). Binaural beats can also induce more cognitive flexibility (Hommel et al., 2016), more sustained attention, and improved performance on memory tasks (Basu & Banerjee, 2022).
 
Still another study found that listening to binaural beats lessened the increase in confusion and fatigue experienced by individuals doing thirty minutes of complex cognitive tasks (Lane et al., 1998). In this example, the authors suggested that the binaural beats they used increased the beta waves present in the brain, which helped participants more effectively cope with the demands of the tasks they were doing.
 
Interestingly, binaural beats have even been used to help people with Parkinson’s disease. While binaural beats have not changed the physical symptoms experienced by people with Parkinson’s disease, it appears that exposure to binaural beats can make their brains start to fire more like neurotypical brains do (Galvez et al., 2018).

Binaural Beats for Anxiety

It is also well-established that binaural beats can help reduce people’s anxiety (Garcia-Argibay et al., 2019). Specifically, listening to theta or delta-level frequencies in binaural beats seems to lessen the anxiety that people feel. This effect seems to increase the longer one listens to binaural beats – up to a point – and can be experienced in one’s first exposure to binaural beats (Garcia-Argibay et al., 2019).

Binaural Beats for Healing

It also appears that binaural beats can help us heal (Garcia-Argibay et al., 2019). For example, in a study conducted with people with chronic pain, listening to binaural beats can reduce the intensity of felt pain, reduce stress, and ultimately their need for pain medication (Gkolias et al., 2020).

Binaural Beats Studies & Science

I will admit that I initially had a hard time believing in binaural beats. However, the science behind this phenomenon goes back to the nineteenth century, when a German professor of physics, Heinrich Wilhelm Dove, discovered binaural beats (Oster, 1973). Ever since then, but especially in the last fifty years, binaural beats have been a topic of study within the field of psychoacoustics – the science of how sounds affect the brain.

Binaural beats were originally studied through projecting them into a specialized room or chamber, but scientists quickly discovered that our brains were more effective at ‘creating’ the binaural beat from the two tones if the tones were delivered by headphones (Oster, 1973). This reduces the impact of what is called diffraction, or the phenomenon of sounds being reflected off other surfaces (such as the walls of a room) to hit one’s ear at slightly changed frequencies.

How do we know that binaural beats are having an effect inside our skulls? We turn to measurement by an electroencephalograph (EEG). Perhaps you have seen an EEG in action before – it is the hairnet of electrodes that is placed over a person’s skull to take readings of their brain waves. As many scientific articles have clearly demonstrated, listening to binaural beats results in changes in the EEG readings for the listeners. In other words, binaural beats cause changes in our brain waves, particularly in its more evolved regions, where binaural beats cause greater connectivity between different brain areas (Perez et al., 2020). We can take this as proof that entrainment occurs when we listen to binaural beats.

Let’s look at a couple examples of what these changes in the brain really look like, and how people experience them. In one study, people listened to 30 minutes of 6 Hz binaural beats. Within ten minutes of listening, their brains showed more connectivity in the cortical areas – the parts of the brain associated with more complex brain functions – and these connectivity patterns were typical of brain activity during meditation. Meanwhile, the participants reported at this point in time that they were feeling less tension than they had been before (Jirakittayakorn & Wongsawat, 2017).

Here's another example: Beauchene and colleagues (2016) wanted to know if different kinds of music and binaural beats would improve people’s performance on a task of working memory (your working memory is your ability to recall information in the short-term, such as memorizing a phone number to then call it a minute later). They found that people who listened to binaural beats at 15 Hz, but not people who listened to different kinds of music or other binaural beats frequencies, performed better on the task and showed increased activity in the brain regions associated with using one’s memory. These results align with other studies showing that people recall things more accurately and respond more quickly to tasks when exposed to binaural beats (e.g., Mahajan et al., 2021).

Binaural Beats for Headaches

It should come as no surprise at this point that at least one study has shown that people with chronic headaches experience fewer of them when they regularly listen to binaural beats (Lovati et al., 2019).

Do Binaural Beats Work?

The scientific evidence thus far suggests that binaural beats have immediate effects, even if you have never been exposed to them before (Mahajan et al., 2021). But how do you know which binaural beats to listen to when? Certain frequencies can calm you down, while others can invigorate you and help you focus. Here is a quick summary of the four brainwave frequencies and their ranges – this can help you know what kind of effect each you might get from a particular binaural beats video or audio track.

1)    Delta waves. As mentioned earlier, these are the waves that occur most prominently when you are in a state of deep sleep. Their frequency ranges from 1.5 Hz to 4 Hz.

2)    Theta waves. These waves occur when you are transitioning into or out of a state of rest or meditation, so listening to them may help you start meditating or fall asleep. Their frequency ranges from 5 Hz to 7 Hz.

3)    Alpha waves. Ranging from 8 Hz to 12 Hz, alpha waves characterize the times when you are both alert and also relaxed, such as during meditation or a contemplative activity like yoga.

4)    Beta waves. These waves are the fastest brainwaves, ranging from 13 Hz to 40 Hz. Listening to them can help with cognitive functioning, as they are the brainwaves that are most involved in your executive functioning.

For a helpful summary of how binaural beats work, with a useful explanation of brainwaves as well, I suggest watching the following video. If you prefer more of a multimedia experience, it will review much of the same content that this article does.

Video: Do Binaural Beats Work? A Doctor Explains Binaural Beats

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Final Thoughts on Binaural Beats

Binaural beats are not just another fad, something people claim can change their lives with little evidence to prove it. While more research remains to be done, it is clear from what already exists that listening to binaural beats, whether on their own or within a musical track (Garcia-Argibay et al., 2019), can positively affect your thinking and mood.
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That said, keep in mind that which kind of beats you listen to, how long you listen to them, and the situation you are in are all important pieces of the puzzle. There is no clear scientific consensus about which beats to listen to when, whether listening longer is always better, or how loud or soft to listen to these beats. I suggest you consider them a low-stakes option for gently changing your mood or improving your ability to focus, one you can try on your own without a medical professional, but also not something to expect to radically transform your life.

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