Brain.fm Step-by-Step Guide: Settings That Actually Work

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Brain.fm creates music for specific states: focus, relaxation, meditation, or sleep. Most people play the first track they find and after two days decide “it’s just background music.” Meanwhile, a few settings that take one minute determine whether the app helps or just plays.

We base these steps on Brain.fm materials and feature descriptions in the app. Where the producer describes how their technology works, we note that it’s their description.

Before You Start: Three Things to Prepare

Headphones, a silenced phone, and one specific task. Focus music won’t help if you check notifications every five minutes or jump between five things. Before your first session, write down on paper what you want to accomplish in the next 45 minutes, and put your phone out of arm’s reach.

Also set a reasonable volume. The music should be background that drowns out your environment, not something you listen to. If you catch yourself following the melody, turn it down a few notches.

Step 1: Choose Your Mode

To start, you choose one of four modes: Focus for work and study, Relax for rest, Meditate for meditation, and Sleep for falling asleep. This is the most important decision, because the music in each mode is built differently. The producer describes, for example, that focus tracks cut out high frequencies that pull attention away, while sleep tracks have spatial sound that gives the impression of gentle rocking.

Step 2: Activity Type

In Focus mode, you also choose what you’re doing, for example deep work, creative work, or lighter tasks. Different music suits writing a report versus answering emails, so it’s worth changing this selection throughout the day instead of leaving one permanently.

In meditation mode there are separate variants, for example unguided meditation, relaxation, or deep rest before sleep. Reviewers point out not to play Brain.fm under a guided meditation recording, because two sound sources start competing with each other.

Step 3: Genre and Sounds

You can choose a music style, for example acoustic, cinematic, electronic, or piano, as well as nature sounds: rain, forest, river, waves. You can select multiple options at once. If a particular track suits you especially well, in its details you’ll see the mood, instruments, and similar tracks.

Step 4: Neural Effect Intensity

The app has a neural effect intensity slider, from low to high. According to the producer, it determines how strongly the technology on which the music is built works. Start with the medium level. If after several sessions your attention still wanders, try higher. If you’re sensitive to sound or prone to headaches, stay with lower. In Focus mode there’s also a variant for people with ADHD, which immediately sets the highest level.

Step 5: Timer

There are three time settings:

• endless, meaning a counter showing how long you’ve been working,
• timer for a specific time,
• intervals, meaning alternating periods of work and break, similar to the pomodoro method.

Brain.fm materials suggest focus sessions from 45 to 90 minutes and a few minutes to get into rhythm at the beginning. Intervals are a good choice for someone who easily forgets about breaks or conversely, can’t last longer than fifteen minutes.

Step 6: Phone and Offline Work

The app works on computer and phone. On your phone you can download music and listen without internet, for example on a plane. On computer, downloading isn’t available, so a connection is needed there.

How to Give It a Fair Chance

Reviewers agree on one thing: give the app several sessions before you judge it. The first session often sounds like ordinary background music. A sensible plan for the first week is one daily session in Focus mode with the same type of task, medium neural effect intensity, and a 45-minute timer. After a week, compare with days without music.

Most Common Mistakes

• One mode for everything, including evening relaxation.
• Speakers in a noisy place, where the music loses to the environment.
• Volume too high, which itself distracts.
• Judging after one session.

How to Evaluate Your First Week

After a week, answer three questions. Was it easier to start work after turning on a session? Did you reach for your phone less often during it? Did you finish the tasks you planned for the session? If the answer to two out of three is yes, the app helps and it’s worth staying with it longer. If not, change the neural effect intensity or activity type and give it another week before you quit.

After such a week, two things usually emerge. First: the same time and the same type of task work best, because your brain associates the music with work faster. Second: the neural effect intensity that suited you on day one doesn’t always suit you on day five, so it’s worth adjusting it instead of leaving the default permanently. Write down the settings where you worked best, and start your next sessions with them.

// read moreBrain.fm Use Cases: Deep Work, Study, Open Office & SleepGuidesBrain.fm Review: Does This Focus Music App Work?AI ToolsWindows 11 Collects Your Data by Default: Privacy Settings GuideGuides

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