# Free room tone recordings

> Free room tone and quiet interior ambience: empty rooms, offices, halls and hums to fill silence in film, podcasts and music, with a licence verdict.

14 samples from 1 sources (Openverse 14), updated 2026-10-23. Picked from a live search and refreshed daily.

- Same search in the browser: https://sound.shep.bot/search?q=room+tone&category=ambience
- Same search over the API: `curl "https://sound.shep.bot/v1/search?q=room+tone&category=ambience"`
- Details, files and the credit line: `GET https://sound.shep.bot/v1/samples/{id}` with an id from the table below.
- Licence verdicts: "Commercial use OK" (with or without credit) is cleared for a release; anything else must be checked or is non-commercial. See https://sound.shep.bot/docs/licences.md

## The sound of an empty room

Every room has a sound even when nobody is talking: air conditioning, the hum of lights, distant traffic through a window, the acoustics of the walls. That background is called room tone. Recording engineers capture a minute of it on every set so editors can patch gaps, and sound designers use it to place a scene.

## Choosing one

Match the size and character of the room: a small carpeted office, a tiled kitchen and a concert hall each sound different. Steady tones without clicks, voices or passing cars are the most useful, since they can be looped for as long as you need. Keep the level very low, just above silence.

Room tones are rarely contested for rights and many are released as CC0. Each card shows the licence and the credit line when one is required.

## Samples

| Sample | id | What | Source | Licence | Commercial use | Direct download |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| [room tone stairway 1.wav](https://freesound.org/people/lwdickens/sounds/268999) | `openverse:ccdd1df1-e4ef-4498-950e-16372a02d0ad` | Ambience, 2:06 | Openverse | CC BY-NC 4.0 | Non-commercial only | yes |
| [room-tone WC](https://freesound.org/people/Yuval/sounds/210063) | `openverse:d94d41c0-12e3-4e00-9f5a-b9592f1ffd4a` | Ambience, 6:30 | Openverse | CC0 1.0 | Commercial use OK | yes |
| [room-tone quiet 01 121129_01.wav](https://freesound.org/people/klankbeeld/sounds/171740) | `openverse:781e82bd-ea1b-4373-a5ef-88612040be99` | Ambience, 2:33 | Openverse | CC BY 4.0 | Commercial use OK with credit | yes |
| [room tone large room library.wav](https://freesound.org/people/lwdickens/sounds/263502) | `openverse:8a99bdf0-f4a3-4b1e-af14-d08cca3fd90e` | Ambience, 2:57 | Openverse | CC BY-NC 4.0 | Non-commercial only | yes |
| [Room Tone Office Quiet Distant Traffic.wav](https://freesound.org/people/mzui/sounds/135097) | `openverse:d03fc899-3cd9-45a2-8a8f-20680fd43558` | Ambience, 1:06 | Openverse | CC0 1.0 | Commercial use OK | yes |
| [Living room tone with clock ticking.aif](https://freesound.org/people/bennychico11/sounds/83068) | `openverse:a8cc1c76-d5ec-45ee-8afc-69ba4b78f92d` | Ambience, 21 s | Openverse | CC BY 4.0 | Commercial use OK with credit | yes |
| [Room Tone Apartment Small Bachelor](https://freesound.org/people/leonelmail/sounds/329568) | `openverse:63e63843-1c05-47b3-a270-6c21d6ff0135` | Ambience, 46 s | Openverse | CC0 1.0 | Commercial use OK | yes |
| [Room tone pasillo Hotel.R.aif](https://freesound.org/people/fritzsound/sounds/56409) | `openverse:1eb477c5-0ecb-425c-9c38-9411792abbf8` | Ambience, 2:01 | Openverse | CC BY 3.0 | Commercial use OK with credit | yes |
| [Room Tone abandoned studio.wav](https://freesound.org/people/speedygonzo/sounds/257662) | `openverse:a405b1ae-1537-4767-afc6-2174bd2daec5` | Ambience, 13 s | Openverse | CC BY 3.0 | Commercial use OK with credit | yes |
| [Room Tone Office 11](https://freesound.org/people/mzui/sounds/203305) | `openverse:dbec3c9e-0717-4e19-8843-b17c4d52f563` | Ambience, 1:59 | Openverse | CC0 1.0 | Commercial use OK | yes |
| [room-tone living 140219_0101.wav](https://freesound.org/people/klankbeeld/sounds/219681) | `openverse:2f135078-c876-4689-96d7-7b4f65fc630f` | Ambience, 10:00 | Openverse | CC BY 4.0 | Commercial use OK with credit | yes |
| [Room tone habitación](https://freesound.org/people/Matias44/sounds/276289) | `openverse:78916d80-6fb7-4b35-b7e2-efa6a906eccb` | Ambience, 4:25 | Openverse | CC0 1.0 | Commercial use OK | yes |
| [room-tone quiet 01 121129_00.wav](https://freesound.org/people/klankbeeld/sounds/171716) | `openverse:4c896be7-5800-4303-bc2f-aabde2367816` | Ambience, 3:19 | Openverse | CC BY 4.0 | Commercial use OK with credit | yes |
| [Room tone pasillo Hotel.L.aif](https://freesound.org/people/fritzsound/sounds/56408) | `openverse:bf1da853-3e71-4fae-80cd-9a924884406a` | Ambience, 2:01 | Openverse | CC BY 3.0 | Commercial use OK with credit | yes |

## Questions

**Why does a film or podcast need room tone?**

Total silence between lines sounds like a mistake. Editors fill gaps with the quiet background of the room the dialogue was recorded in, so cuts are seamless. When you lack your own, a similar room tone is the next best thing.

**Is room tone useful in music?**

Yes. A faint room tone under an electronic track makes it feel recorded rather than generated, and a hum or air-conditioning drone can become a pad when pitched and filtered.

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Source: https://sound.shep.bot/samples/free-room-tone