Difference Between White Noise and Pink Noise

White Noise vs Pink Noise

White noise and pink noise seem strange to one who is not into sound masking. They may either be connected to a band or maybe to a movie. But these two types of noise co-exist with the daily frequency that we hear and hence its worth to check their difference.

White noise

White noise is the random signal that is found and is equal to the frequency of a given bandwidth. It has a flat spectrum that uses a linear frequency scale with constant energy that is reflected in Hertz. Basically it carries equal energy per frequency. Audibly it can be recognized for its hissing sound due to its high frequency which takes less energy.

Pink noise

Pink noise is known to be a variant of white noise. It is generally white noise that is filtered to reduce the volume at each octave and often done to compensate for the increase in frequency per octave. The spectrum of a pink noise has a -3dB octave slope or that of a constant energy per octave. It is usually used to equalize rooms since it shows as a flat line on a standard 1/3 octave band analyzers.

Difference between white and pink noise

A lot of people are confused about the difference between these two noises. However pink noise is the right type of noise that can be used to calibrate audio equipments. With white noise there is a ton more energy in between let’s say a 10 kHz and a 20kHz between other higher frequencies since it spans a wider range of frequencies and they all contribute to the total lever of each octave. The whole point of pink noise is to evenly distribute the energy based as to how we hear it.

Those noises are calibrated as to how we perceived them to be, each time a frequency doubles we interpret it as an octave. Thus we hear an appropriate amount of sound energy.