Two of my kids sleep with a fan when it is hot and they have continued doing it when it is cold and I suspect it’s the white noise that is helping them sleep rather than the air flow (unless it is hot).
A year ago I forgot to take off my smart watch when I went to sleep.
When I awoke I felt more refreshed than I had felt for years. It was the first night on a trip back to the UK, sleeping outside a quiet sleepy village, well away from the road.
Using the data from that night as a baseline (I like data), and wearing the watch at night, over the next year I never once slept as well as that night - until the last two nights where it was swelteringly hot and I resorted to a fan in the bedroom.
I didn’t have that mid afternoon slump and my wathc data said I had had two good nights of sleep with enough deep sleep.
As it was uncomfortably hot, yet I still slept better than ever, I suspect it was the noise from the fan which helped me sleep.
So, can anyone recommend any white noise generators/equivalents or other ideas as I’m sure a fan blowing air constantly onto my kids faces is probably not good for their skin, especially in winter when the air is so dry.
As much as people like to think Switzerland is quiet, I find much of the UK much quieter at night - I suspect it’s because people don’t feel they need to have such large engined cars which are incredibly noisy - even outside of the cities in the countryside, and with triple-glazed windows and insulated walls and so on…
(please don’t take this as a moan at Switzerland - just an observation of a country with such strict, and often farcical, noise rules).
10 hours of white noise on the smart speaker?
White Noise 10 Hours | Spotify Playlist
You can download noise videos off YouTube, convert them to audio and play on any player you have. e.g. if you have a phone or bluetooth speakers.
You can even buy <$10 audio modules and just load the sound onto the built-in storage or add a CF card.
I was thinking that there were self-contained units you could buy. Perhaps I could do something with a Raspberry Pi.
( I refuse to have a smartphone in the bedroom, unless a family member is in hospital or something like that)
I haven’t started looking into it yet - I was just amazed that with such terrible sleeping conditions, I slept better than ever and know I think I know why!
You don’t need to with a smart speaker, just having it within range, which can be quite a few meters away, in another room.
We’re using Xiaomi Air purifier as we’re used to that white noise and find it calming/therapeutical 
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We bought one of these for our son for Christmas a couple of years ago and he loves it.
https://www.galaxus.ch/en/s6/product/easysleep-white-noise-maschine-mit-schlaf-timer-funktion-sleep-therapy-65264220
Like your boys he’d taken to having a fan on year round purely for the white noise effect and I thought an actual white noise generator would probably be better.
He clearly sleeps very well as he didn’t hear the doorbell and the police banging loudly on our door at 1am last week.
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He didn’t do anything, it was the cat who was to blame.
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That looks ideal - I’ll buy one for my son first and see how he gets on with it.
I really don’t want a device which does lots of other things too.
I downloaded a freebie called myNoise to my iPad about 4 years ago. You can set a timer and a fade out length. Some of the sounds were developed with tinnitus in mind and I find Binaural Beats a good one, it’s hypnotic. OH downloaded it and was using it in hospital when he couldn’t sleep.
He likes having a fan on in the bedroom in this weather but I end up getting up in the middle of the night to switch it off as the racket drives me nuts.
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Sadly not. He got run over.
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Oh dear…sorry to hear that. Police visit for a cat? I can’t think where else this would happen. TIS.
Really sad, you look for them when they’ve gone. A friend of ours lost one of his cats when it was run over, he was distraught for weeks after.
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Thank you!
It’s very sad, we’d had him for nearly 15 years.
Everyone in the village knew him.
I am so sorry for you and your family.
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Alexa does white noise very good, also ambient sounds like starship noises at three in the morning… rain on tent, fireplace, water.
Anything that floats your boat.
Speaking of boats and white noise, a vacation after six months at sea sleeping in a bunk in “screw hotel” right over the portside propeller (not a brothel) and the only way I could sleep was to put the vaccuum cleaner in the cupboard and turn it on.
I‘m so sorry: they’re family. This is where I wish there was a hug emoji
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