Wake tones
Sunrise alarm clocks, and what an app can do instead
Tock has no lamp in it, so let's be straight about what a sunrise alarm clock actually is before working out whether an app can stand in for one.
In short
A sunrise alarm clock is a bedside lamp that brightens over roughly 20 to 30 minutes before your set time, and the light is the part you are paying for. Tock is an iPhone app with no light hardware at all, so it takes the timing half instead: a soft wake tone rung at a lighter moment inside the last 30 minutes rather than at a fixed time.
- Lights Tock can control
- 0Lights Tock can controlIt is an app, not a lamp
- How early smart wake rings
- 30 minHow early smart wake ringsAt a lighter moment, if it finds one
- Wake tones to choose from
- 18Wake tones to choose fromIncluding several soft ones
Nothing to play on this page
This page is about a kind of wake tone rather than one specific sound, so there is no single clip to put here. Beacon, Kalimba, Marimba and Musicbox all have one.
How it rings
A sunrise-style tone is built to be almost inaudible at the start, to build across tens of seconds instead of jumping to full level, and to hold a soft repeating figure that stays comfortable right up until you notice you are late.
What the lamp is actually doing
A wake-up light sits on the nightstand and ramps its brightness up over 20 to 30 minutes, so by the time any sound arrives the room is already lit and your eyes have had a long, gradual introduction to it. Most models finish with a tone or a radio.
The light is the active ingredient and the sound is a backstop. That is the whole design, and no phone app can replicate it, because a phone screen pointed at the ceiling is not a light source in any meaningful sense.
There is nothing to play on this page. A sunrise alarm is a setup rather than a tone, and the tones it uses are on the Kalimba and Music box pages.
If the light is what you want, buy the lamp
This is the honest recommendation and it costs us nothing to make. If you have decided that gradual light is the thing that will fix your winter mornings, buy a wake-up light. An app cannot give you that and should not pretend otherwise.
Plenty of them are inexpensive, and the ones with a sunset ramp on the other end are worth the extra if you struggle to put the day down at night.
The timing half is the part software is good at
What a lamp cannot do is know anything about the night you just had. It brightens on a fixed schedule whether you are deep under or already half awake.
Tock reads movement and sound through the night and, inside the 30 minutes before your alarm, rings at a moment that looks lighter. Choose a soft tone and the ring stays undramatic. Your set time is always the fallback, so nothing about this makes you late.
Running a lamp and Tock together
The combination is better than either half. Put the lamp on its own ramp finishing at your normal wake time, and let Tock handle the alarm itself so it rings through silent mode and through a Focus on the system alert, and keeps ringing until you finish a mission.
The room gets you close to the surface. The alarm finishes the job and makes sure you do not sink back.
Who should set this one
Worth setting if
- Dark winter mornings where nothing in the room tells you it is time
- People who already own a wake-up light and want the alarm side handled properly
- Anyone whose complaint is being startled rather than being late
- Bedrooms with blackout blinds and no natural light at all
Pair it with a mission
ShakeWake-up mission
A light-first morning is meant to be unhurried, and Shake is the shortest mission in the app. It gets you moving without putting a screen in front of your eyes, which suits a room that is already brightening.
All nine missionsQuestions people ask
Is Tock a sunrise alarm clock?
No. Tock has no light hardware and cannot control a lamp. It does the timing part, ringing at a lighter moment in the 30 minutes before your alarm with a tone of your choosing.
Can an app really replace a wake-up light?
Not on the light. If gradual brightness is what you are after, buy the lamp. An app can change when the alarm arrives and what happens after it, which is a different improvement.
Can Tock control smart bulbs?
No. There is no lighting or home automation control in the app.
Does a soft tone still ring through silent mode?
Yes. Every Tock alarm is scheduled through Apple's AlarmKit and comes up on the native full-screen alert, no matter which of the 18 tones you picked.
Other wake tones
Eighteen ship with the app. These are the ones worth reading about first.
- Gentle alarm soundsA gentle alarm works when it catches you at a light moment and fails when it lands in the heaviest part of your night, which is a timing problem rather than a volume one. Tock watches movement and sound across the 30 minutes before your alarm and rings early at a lighter moment if it finds one, with your set time as the fallback.
- Nature alarm soundsBirds, water and weather make calm wake tones and carry one specific failure: a natural sound is easy for a sleeping brain to fold into a dream rather than treat as an alarm. Tock counters that in two places, by scheduling the alarm through Apple's AlarmKit so it lands on the system full-screen alert, and by keeping it ringing until a wake-up mission is done.
- KalimbaKalimba is Tock's thumb-piano wake tone: warm plucked notes with a short woody decay that lift you rather than startle you. It still runs on Apple's AlarmKit, so a silent switch, an active Focus and a closed app make no difference to whether it goes off.
- Loud alarm soundsTock's alarms ring through silent mode and through a Focus because they are built on Apple's AlarmKit, not on an app keeping audio alive in the background. What no app can do is raise your iPhone's hardware volume for you. Loudness gets your eyes open; the wake-up mission is what stops you dismissing it and going straight back to sleep.
Elsewhere on the site
A different corner of the same problem.
- Tock for youNew parentsYou do not wake up to an alarm any more, you wake up to a small person, three or four times, and then you have to be a functioning adult by seven. The night is not so much short as it is in pieces.
- AlternativesTock vs PzizzKeep Pzizz if you nap, or if your mind needs words to hold onto while you fall asleep. Tock generates its sound too, but it has no voiceover and nothing for naps. What Tock adds is the alarm, the tracking and the morning report Pzizz does not attempt.
- RoundupsThe best sleep apps for iPhone, sorted by what you're fixingFor iPhone, the best sleep app depends on the problem. Tock is the best all-round pick when the alarm and the morning are what is broken, Apple Health Sleep is the free place to start, Calm is for people who cannot fall asleep, AutoSleep is for Apple Watch owners, Rise is for sleep debt and SnoreLab is for snoring.
- Wake timesWaking up at 6:30amBedtimes by sleep cycle for a 6:30am alarm.
- BedtimesGoing to bed at 9:30pmWhere to put the alarm after a 9:30pm lights-out.
- Sleep by ageHow much sleep older adults needThe American Academy of Sleep Medicine recommendation of 7 or more hours per night applies to adults without an upper age cut-off. What changes with age is not how much sleep is needed but how easily it is obtained: the night becomes lighter, more broken, and shifts earlier.
An alarm that rings on silent, and then asks for something
Tock is built on Apple AlarmKit, so it rings through silent mode and a Focus with the app closed. Then it keeps ringing until you solve one of nine missions.