Head to head
Sleep Cycle vs SnoreLab
Depth on one problem, or breadth across the night. SnoreLab has spent its entire existence on snoring. Sleep Cycle spreads itself across the night and the morning that follows it.
In short
If someone in the bed has complained about your snoring and you want to test whether anything helps, SnoreLab. If you want a picture of the whole night and an alarm at the end of it, Sleep Cycle.
SnoreLab is narrow, and that is the reason to buy it
SnoreLab listens, scores how loud the night was, saves samples and then tracks whether whatever you tried made a difference. That last part is the bit nothing else does properly: a remedy loop, so the mouthguard or the side-sleeping or the extra pillow gets tested rather than guessed at.
Its score is also built to be shown to someone else, whether that is the person you share a bed with or a doctor. That framing shapes the whole app.
Sleep Cycle is buying you the other twenty-three hours of context
Sleep Cycle estimates the whole night from the phone microphone, rings inside a window near your set time, and carries a large library of sleep aids for bedtime. Snoring is not the thing it was built around, but it is watching everything else.
It is also one app instead of two. If you want a habit rather than an investigation, that counts for a lot.
Decide whether you are running an experiment or building a routine
These two suit different moods. An experiment has a question, a change, and a before and after, which is SnoreLab exactly. A routine is something you keep doing for a year without thinking about it, which is Sleep Cycle.
Plenty of people want the experiment for six weeks and the routine forever. Running SnoreLab for a stretch and then going back to a general tracker is a perfectly sensible plan.
Neither app diagnoses anything. If the snoring worries you or the person next to you, that is a conversation with a doctor rather than an app.
One app that does both, if you are on an iPhone
Running two apps overnight is annoying, and one of them has to be the alarm. Tock classifies snores, coughs and sleep talking on device with Apple SoundAnalysis, keeps the clips so you can play them back in the morning, and is also the alarm, built on AlarmKit so it rings on silent and through a Focus.
It has no remedy-tracking loop, so if the point of the exercise is testing a specific fix, SnoreLab is still more deliberate about it. Tock is iPhone only and costs from $39.99 a year after a 3-day trial.
| What we compared | Sleep Cycle | SnoreLab |
|---|---|---|
| Scoring how loud you were | Not what it measures | The entire point (stronger here) |
| Testing whether a remedy helped | No such loop | Built for exactly that (stronger here) |
| Something to show someone | A chart of the night | A score made to be shared (stronger here) |
| Audio you can play back | Not its selling point | Samples saved (stronger here) |
| Waking you in the morning | A smart alarm window (stronger here) | Not an alarm |
| The rest of the night | Estimated end to end (stronger here) | Snoring only |
| Sounds to fall asleep to | A large library (stronger here) | Nothing like it |
| Available on Android | Yes, both platforms (about the same) | Yes, both platforms (about the same) |
Which one to actually install
Pick Sleep Cycle if
Sleep Cycle is the everyday app. It watches the whole night, wakes you inside a window and gives you a history to look back on, with no particular focus on snoring.
Pick SnoreLab if
SnoreLab is the specialist. Buy it when snoring is the actual question and you want to test a remedy properly and end up with something you can show someone.
Pick neither if
If you want the snoring recorded and the alarm in the same app, Tock classifies snores, coughs and sleep talking on device and saves playable clips, then wakes you at a lighter moment near your set time. iPhone only, and it has no remedy-testing loop.
Questions people ask
Does Sleep Cycle detect snoring?
Sleep Cycle is built around estimating the whole night from the phone microphone rather than around snoring in particular. If snoring is the reason you are searching, SnoreLab is the app that made it the whole job.
Can I run both on the same night?
Two apps competing for the microphone overnight is rarely a good time. If you want to test a remedy, run SnoreLab on its own for a few weeks and then go back.
Which one can I show a doctor?
SnoreLab scores the night in a way designed to be shared with a partner or a doctor. Neither app diagnoses anything, so treat it as a starting point for a conversation.
Do both run on Android?
Yes. Sleep Cycle and SnoreLab are both on iPhone and Android.
Where Tock sits against each of them
These pages are written the same way as this one, which means they state what Sleep Cycle and SnoreLab each do better than we do.
Related matchups
Other pairings involving one of these two.
- Alarmy vs Sleep CyclePick Alarmy if you sleep through alarms and need one you can't beat. Pick Sleep Cycle if you wake up on time but feel wrecked when you do, and you want a gentler window plus a record of the night.
- Apple Health Sleep vs Sleep CycleIf you wear an Apple Watch to bed, Apple's built-in tracking is more accurate and costs nothing, so Sleep Cycle has to win on the alarm and the sound library instead. If you don't own a Watch, Sleep Cycle is the only one of the two that records anything.
- AutoSleep vs Sleep CycleIf you already wear an Apple Watch to bed, AutoSleep reads a night that Sleep Cycle can only estimate from the room. If you don't own a Watch and don't want one, Sleep Cycle is the only one of the two that works, and it's your alarm as well.
- Calm vs Sleep CycleIf the problem is lying awake with a busy head, Calm. If the problem is groggy mornings and having no idea what your nights look like, Sleep Cycle. Most people searching this have already decided which; they just have not said it out loud.
- Pillow vs Sleep CycleIf you wear an Apple Watch to bed, Pillow gives you measured stage data and starts itself. If you do not own a Watch, or half the house is on Android, Sleep Cycle is the sensible pick.
- Rise vs Sleep CycleIf you want to plan a day around your energy and stop spiralling over one bad night, Rise. If you want the night itself drawn out and an alarm that finds a lighter moment, Sleep Cycle.
- Sleep as Android vs Sleep CycleOn Android, if you want every dial and every integration you can get, Sleep as Android is unmatched. If you want something simple, or your partner is on an iPhone, Sleep Cycle is the one that works for both of you.
- Sleep Cycle vs SleepScoreIf you want one app that watches the night and also rings in the morning, Sleep Cycle. If you only want the measurement, and you want the method explained rather than asserted, SleepScore.
Elsewhere on the site
A different corner of the same problem.
- Sleep soundsGentle windWind is broadband noise shaped by whatever it is moving past, drifting slowly up and down in level with no rhythm your ear can lock onto, which makes it unusually easy to stop noticing. It masks gently rather than firmly, so it belongs in a wind-down more than it belongs in a fight with a busy street.
- Tock for youEarly risersYou are up before your alarm most days, lying there working out whether to get up or risk another twenty minutes. On the days you go back to sleep, you feel worse than if you had just got out of bed.
- AlternativesTock vs PillowStay with Pillow if you track on your wrist, because it runs on the Watch and Tock does not. Choose Tock if your phone is the only thing on the nightstand and you want the alarm to be the centre of the product rather than a feature of the tracker.
- RoundupsThe best snoring apps, ranked by what they're forSnoreLab is the best dedicated snoring app: recording and scoring your snoring is its only job, and its remedy tracking is more deliberate than anything else here. Tock is the better pick if you want snoring in context, inside a night that also carries your sleep, your alarm and playable audio of what the room actually sounded like.
- Wake timesWaking up at 5:30amBedtimes by sleep cycle for a 5:30am alarm.
- BedtimesGoing to bed at 1:30amWhere to put the alarm after a 1:30am lights-out.
If neither of them is quite the alarm you wanted
Tock is built on Apple AlarmKit, so it rings on silent and through a Focus, moves earlier when it finds a lighter moment, and keeps ringing until you solve something.