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Breathe along · Sleep

Coherent breathing timer: breathe along online

Breathe in for 5, breathe out for 5: six breaths a minute. The orb breathes, you follow. Free, no sign-up, no cookies.

Ready?

Slow doesn’t mean deep

in 5 · out 5

If anything feels uncomfortable, just stop and breathe normally.

How it works

  1. Sit or lie down comfortably.
  2. Breathe in gently through your nose while the orb grows: 5 seconds.
  3. With no pause in between, breathe out gently while the orb shrinks: 5 seconds.
  4. What matters is the pace, not the amount of air: breathe only as much as feels comfortable.

That’s one round, and it takes 10 seconds, so six breaths a minute. Five minutes is plenty to start. Then just breathe normally.

Slow doesn’t mean deep. In one head-to-head study, six breaths a minute led to mild overbreathing on average, meaning too much air.1 If you feel dizzy or notice tingling in your hands or lips, breathe more shallowly, or stop and breathe normally. Practice sitting or lying down, never while driving. Coherent breathing isn’t a treatment: if you have a heart, circulation, or lung condition, check with your doctor first.

If the pace feels too slow

At rest, adults breathe about 12 to 20 times a minute.2 So six breaths a minute feels unusual at first. If the slow pace feels hard, experts suggest working your way down from your own pace.2 That’s what Find your breathing pace is for: you tap four times as you breathe in. The orb starts at your own pace and slows down over the first fifth of the session until you reach six breaths a minute. In and out stay the same length: both phases get shorter in the same proportion. Whether that works better than starting at six right away hasn’t been studied.

What studies show

During practice, your heart rate swings more with your breath; a meta-analysis of 223 studies on slow breathing shows this.3 That’s a measurement taken while you practice, not a verdict on your health. In the largest study of coherent breathing so far, 400 adults practiced about ten minutes a day for four weeks with an audio guide. Half breathed about 5.5 times a minute, the other half 12 times, with identical instructions. Both groups felt less stressed at the end, and by the same amount.4

So in this study, the slow pace did no better than calm, guided breathing at a normal pace. The benefit most likely came from what both exercises had in common: a few minutes a day to yourself, breathing calmly with guidance, and the expectation that it would help. These studies tested the technique, not the nowa app. More on this, including what happens to your heart rate: Coherent breathing, honestly explained.

This page shares general information about breathing exercises for relaxation and well-being. It is not medical advice and does not replace diagnosis or treatment by a licensed professional. nowa is a wellness app. It is not a medical device and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Only practice while it feels comfortable. If you feel dizzy or short of breath, or notice a racing heart, chest pain, or strong anxiety, stop and breathe normally. If you have a medical condition (for example a heart or lung condition, or epilepsy) or are pregnant, talk to your doctor or midwife before trying new breathing exercises. Never change prescribed treatment on your own.

Embed on your site

Do you teach yoga, coach people, or write about breathing? Embed the breathing orb on your website for free. It only loads files from nowabreathing.com, sets no cookies, stores nothing in the browser and shows no ads.

See how it looks embedded: preview. For your privacy policy: when it loads, the browser sends the visitor’s IP address to nowabreathing.com (hosted by Cloudflare), as with any embedded content.

Sources

  1. Marchant J, Khazan I, Cressman M, Steffen P (2025). Comparing the effects of square, 4-7-8, and 6 breaths-per-minute breathing conditions on heart rate variability, CO2 levels, and mood. Applied Psychophysiology and Biofeedback 50(2):261–276. doi.org/10.1007/s10484-025-09688-z
    Lab comparison, 84 college students
  2. Shaffer F, Meehan ZM (2020). A practical guide to resonance frequency assessment for heart rate variability biofeedback. Frontiers in Neuroscience 14:570400. doi.org/10.3389/fnins.2020.570400
    Practical guide, review
  3. Laborde S, Allen MS, Borges U, Dosseville F, Hosang TJ, Iskra M, Mosley E, Salvotti C, et al. (2022). Effects of voluntary slow breathing on heart rate and heart rate variability: A systematic review and a meta-analysis. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews 138:104711. doi.org/10.1016/j.neubiorev.2022.104711
    Meta-analysis, 223 studies
  4. Fincham GW, Strauss C, Cavanagh K (2023). Effect of coherent breathing on mental health and wellbeing: a randomised placebo-controlled trial. Scientific Reports 13(1):22141. doi.org/10.1038/s41598-023-49279-8
    Randomized placebo-controlled trial, 400 adults, four weeks

All sources last checked on November 3, 2026.