SoundGym and ToneGym come from the same company, but they train two different skills. SoundGym is for engineering ears — hearing frequency, dynamics and space in a mix. ToneGym is for musicianship — the pitch side, intervals and chords. Neither one covers the other, and there is no bundle, so if you want both you pay for both.
If you mix and produce and you are picking one, pick SoundGym. If you write parts and struggle to name what you are hearing, pick ToneGym. Below is what each one actually contains, what it costs, and where you can get the same skill cheaper. All prices checked August 2026.
What is the difference between SoundGym and ToneGym?
The difference is the skill, not the quality. Both are browser-based game platforms from the same operator, both use short timed drills, both have leaderboards and streaks. What changes is what the drill is asking your ear to do.
SoundGym asks processing questions. Which band got boosted. Is that compressed. How wide is that. Which of these two is louder. It is aimed at the person sitting in front of a mix, and its game names give it away — EQ Mirror, Compressionist, Stereohead, Dr. Compressor, Reverb Wizard, Bass Detective, Filter Expert.
ToneGym asks musical questions instead: pitch relationships, intervals, chords, the material a musician needs to transcribe a part or play one back. Their site lists 17 music games. It is a musicianship trainer that happens to be built by an audio-engineering company.
So the honest answer to “which one covers both” is neither. They are two products with two checkouts.
What does SoundGym train, specifically?
SoundGym trains mix-engineering perception through a set of named games. Eighteen are listed by name on their site: Sonar Beast, EQ Mirror, Compressionist, Stereohead, Balance Memory, EQ Knight, Peak Master, Dr. Compressor, DB King, Filter Expert, Kit Cut, PanGirl, Bass Detective, Delay Control, Distorted Reality, Reverb Wizard, EQ Cheetah and Feedback Eliminator.
Their shop page says “all 21 sound games”. Eighteen are listed. We are not going to guess what the other three are; that is just the gap as it stands.
A free account works, with limits. Their help pages say free accounts “get the same 3 games on each workout”, while Pro gets the full set and 5 games per workout. On beat workouts, free gets 1 game and Pro gets 3. So the free tier is a real taste of the thing, not a locked demo, but it repeats.
There is also a free “Audio School” with five programs covering recording, electronic production, mix and mastering, synthesis and live sound. Read their own description before you count it as teaching: the material is “curated from the best free online content”. It is organised third-party video, not original instruction.
One more practical detail: there is no native mobile app. Their help page says there is no iOS or Android application and it runs in a mobile browser.
What does ToneGym train, and who is it for?
ToneGym trains musicianship, so it is for people writing and playing rather than mixing. If your problem is that you can hear a chord change but cannot name it, or you cannot transcribe a bassline without hunting on the keyboard, that is the ToneGym problem space.
It has a free plan and 17 music games, and it sells on the same monthly/yearly/lifetime pattern as its sibling.
Where it does not help: none of that makes an EQ move easier to spot. Interval training and mix perception are close enough to sound related and far enough apart that one does not transfer to the other. A producer who can name every interval can still be deaf to 300 Hz mud.
SoundGym vs ToneGym: price and what you get
Prices below are from each site’s shop page, checked August 2026.
| SoundGym | ToneGym | |
|---|---|---|
| Trains | Mix engineering: EQ, compression, level, panning, stereo, reverb, delay, distortion | Musicianship: pitch, intervals, chords |
| Monthly | $24.95 | $13.95 |
| Yearly | $142 (marketed as $11.80/month) | $74.95 |
| Lifetime | $495 | $255 |
| Free plan | Yes, 3 games per workout | Yes |
| Games listed | 18 by name (shop says 21) | 17 |
| Bundle with the other | None. Two separate subscriptions. | |
Worth noticing on the SoundGym line: Sound On Sound’s July 2021 review quoted $24.95/month and $119/year. The monthly price has not moved. The annual went from $119 to $142.
Both together, on annual plans, is $216.95 a year. That is the number people are really asking about when they search for a comparison.
Which one should a mixing producer pick?
SoundGym, without much argument. If you make beats, mix your own tracks, or master for other people, the skill that pays you back this month is hearing what a processor did. That is exactly what SoundGym drills.
Take ToneGym instead only if your bottleneck is writing. If your mixes are fine and your chord choices are guesswork, the pitch side is your gap.
And if you are choosing SoundGym, it is worth knowing its shape before you subscribe. It is a measurement machine more than a teacher — one user on SoundGym’s own public feedback thread called it “more of a reference game than a teacher” with “no explanation of what to listen for”, and the team replied defending the deliberate gamified design. That is a fair description rather than an insult. It scores you, it does not coach you. We went into that in more detail in our look at whether SoundGym is worth paying for.
Sound On Sound raised a related point in 2021: because the settings are randomly generated, difficulty is uneven. The same EQ move is far easier to hear on a busy synth than on a sparse drum loop, so your score wobbles for reasons that have nothing to do with your ears.
Cheaper ways to get each skill
For the musicianship half, EarMaster Pro 7 is the pay-once option: $59.95 for a perpetual licence covering 2 computers, Windows and macOS, with 4000+ exercises and exam prep for ABRSM and RCM. There is also a free tier on iOS, Android, Windows and macOS with intervals, chords, 4 beginner modules and 3 preloaded courses. One payment of $59.95 against ToneGym at $74.95 a year is not a close call if you intend to train for more than a year.
For the engineering half, our own trainer is free: Monosounds Ear Training. Full disclosure, we make it, so weigh that accordingly — but here is what it is, judged the same way as everything above. Browser-based on phone or desktop, 500 levels across 10 chapters, first 10 levels with no account. 54 exercise generators in 6 answer formats: multiple choice, a slider you match by ear, quiz questions, ABX, ranking three clips, and a “fix it” mode with two knobs where the right values make the audio identical to the reference. It covers EQ boosts and cuts, resonance hunting, compression, gain, panning, width, mono compatibility, phase, saturation, reverb, filters and synthesis by ear. When you miss, it tells you what that frequency range sounds like, which is the piece the SoundGym critic above was asking for.
Its limits, plainly: it is a game, not a curriculum, there is no video teaching, and it is browser-only so there is no offline app.
If the deciding factor is method rather than money, TrainYourEars is the other serious pay-once contender for the mixing side, and we compared it directly in SoundGym vs TrainYourEars. The wider field — free browser tools, desktop apps, open-source options — is in our roundup of SoundGym alternatives.
How to actually train, once you have picked
Short daily sessions beat long weekend ones, and training on material you make is better than training on someone else’s loops. Ten focused minutes, most days, on the one thing you are worst at.
Then close the trainer and do the same move in your DAW on a real track, because the score is not the point. Sweep a boost until you find the ugly spot, cut it, and check whether the mix agrees with you. If you need material to practise on, our free Serum 2 preset pack gives you sounds to mangle, and the Serum 2 bundles come with stems and full mixes if you want to practise on finished material.
Between the trainer and the DAW, the transfer is the whole job. Games measure. Sessions teach.
FAQ
Are SoundGym and ToneGym the same company?
Yes. ToneGym is run by the same operator as SoundGym. They share a design approach — short gamified drills in a browser, leaderboards, free and paid tiers — but they are sold as two separate products with two separate checkouts.
Is there a SoundGym and ToneGym bundle?
No. There is no combined plan, so wanting both means paying for both. On annual plans that is $142 for SoundGym plus $74.95 for ToneGym, which comes to $216.95 a year. Prices checked August 2026.
Which is better for mixing, SoundGym or ToneGym?
SoundGym. It trains mix-engineering perception: EQ bands, compression, level, panning, stereo width, reverb and delay. ToneGym trains pitch and harmony, which is useful for writing music but will not help you hear a 3 dB boost at 400 Hz.
How much does SoundGym cost?
SoundGym’s shop page lists $24.95 per month, $142 per year (marketed as $11.80 a month) and $495 lifetime, checked August 2026. There is a free account that gives you 3 games per workout, versus 5 games and the full catalogue on Pro.
How much does ToneGym cost?
ToneGym is $13.95 per month, $74.95 per year or $255 lifetime, with a free plan available, checked August 2026. It carries 17 music games. That is roughly half the SoundGym price at every tier.
Is there a free alternative to either one?
For mixing, yes — our own Monosounds Ear Training is free with no paid tier, though it is ours so judge it accordingly. For musicianship, EarMaster has a free tier with intervals and chords, and a $59.95 perpetual licence if you want the full version without a subscription.
I run Monosounds.studio and make the packs myself. Ten-plus years of producing, 97+ releases, 16,000+ downloads. Every Serum 2 preset we ship passes a CPU check on a mid-range laptop and gets used in a real track before release. If it does not survive a mix, it does not go in the pack.
More about Maxim & the studio →
