Prana Breathing Exercises Help Documentation

A complete guide to Prana, from the first breath to your progress.

Last Updated: November 10, 2026

1. Getting Started

The tool has three tabs: Breathe, Breath test and Progress. On Breathe, the chosen technique sits beside the list: its name, its shape, its length and pace, the guide, the sound, the Start button and, under How to do it, and why it works, its steps, its reason and its source. Pick a card, check the panel, and press Start.

The line above the tabs shows today's minutes against your daily goal and the days in a row. Sound and settings and How it works sit beside the tabs.

2. Right Now I Feel

Ten words: Stressed, Panicky, Anxious, Angry, Cannot sleep, Nervous before something, Scattered, Need to focus, Low on energy and Out of breath. Tapping one chooses a technique and a length for that moment and says in one line why. On a phone the words are one row you can swipe, and the page moves down to the chosen technique.

3. The Fifteen Techniques

Each card shows the name, the seconds of each step, the shape (blue in, green out, purple holding), one line on what it is for and what it is mainly used for. The buttons above the list filter it: All, Calm, Sleep, Focus, Energy, Balance and Breathless. The seconds below are as written; the pace buttons make them shorter or longer.

• Cyclic sighing: in 2.5 through the nose, a short second sip of 1, then a long sigh out of 6 through the mouth; 5 minutes.
• Box breathing: in 4, hold 4, out 4, hold empty 4, all through the nose; 4 minutes.
• 4-7-8 breathing: in 4 through the nose with the tongue behind the top teeth, hold 7, out 8 through the mouth; 4 breaths.
• Coherent breathing: in 5.5 and out 5.5 through the nose, about five and a half breaths a minute; 10 minutes.
• Long breath out: in 4, out 6, no holds; 5 minutes.
• Slow down to sleep: in 4 and out 4, the breath out growing to 8 over the first three quarters; 10 minutes.
• Humming bee breath: in 4, then hum out for 8 with the lips closed; 3 minutes.
• Alternate nostril: in 4 through the left, out 6 through the right, in 4 through the right, out 6 through the left; 5 minutes.
• Triangle breathing: in 4, hold 4, out 4; 3 minutes.
• Equal breathing: in 4, out 4; 3 minutes.
• Ocean breath: in 5 and out 6 through the nose with the throat a little narrowed; 5 minutes.
• Pursed-lip breathing: in 2 through the nose, out 4 through pursed lips; 3 minutes.
• Energizing breath: rounds of 20 strong breaths, a second in and a second out, then 30 seconds of normal breathing; 3 rounds.
• Skull-shining breath: rounds of a half breath in, 30 sharp breaths out through the nose, then 30 seconds of normal breathing; 3 rounds.
• Breath-hold rounds: rounds of 30 deep breaths, a hold after breathing out for as long as is comfortable (up to four minutes), then one breath in held for 15 seconds; 3 rounds.

Just for you holds Find your pace (or Your pace once found), your own patterns and the button to make one.

4. Length, Pace and Guide

• Length: minutes, breaths, rounds or Until I stop, depending on the technique. A session in minutes ends at the end of the breath closest to the time.
• Pace: Faster and Slower change every step by the same share, from 40% faster to twice as slow; the shape and the ratio stay. The breaths a minute under the shape follow.
• Guide: Orb, Wave or Words. On a phone the guide is chosen inside the session.

The tool remembers the length and pace you chose for each technique.

5. The Session

The session fills the screen. With the three-second countdown on, it starts with Get ready and the first step. The word in the middle says what to do (Breathe in, Hold, Breathe out, Hum out...), the number counts each step down (or up, or not at all, in Sound and settings), and the line below says how: through the nose, through pursed lips, through the left nostril. At the top: the name, the step or the time left, and a thin bar for the whole session. At the bottom: the breaths so far, the breaths a minute and the time, the guide buttons, the round pause button, and the sound and eyes closed buttons. The controls fade after a few quiet seconds; any touch, mouse move or key brings them back.

At the end a bell sounds, and the session shows the time, the breaths and the breaths a minute, today's minutes against your goal, your hold times or your pace, the question how you feel now, and a box for a note. Again starts the same session, Done closes it. Sessions of 15 seconds or more are kept in Progress.

6. Eyes Closed, Sound and Voice

The eye button (or E) darkens the screen and hides the guide; a sound leads each breath. If the sound was off, it turns on. Tap anywhere to see the controls. The sound button (or M) turns all sound off and on for this session.

• Breath sound: a soft sound that rises as you breathe in and falls as you breathe out, a hum for the humming bee breath, and a soft tap at each hold.
• Soft tones: a rising tone in, a falling tone out, a steady one for a hold.
• Bowl: a singing bowl struck at each step.
• Background: none, brown noise, rain or a low drone, at its own volume.
• Say each step aloud: only with a voice that runs on your device; without one, nothing is spoken.
• Vibrate at each step: on most Android phones.

Every sound is made in your browser; nothing is downloaded. With soft tones or the bowl, fast breathing has a short tick instead; it is never spoken or vibrated.

7. Fast Breathing and Breath Holds

The energizing breath, the skull-shining breath and breath-hold rounds run in rounds. Before they start, the session shows the care note again and asks you to confirm you are sitting safely; Not now closes it. In breath-hold rounds, the hold after the deep breaths has no end of its own: a dot walks round the orb once every ten seconds and the time counts up. Tap I need to breathe (or press Space) as soon as you want to; the hold time is kept with the session and shown on the Breath test tab. A hold stops by itself after four minutes.

8. Find Your Pace

Five paces: 6.5, 6, 5.5, 5 and 4.5 breaths a minute, each with the breath out a little longer than the breath in, for one or two minutes each. After each pace the session asks how it felt: Hard work, A bit forced, Fine, Easy, or Smooth and easy. At the end it keeps the pace you rated highest (the slower one on a tie) as Your pace, shows your answers, and offers Breathe at your pace.

9. Before and After

With Ask how I feel before and after on, a session starts with "How tense or stressed do you feel right now?" from 1 (very calm) to 5 (very tense), or Skip, and ends with "And now?". When you answer both, the tool says whether you came out calmer. Progress averages the ratings per technique.

10. The Breath Test

Follow the four steps on the tab: breathe quietly for a minute, breathe out normally and pinch your nose, press Start (or Space) and press Stop at the first clear urge to breathe. The result shows in seconds with the difference from your last test. It is a personal record, not a health score, so there is no rating: the chart shows your last 30 results and the list your last 20, each with a bin to delete it. Results under two seconds or over ten minutes are not kept. Do it sitting down, never push, and skip it if you are pregnant or have a heart or lung condition, unless your doctor agrees.

When you have done breath-hold rounds, a second chart shows the longest hold of each session.

11. Progress

• Four tiles: today against your daily goal (a ring), the days in a row and your best run, this week's minutes and sessions, and the sessions that left you calmer.
• Last 14 days: minutes a day as bars, with your goal as a dashed line.
• Last 26 weeks: a calendar, one square a day, darker for more minutes against your goal.
• What helps you: sessions, time and the average tension before and after for each technique.
• Sessions: every session by day, with its time, breaths, tension, holds, pace and note, and a bin to delete it (Undo in the message). The first 30 show; Show more adds 30.

A day with a session counts for the days in a row until the end of the next day. Weeks start on Monday or Sunday, as set in Sound and settings.

12. Your Own Patterns and Share Links

Make your own pattern opens a window: a name, the seconds for Breathe in, Top-up breath, Hold with lungs full, Breathe out and Hold with lungs empty (half seconds; 0 turns a part off), Breathe in through nose or mouth, Breathe out through nose, mouth, pursed lips or a hum, Alternate nostrils, and Slow down as I go with a second set of numbers reached over the first three quarters of the session. The shape and breaths a minute show as you type. Set a usual length and what it is good for, and press Save pattern. Your patterns appear under Just for you; the pencil changes or deletes one (with Undo), the share button copies a link. Up to 100 patterns are kept.

Opening a shared link shows the pattern in a banner: Keep it, Try once (without keeping it) or Not now. The pattern rides after the # sign and is taken out of the address at once.

13. Sound and Settings

• Sound: the guide sound with Listen, Say each step aloud, the background with Listen, both volumes, Vibrate at each step.
• Sessions: numbers in the guide (count down, count up or none), the three-second countdown, Ask how I feel before and after, Keep the screen on during a session.
• Daily practice: the daily goal (1 to 60 minutes), the first day of the week, and a daily reminder file for your calendar.
• Your data: Delete everything.

14. Backup, Restore and Spreadsheet

• Backup (Progress tab): everything in one JSON file named with today's date.
• Restore: reads such a file, up to 20 MB, and adds the sessions, test results and patterns that are not here yet; your pace is taken if it is newer. Every value is checked first: real dates, numbers in their ranges, texts cut to their limits. Up to 20,000 sessions, 2,000 test results and 100 patterns are kept.
• Spreadsheet: your sessions as a CSV file, with the date, time, technique, minutes, breaths, breaths a minute, tension before and after, holds and note.

15. Keyboard and Accessibility

Every button and field works with the keyboard. The tabs are a tab list: the left and right arrows, Home and End move between them. In a session, Space pauses and carries on (and ends a hold), Esc ends, M turns the sound off and on, G changes the guide and E closes or opens your eyes. On the Breath test tab, Space starts and stops the timer. Elsewhere on the page these keys do what they always do. Each step is also announced to screen readers. With reduced motion set on your device, the guide starts as words only.

16. Staying Safe

Never practise breath holds or fast breathing in or near water, while driving, or standing up. Feeling a little light-headed or tingly can happen; slow down or breathe normally. If you are pregnant, or have heart or lung problems, epilepsy or high blood pressure, stay with the gentle techniques and ask your doctor about the rest. Breathing exercises can help you relax, but they do not replace care for a medical or mental health problem.

17. Privacy

Prana works in this browser, and nothing you do in it is sent anywhere: no upload, no account and no server-side storage. Every sound is made on your device, and spoken steps use only your device's own voice. A share link carries the pattern after the # sign, which browsers do not send to servers, and the page removes it from the address before anything else loads. Like every page on ZeroDataUpload, the page shows advertising and counts visits; the cookie banner explains the choices and the Privacy Policy explains both. What you do in the tool is never part of them.

18. How It Was Checked

Before this page was published, the engine behind the tool was checked against references written from the rules on this page, with the test values made first: 81,797 cases in 13 groups. They include every technique at every length and pace, the timing of every step over whole sessions (the same to the millisecond however often the screen redraws), pauses, holds, the pace finder's answers, the progress bar, the days in a row and the calendar in two time zones, your own patterns and share links, saved data and backups made to break the tool, the spreadsheet and the calendar file. Then the page was tried at four screen widths in both themes.

19. Troubleshooting

• No sound. Check the sound button in the session and the guide sound in Sound and settings; on a phone, check that it is not on silent. Some browsers start sound only after a tap, which Start is.
• The steps are not spoken. Your browser has no voice of its own on this device; the tool does not use online voices.
• The phone does not vibrate. iPhones do not let web pages vibrate; on Android, check Vibrate at each step.
• The screen turned off during a session. Turn on Keep the screen on in Sound and settings; some browsers do not allow it.
• "That link does not hold a breathing pattern Prana can read." The link was cut short when it was sent. Ask for it again.
• My sessions are gone. They are kept per browser and device; a private window or cleared browser data starts afresh. Restore a backup file to bring them back.

20. Support

For questions the FAQ does not answer, use the contact form.