Ambora is a desktop app for the music and the ambience of your tabletop RPG sessions. Switch scenes with a crossfade, layer wind and birdsong underneath, and trigger a raven when your players get comfortable — all from your phone, one tap at a time.
Every DM knows the struggle. You've curated the perfect playlists — but actually using them mid-session is a nightmare.
Spotify and YouTube don't crossfade between playlists. Combat music cuts to tavern music with an ugly silence gap or hard switch.
Alt-tabbing to a browser while your players watch you fumble for the right playlist. Mood: killed. Immersion: shattered.
You're already managing NPCs, combat, and story. Remembering which playlist goes with which scene is one thing too many.
Create a campaign — or start with the 15 pre-built RPG moods. Add climates like combat, tavern, forest, and mystery, each with its own playlist of YouTube or local tracks, plus optional ambient layers underneath.
Ambora starts a local server on your network. Scan the QR with your phone — no app install, no account. Your phone becomes a remote control.
One tap switches climates with a smooth crossfade — music and ambience together. Your players hear the tavern chatter melt into forest wind. Then you tap Raven, and nobody knows why they're nervous.
Ambora focuses on doing one thing exceptionally well — letting you shape the sound of a scene without breaking your flow.
Each climate gets its own color and icon — choose from 16 colors and 20 icons. On the phone, they're large, glowing cards you can identify at a glance — even in a dimly lit room.
Dual-channel audio engine with configurable crossfade (1–10 seconds). Old music fades out while new music fades in. No gaps, no silence.
A forest isn't one looping file. Stack layers under the music: wind looping continuously, birds every 8–20 seconds, a branch cracking every half minute, and a raven only when you tap it. Each layer has its own volume, and random layers never overlap themselves — the next delay starts when the last clip ends.
Your phone becomes the remote via local WiFi. No app to install — just scan a QR code. Switch scenes, ride the volume, toggle ambient layers, and fire one-shots from big tap-friendly pads.
Paste YouTube URLs or use your own MP3, WAV, OGG, or FLAC files. Mix both in the same climate playlist.
LUFS-based auto-leveling analyses your local tracks and holds them all at the same perceived loudness — no more diving for the volume knob between songs.
One button gently fades everything to silence for dramatic moments. Tap again to resume. Volume control always at your fingertips.
Organize music by campaign. Switch between The Lost Mines, Curse of Strahd, and your homebrew without losing your setup.
Built for dimly lit game rooms. The dark interface never glares at you or draws your players' attention to your screen.
Export campaigns as .ambora files and share them with other DMs. Import with one click — tracks, climates, and settings included.
New to Ambora? Start with 15 pre-built RPG moods — combat, tavern, mystery, and more — ready to play out of the box.
Shuffle tracks within a climate so your playlist never feels predictable. One toggle, from the desktop or your phone.
macOS builds are signed with an Apple Developer ID and notarized by Apple, so Ambora opens with a double-click — no “unidentified developer” warning, no right-click workaround. And it asks for no permissions it doesn’t need.
Ambora is MIT-licensed. No subscriptions, no telemetry, no data collection. Your music stays on your machine.
No cloud servers. Music plays from your computer. Phone connects via your local WiFi. Nothing leaves your network.
Built with Electron, React, TypeScript, and shadcn/ui. PRs welcome — check the CONTRIBUTING guide on GitHub.
Clean architecture. Add new music sources, sound effects, or integrations. The codebase is documented and approachable.
Zero telemetry, zero analytics, zero tracking. We don't know you use it. That's by design.
# Clone and run in 60 seconds git clone https://github.com/xetorthio/ambora cd ambora npm install npm run dev # Or download a pre-built installer # from the GitHub Releases page # → macOS Apple Silicon + Intel (.dmg) # signed & notarized by Apple # → Windows (.exe) # → Linux (.AppImage, .deb)
Download Ambora for free, set up your climates in 5 minutes, and run your most immersive session yet. macOS builds are signed and notarized by Apple, for both Apple Silicon and Intel.