Silica-based aerogels are widely regarded as promising sound-absorbing materials due to their low density and high specific surface area. However, their hard surface and small pores hinder sound wave penetration, resulting in a relatively poor sound absorption performance. To overcome this limitation, our study employs melamine foam (MF) as a scaffold to construct a gradient aerogel composite acoustic absorber. This innovative design significantly leads to a low average density (31.3-117.4 mg/cm