Wenoker's R10 magnetic rower is the quietest rowing machine we can verify on its maker's own terms. Wenoker says it "operates at under 30 dB" through "recovery rows, steady cardio, and higher-intensity workouts", and that its magnetic resistance works "without becoming louder as rowing speed increases". No maker we read names a resistance level, a stroke rate or a measuring distance, so a ceiling its maker says holds as the pace rises is as close to a stated condition as rowing machine figures come.
Smaller numbers exist, and they say less. MERACH labels its Q1S Interactive under 20 dB and Pooboo labels its H015 the same, both inside product images with no condition, and Wenoker's own image for the R20 Pro claims under 10 dB. The best-known names in rowing, Concept2, Hydrow, Ergatta and Peloton, print no decibel figure at all, and no rower that relies on air or water alone carries one from its maker. Below, the figures are sorted by resistance type, followed by what the makers say about stroke rate, floors, mats and standing a rower on end.
Our picks are listed above, with full specifications for each.
What each maker prints, by resistance type
Rower figures turn up in two places, the text of a product page or the pictures on it. Wenoker for the R10 and Aviron are the only makers that put a number in the page text; every other figure on this page is printed on a product image.
Magnetic rowers carry nearly all of the numbers:
- Wenoker R10: "under 30 dB" in the page text, repeated on a French-language image as "Faible bruit", low noise.
- Wenoker R20 and R20 Pro: under 10 dB, on one image beside "32 Level" resistance.
- MERACH Q1S Interactive: under 20 dB, on an image headed "70% Space Saving".
- MERACH NovaRow RS3: "25dB" on its headline image, and under 25 dB on a later one.
- MERACH NovaRow R7 and R7 Aura: under 40 dB, on the same image on both pages.
- Pooboo H015: under 20 dB, on an image headed "Double Wheels Design".
- Peloton Row+ and NordicTrack RW700 and RW900: no figure. Peloton calls the Row+ "near-silent", and NordicTrack credits Silent Magnetic Resistance with a pull that is "smooth, fluid, and quiet".
- Sunny Health & Fitness, Stamina, JOROTO and Echelon: no figure on any rower page or product image we read, only words such as whisper-quiet and silent.
Fan and magnet together produce two figures that cannot be lined up with each other:
- Aviron Strong Series: "~60 decibels" in its feature list, and "~60 decibels or conversational volume" in its FAQ.
- Pooboo H188: under 20 dB, on an image that shows the fan beside the magnetic flywheel.
Electromagnetic resistance comes with words only. Hydrow lists the Wave's operating noise as "Nearly silent operation" and the Origin's and Arc's as "Whisper quiet operation", and MERACH describes the R15 Pro's electromagnetic flywheel as giving "a robust and silent performance".
Air and water rowers carry no figure from any maker we read. Concept2 gives none on its RowErg page, spec sheet or manual, and MERACH's NovaRow R50, JOROTO's MR56, Stamina's air rowers and Sunny's air rower give none either. On the water side, neither Ergatta, whose rowers are handcrafted by WaterRower, nor MERACH, JOROTO, Wenoker, Stamina or Sunny prints a figure for a water rower.
Why under 20 dB and about 60 decibels cannot be ranked
Every figure here leaves out the three things that would let two of them be compared: how hard the handle was pulled, at what resistance setting, and how far away the sound was measured. The figures also come in three forms. Most are ceilings, such as under 20 dB, which say only that the sound stays below a line. MERACH's "25dB" for the RS3 reads as a value until a later image on the same page prints it as a ceiling, so we read it as one. Aviron's "~60 decibels" is an approximation.
So nothing is ranked across those forms, and no rower with a fan or a water tank is set against a magnetic one, because no two makers name the same condition. Even inside one brand the numbers say little: MERACH claims a lower ceiling for the Q1S Interactive, under 20 dB, than for the R7, under 40 dB, on images that give a condition for neither. The R10 comes first because Wenoker is the only maker to say what its figure covers, not because 30 is the smallest number on the page.
Some of the claims are hard to square with everyday sounds. The NIDCD puts whispering at 30 dB, and the National Park Service lists leaves rustling in Canyonlands National Park at 20 dBA and the crater of Haleakala National Park at around 10 dBA. On the reference scale of our decibel chart, Wenoker's under 10 dB would put a 32-level rower, seat rollers and all, beside that volcano crater. The park service's figures are A-weighted and Wenoker's is not labelled either way, so the comparison is loose, but it shows how far below a whisper the claim sits. Aviron's "conversational volume" is easier to place, since the NIDCD gives normal conversation as 60 to 70 dBA.
What stroke rate and resistance do to the sound
No maker gives a figure at more than one effort, so what changes with the pace comes only from their descriptions.
Air. Aviron says of an air rower: "The harder you row, the faster the fan spins, and the louder it gets." Hydrow describes the whoosh of air moving through the flywheel, and adds that the chain can rattle or clink if it is not maintained. Concept2 deals with chain noise in the hardware, through a Quiet Cog system of urethane washers, and its manual asks for the chain to be oiled every 50 hours of use. The same manual describes the damper only in terms of feel: it "affects the feel of your workout but does not directly affect the resistance". Marcy's page for its California Fitness NS-7874RW air rower goes further, saying the damper control "also adjusts the amount of noise produced by the fan".
Water. Hydrow says a water rower's noise "will increase as the intensity of your rowing does". Ergatta describes the sound as "a gentle, rhythmic whoosh" and says it is significantly quieter than a treadmill and most air rowers, with no figure for any of them.
Magnetic. Wenoker's R10 claim is the only one that speaks to the pace directly. Aviron says magnetic resistance "stays quiet and consistent no matter how hard you pull", and its Strong Series pairs that with a fan: in Aviron's words, a hard sprint "moves more air and makes more sound than an easy recovery row".
Resistance levels. The rowers with figures that list their levels run from 14 on Pooboo's H015 to 32 on Wenoker's R20 Pro, and no maker says at which level its figure was taken. Wenoker's R20 images sort the 32 levels into four bands, from Leisure Sports to Physical Training, and MERACH's Q1S dial groups its 16 the same way, so a level could easily have been named.
The floor under the rail
Aviron is the most direct about what reaches the flat below: "The main thing your neighbors below would notice is vibration through the floor, not the resistance sound itself." Its blog calls a dedicated rower mat "the single most effective change" for an apartment, asks for a solid, level floor, and suggests keeping the machine off a shared wall if you can. It adds: "A smooth, controlled stroke is quieter than a jerky one that slams the seat at each end of the rail."
Concept2's manual asks for "a stable, level surface" and warns against fixing the RowErg down: it "should NOT be bolted or permanently fixed to the floor", which Concept2 says may damage the frame. Ergatta says its water rowers are "safe for all floor types, including hardwood and carpet", and treats a mat as optional, for catching sweat. Hydrow sells a Machine Mat for the Wave under the line "Protect your floor", and Aviron puts a rower mat in its Premium Package.
None of these makers gives a figure for what a mat changes, so the mat is a maker's recommendation rather than a measured result. Of the makers here, Aviron is the one that says what the people downstairs are likely to hear, and its answer is the floor, not the fan.
Standing a rower on end
Upright storage is where the manuals disagree most. Concept2's manual says "DO NOT stand the RowErg up on end as it may tip over"; the RowErg splits into two pieces without tools instead, and takes 25 by 33 by 54 inches stored with standard legs.
Most of the others are built to stand. Aviron calls the Strong Series' upright storage "Safety tested" and says it needs no wall mount. Ergatta says its rowers fold and store upright "with no additional equipment", in about 2 by 2 feet. Peloton ships the Row+ with an Upright Wall Anchor, while Hydrow sells the Wave's Vertical Anchor separately and gives its upright size as 26.5 by 30 inches and 82 inches tall.
Among the rowers with figures, MERACH gives the Q1S Interactive about 1.6 by 2.1 feet upright and the R7 3.23 square feet, Wenoker says standing the R10 on end frees about 70% of its floor space, and Pooboo's image shows the H015 at 50.39 inches tall on end. MERACH shows no upright position for the RS3, so plan for it to keep its 65 inches of floor.
How we chose
We read the US product pages of Concept2, Hydrow, Ergatta, Aviron, Peloton, NordicTrack, Echelon, MERACH, Sunny Health & Fitness, Stamina, JOROTO, Pooboo, Wenoker and Marcy, plus Concept2's spec sheet and owner's manual and Life Fitness's rower manuals. Because the budget brands print their figures inside pictures, we read every product image on their rower pages too. CITYROW's site now offers its app rather than a rower, YOSUDA's US site returned an error page, and WaterRower's showed a human-verification check that we did not try to pass, so none of the three is counted.
A rower made the picks only with a decibel figure from its own maker, and the picks run in order of how much each maker says about its figure, not of how small the number is: Wenoker's claim for the R10 sits in the page text and names its scope, Aviron's sits in the page text and the FAQ, MERACH's for the Q1S Interactive and Pooboo's appear only on images, and MERACH prints the RS3's in two forms. We copied each figure with its unit and the words around it, noted whether it sat in the page text or on an image, kept ceilings, values and approximations apart, and set no rower with a fan or water tank against a magnetic one. Prices are those on the makers' own stores on October 13, 2026, with the regular price wherever a sale was showing.
We did not measure any of these rowing machines; every decibel figure here was copied from the maker's own US product page, product image or FAQ, and every floor and storage rule from the maker's page, blog or manual.
