What decibel level is quiet depends on the room: a decibel figure means little until you know which room it is for. The 72 dBA spin cycle that nobody notices in a basement laundry would be unbearable beside a bed. This page sets out the few official reference points that exist, and then walks through the house using the figures makers publish.
Two cautions first. The reference points describe the sound level in a room. Maker figures describe one product, measured at a distance the maker almost never states. So the two cannot be matched exactly, and we do not try.
Use this page to decide what to aim for, and the buying guides to compare products.
What decibel level is considered quiet?
No official body sets one quiet level for a whole home. The few reference points that exist cover bedrooms at night, everyday sounds, sones for fans and hoods, campgrounds and loudness.
Bedrooms at night.
For a good night's sleep, the bedroom target in the World Health Organization's community noise guidelines is under 30 dB(A) after dark.
Everyday sounds.
Counting down from normal conversation at 60 to 70 dBA, the US hearing institute NIDCD lists a refrigerator humming at 40 dB, then whispering at 30 dB.
Sones, for fans and hoods.
The Home Ventilating Institute compares 0.5 sone to rustling leaves, 1.0 sone to a refrigerator, 3.0 sones to typical office noise and 4.0 sones to a television at normal volume. By its reckoning, a bathroom fan earns the word quiet at a rating of 1.0 sone or less.
Campgrounds.
Federal rules for national parks prohibit running a generator above 60 decibels, A-weighted, measured at 50 feet.
Loudness.
A 10 dB rise is, in the National Park Service's words, a doubling of perceived loudness. So 40 sounds about twice as loud as 30.
That is the whole list. There is no official figure for a living room, a kitchen or a home office. To see these reference points beside the figures makers publish, band by band, see our decibel chart.
How many quiet ratings say where they were measured?
Almost no bedroom product rating says where it was measured. Of 138 bedroom-type products with a maker's noise figure in six of our catalogs on 2026-10-26, one states a measuring distance. These are counts of products in our catalog, not of the whole market.
| Catalog | Products | With a maker's figure | Distance stated |
|---|---|---|---|
| Window air conditioners | 43 | 43 | 1 |
| Portable air conditioners | 19 | 18 | 0 |
| Tower fans | 30 | 27 | 0 |
| Dehumidifiers | 35 | 32 | 0 |
| Mini fridges | 12 | 11 | 0 |
| Box fans | 9 | 7 | 0 |
We counted a figure when the maker printed a decibel number for that model at any setting, and a distance only when the maker tied one to the noise figure. Clearance advice in a manual, such as keeping a dehumidifier 18 inches from a wall, did not count. The portable row leaves out three window units that our portable catalog holds for comparison.
The single exception is SoleusAir. Its WS5-10HW and WS5-12HW manual says "Noise level is measured at a distance of 3.28 ft away from the front of the unit in cooling mode."
For a bedroom, the gap matters. The WHO's 30 dB(A) describes the room around your bed, and a maker's figure that omits the distance has no fixed place in it. It can still rank one maker's models against each other, which is how our guides use it.
Bathroom fans are better documented, because HVI certifies ratings at stated static pressures. Of the 55 fans in our catalog, 45 publish a sone figure at 0.25 in. of static pressure as well as at 0.1 in.; the other 10 give only the 0.1 in. figure or name no pressure.
How many decibels is good for sleeping?
For a bedroom, the target is the WHO's 30 dB(A), and very few products get under it, even on their makers' figures, and then only at their lowest setting.
Tower fans.
On low, Lasko's DC tower fans are listed at 23 and 24 dBa, with Levoit at 25dB. See the quietest tower fans.
Box fans.
Vornado lists its Model 80X at 28 dBA at the quiet end of its range. See the quietest box fans.
Heaters.
Dyson lists its Hot+Cool HF1 at 26 dBA in Quiet Mode. See the quietest space heaters.
Mini fridges.
Summit's 32.9 dB is the lowest figure we found in print. A fridge also switches on and off through the night, which a steady figure does not capture. See the quietest mini fridges.
Dehumidifiers.
The quietest full-size units list 43 dBA on low, well above the bedroom target. One option is to run it during the day and switch it off at night. See the quietest dehumidifiers.
Portable air conditioners.
The lowest published figures are 42 to 44 dBA at the lowest speed. Going by what the makers publish, a window unit runs quieter than a portable. See the quietest portable air conditioners, or for the window route, the quietest window air conditioners.
In a bedroom, look beyond the motor too. A light sleeper can be kept awake by a bright display or a beep at every button press as easily as by the fan. Some tower fans let you switch both off.
For the fan you sleep beside, what a tower fan's sleep mode actually does is the next thing to read. The same question applies to an air purifier in the bedroom: most makers quote their quietest speed, but few say if that is the night mode.
How loud is too loud for a home office?
A home office has no official noise target, so use speech as the yardstick. Normal conversation is 60 to 70 dBA, so an appliance near that level competes with your voice on a call.
Heaters.
The fan heaters with published figures list 25 to 44 on their makers' numbers, and fanless heaters have no fan at all, though not one fanless model comes with a maker's measured figure.
Walking pads.
Makers' figures run from 35 dB, claimed with no conditions, to under 70 dB at full speed. One maker's manual notes that the machine is noisier under load than without it. See the quietest treadmills.
Robot vacuums.
The robots list 52 to 65 in their everyday modes, and the self-empty dock lists 70 to 83 where a maker publishes it. Schedule both for when you are not on a call. See the quietest robot vacuums.
How loud is too loud in an open-plan kitchen?
In an open-plan room, a range hood's full-speed figure is the one that decides whether you can talk while you cook. Here the units change. Range hoods and bathroom fans are rated in sones, and sones are not decibels.
Range hoods.
On the Home Ventilating Institute's ladder, 4.0 sones is a television at normal volume. The quietest hood we could verify at full cooking power is certified at 4 sones. At full speed, hoods sold on quietness carried certifications of 5 to 13 sones. See the quietest range hoods.
If you are weighing a downdraft vent for an island instead, our guide to downdraft range hoods found every certified one it could match between 8.5 and 12 sones on high, the speed a downdraft needs.
Dishwashers.
In an open kitchen a dishwasher runs while people eat, talk and watch TV, so the cycle behind the figure matters as much as the number. Our dishwasher guide covers what makes one quiet enough for an open-plan kitchen.
Refrigerators.
A fridge in an open kitchen hums through the evening, and the ice maker, door alarm and compressor all add to what you hear. See the open-plan section of our refrigerator guide.
Garbage disposals.
No maker publishes a decibel figure, so there is nothing to set against a target. We rank on the sound insulation each model has. See the quietest garbage disposals.
Microwaves.
Almost no maker publishes a figure, and the complaints are about doors and beeps as much as hum. See the quietest microwaves.
How loud should a bathroom fan be?
A quiet bathroom fan is rated at 1.0 sone or less, the Home Ventilating Institute's guideline for quiet ventilation. Several fans are rated under 0.3 sone, the lowest rating HVI will certify.
Check the rating at the higher test pressure where a maker publishes it, because that is closer to a real duct. See the quietest bathroom exhaust fans.
How loud is a washing machine?
Washing machines are the loudest appliances in this list: Bosch, one of only two brands that publish a figure, lists 51 to 52 dBA for washing and 72 to 75 dBA for spinning. A spin at 72 dBA is louder than conversation, which is fine behind a closed door and a problem next to a bedroom.
The manuals agree that the floor, the feet and the shipping bolts decide most of what you hear. See the quietest washing machines.
How quiet are living room ceiling fans and projectors?
Ceiling fans are the least documented product we cover, and only one maker ties a figure to a speed: under 35 dBA at maximum.
For the rest, choose a DC motor with more speeds, and keep the fan off a wall dimmer, which the manuals name as the cause of humming. See the quietest ceiling fans.
A short throw projector belongs here too, because it sits under the screen with its fan facing the couch. Our guide to short throw and laser TV projectors reads each figure at the mode you would run in the evening: Epson lists its LS650 at 23 dBA in Eco Mode and 36 dBA in Normal Mode.
How loud can a generator be at a campground?
In national parks, the limit is 60 decibels at 50 feet, plus a clause against unreasonable noise below that. It is the only hard legal number on this page.
No generator maker measures at 50 feet, so a figure on the box proves nothing either way. The lowest published figures are Honda's: 42 to 50 dB(A) for its smallest unit. See the quietest generators.
For every current Honda, with the 7 meter distance that Honda's own sound level chart states, see our Honda generator decibels page.
How do you choose a quiet enough target for each room?
Pick the room's target first, then find the maker's figure for the setting you will actually use, and compare only figures printed the same way.
- Pick the target: as close to 30 dB(A) as you can get in a bedroom, 1.0 sone or less for a bathroom fan, and lower is better everywhere else.
- Find the setting: a bedroom figure should be the low or sleep figure, and a kitchen figure should be the full-speed one.
- Check the unit and the conditions: dBA, sones and sound power do not convert, and a figure with no distance only compares models within one maker.
- Compare like with like: same unit, same setting, and ideally the same maker's spec table.
- Remember the room: hard surfaces reflect sound, and no maker's figure accounts for yours.
Here is the method on a bedroom fan. Lasko lists its Ascend 36 DC tower fan (OST301) at 24 dBa on low and 54.5 dBa on high, with no distance. The low line is the night figure, and it sits under the WHO's 30, though one number describes a fan and the other a room.
The high line is 30.5 dB above the low one. By the National Park Service's rule that 10 dB sounds twice as loud, that is roughly eight times as loud, and it is the speed the fan runs at on a hot evening. Read both lines before you decide.
A window unit works the same way. LG prints 44 dBA for Sleep beside 46 dBA for Low on the LW1222IVSM, a step of only 2 dBA, with both well above 30. The useful comparison for that room is between LG's own models, read from the same table, not between LG's sleep figure and the WHO target.
A bathroom fan is the easy case, because the rating is certified. Delta rates its BreezSignature SIG80-110 under 0.3 sone on both speeds, 80 and 110 CFM, at 0.1 in. of static pressure, and 0.5 and 0.8 sone at 0.25 in. Both pressures meet HVI's 1.0 sone guideline.
For the units themselves, see dBA explained and sones vs decibels. If something that used to be quiet no longer is, see why your appliance got louder.
