Home › About

About NoiseLevelDB

NoiseLevelDB exists to answer one deceptively simple question — “how loud is that?” — accurately, quickly and for free.

Decibels are genuinely confusing. The scale is logarithmic, the units come in flavours (dB, dBA, dBC), and most online answers are either oversimplified or buried in jargon. We built NoiseLevelDB to sit in the middle: plain-English answers that are still technically correct, with the maths shown for anyone who wants it.

What you'll find here

A page for every level from 10 to 140 dB, with real examples, a safety verdict and distance behaviour.
50 everyday sounds measured against those levels, from a whisper to a gunshot.
Free browser tools — a sound meter, exposure calculator, decibel calculator and protection calculator.
Noise-law guides for major countries, plus practical hearing-protection and soundproofing advice.

How we stay free

The site is funded by unobtrusive advertising, optional affiliate links on our gear recommendations, and voluntary reader tips. None of this changes our data or our recommendations — the numbers come from the sources, not the sponsors.

Accuracy & corrections

We review figures against published standards and welcome corrections. See our methodology for exactly how levels are sourced and calculated. This site is educational and is not a substitute for a calibrated sound level meter or professional medical advice.

Sources & accuracy. Reference levels are drawn from published data by NIOSH, OSHA, the CDC, the WHO Environmental Noise Guidelines and the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA). Real-world readings vary with distance, room acoustics and the specific source, so treat every figure as a typical value rather than an exact constant. Last reviewed 2026-08-11.