Just how remarkable this result is shouldn’t be understated - an app on a watch being within around two decibels of the actual level is pretty stunning. As decibels are rounded up this means that the noise meter went up from 82 to 83 dB while the Apple Watch changed from 80 to 81 dB, which is very consistent with the Watch tracking the noise meter. In the final photo, the noise meter wavered by 0.4 dB, indicating a possible slight change in the generated levels, while the Apple Watch went up one decibel. At the same time the proper noise meter stayed consistent at 82.4 dB.įor the majority of the time the Apple Watch noise app remained within 2 dB of the noise meter. The Apple Watch noise app is consistently within around 2 to 3 dB of the actual noise level.Įven though the sound was consistent, the Apple Watch did wander a little, from 79 db at the lowest then to 80 dB. The room was otherwise quiet with no external noise. The sound was being produced by two well spaced floor-standing speakers on either side of the room to help eliminate small changes due to directionality of the noise.
DECIBEL APP GENERATOR
By using a tone generator we get a constant signal, with consistent pitch and volume. 4000Hz is important as it is bang-on the range of frequencies used in speech. I played a loud pure tone of 4000Hz at a constant volume. My normal noise meter is a Pulsar Nova Model 45 noise meter, a Class 1 mutts-nuts noise toy costing something in the region of £3,000 and suitable for both workplace and environmental noise assessment, so the easiest thing is to measure a noise using both the Apple Watch and the noise meter at the same time.
DECIBEL APP HOW TO
How to check the accuracy of the Apple Watch noise meter app So, to get around that I did a test using a constant noise and sat both the Apple Watch and noise meter together. There are many phone apps out there which claim to be decent noise meters, although very few are anything like remotely accurate, but with a 2019 Apple Watch operating system update, Apple introduced a noise meter app as a standard feature to the Apple Watch, but how accurate is it? The answer based on my own experience with it, is ‘not too bad’, although not without some flaws.Īnecdotally, when out and about on noise assessments, the Apple Watch noise meter app is usually fairly close to the reading on the proper noise meter but when noise levels are varying and the Apple Watch decibel levels are moving around a lot, it is hard to be accurate.
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