Newport Beach, CA Noise Ordinances: Decibel Limits (2026)

Chapter 10.26 of the Newport Beach Municipal Code assigns every property a noise zone and attaches an allowable exterior noise level to each one, measured as an equivalent noise level (Leq). Section 10.26.025(A) sets Noise Zone I, covering single-, two- and multiple-family residential land, at 55 dBA between 7:00 a.m. and 10:00 p.m. and 50 dBA between 10:00 p.m. and 7:00 a.m. Noise Zone II (commercial) is 65 dBA daytime and 60 dBA at night. Noise Zone III, the residential portions of mixed-use properties, is 60 dBA daytime and 50 dBA at night. Noise Zone IV (industrial or manufacturing) is 70 dBA at all hours. Where the ambient noise level already exceeds the figure in the table, subsection (A) makes the ambient level the standard instead.

The limit is violated in two distinct ways. Under Section 10.26.025(B), it is unlawful to create noise, or to allow noise to be created on property you own, lease, occupy or control, that when measured on any other property exceeds either the zone standard for any fifteen-minute period, or a maximum instantaneous level of the standard plus twenty dBA for any length of time, measured with A-weighted slow response. So a Noise Zone I property faces both a 55 dBA fifteen-minute daytime average and a 75 dBA instantaneous ceiling.

Two boundary rules decide which number applies. Subsection (D) applies the stricter Noise Zone III standard to the part of a residential property lying within one hundred feet of a commercial property, but only when the intruding noise originates from that commercial property. Subsection (E) provides that when the measurement location falls on the boundary between two noise zones, the lower of the two standards governs. Section 10.26.030 sets a parallel interior standard for residential property of 45 dBA daytime and 40 dBA at night, and Section 10.26.040 applies the Noise Zone I residential figures to schools, day care centers, hospitals and similar health care institutions, churches, libraries and museums while they are in use.

Chapter 10.26's exemptions in Section 10.26.035 are wide, and they route much of what residents think of as "noise complaints" to other chapters entirely. Construction, repair, remodeling, demolition, grading and property maintenance are exempt from Chapter 10.26 and handled under Chapter 10.28. Parties at residential properties and barking dogs are also exempt, because the code says that noise is difficult to measure in Leq terms; parties go to Chapters 10.28 and 10.58, and animal noise to Chapter 7.20. Also exempt are public-entity activities including City and Newport Mesa Unified School District sporting events, permitted outdoor gatherings and entertainment events, emergency alarms that shut off within forty-five minutes of activation, permanently installed residential HVAC equipment permitted under Section 10.26.045(B) and (C), and anything preempted by state or federal law, which the code notes may include motor vehicle, aircraft-in-flight and railroad noise.