Gwinnett County, GA Noise Ordinances: Quiet Hours (2026)

Sec. 38-48 is Gwinnett's catch-all quiet-hours rule: it only reaches sound that isn't already regulated by one of the specific categories in Sec. 38-47, motor vehicles, buildings, outdoor places, human-produced sound, landscape equipment, construction, business amplification, so it fills the gaps rather than duplicating those tables. For sound reaching a residential receiving land use, the daytime threshold is 300 feet or more from 8:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m. Sunday through Thursday and 8:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m. Friday and Saturday; overnight, the allowed distance tightens to 50 feet or more, running 10:00 p.m. to 8:00 a.m. on weeknights and 11:00 p.m. to 8:00 a.m. on weekend nights.

The same table sets looser thresholds for other receiving land uses: sound reaching a mixed-use property is capped at 300 feet daytime and 150 feet overnight, while sound reaching a nonresidential property gets the widest allowance, 500 feet daytime and 200 feet overnight. "Receiving land use" means the property being affected by the noise, not the property where the noise originates, so the applicable distance depends on what kind of property the sound is landing on.

The "plainly audible" standard carried over from Sec. 38-45 governs the whole table: enforcement doesn't require a decibel meter, only that a person of ordinary hearing sensibilities can hear the sound, unaided, at or beyond the listed distance. Because this is the residual rule, it typically catches things like loud conversation, party noise not otherwise covered, or an unclassified sound source operating late at night near a home.