What the AAP's 2023 policy statement on noise actually says
Published 2026-05-18 · Checked against the statement 2026-10-03 · 9 min read
Informational reference, not medical advice. The American Academy of Pediatrics policy statement is the authoritative source. This page paraphrases and links to it; for clinical decisions consult your pediatrician.
The short answer: what the AAP recommends for a baby's white noise
Distance: away from the infant, with no number given
The AAP recommendation says only to locate the device away from the infant. The widely quoted 7 ft (about 200 cm) is a consumer rounding of the furthest distance tested in the Hugh 2014 study, not an AAP figure.
Volume: low, with no number given
The AAP recommendation says to set the volume low and gives no decibel target for sound machines. The 50 dB ceiling parents often cite is the recommended noise limit for infants in hospital nurseries, which is the benchmark the Hugh 2014 study measured against. It is a sensible conservative cap, but it is not an AAP sound-machine number.
Duration: less than 8 hours
This is the one number the AAP does attach to sound machines. Its recommendation reads: locate the device away from the infant, set the volume low, and limit the duration of use to less than 8 hours. The rationale traces to the Hugh 2014 study, which found three of fourteen machines produced more than 85 dBA, a level that exceeds adult occupational exposure limits if played for more than 8 hours. A sleep timer or fade-out keeps exposure well under that.
The AAP does not ban infant sound machines and does not endorse any brand or sound colour. Source: AAP policy statement, Pediatrics 2023; 152(5): e2023063752, doi 10.1542/peds.2023-063752.
The American Academy of Pediatrics published a policy statement titled Preventing Excessive Noise Exposure in Infants, Children, and Adolescents online on 21 October 2023, and in the November 2023 issue of Pediatrics (Balk SJ, Bochner RE, Ramdhanie MA, Reilly BK; Pediatrics 2023; 152(5): e2023063752), with a companion technical report at e2023063753. It is broader than its 1997 predecessor, which was confined to the fetus and the newborn, and it runs from infancy through adolescence. It is the clinical reference most often cited alongside the 50 dB and 7 ft figures that circulate in parenting media, though, as this page explains, neither of those numbers appears in the AAP document. The one number the statement does attach to sound machines is a duration: less than 8 hours. This page summarises what the statement actually contains, what it does not say, and where the popular figures actually come from.
The headline takeaway: the AAP does not prohibit infant sound machines. On sound machines specifically, the statement is brief. Its recommendation is to encourage safe usage practices, namely locating the device away from the infant, setting the volume low, and limiting the duration of use to less than 8 hours. That guidance sits inside a much larger document about noise as an under-recognised pediatric health risk.
Scope of the 2023 statement
The statement runs from infancy to adolescence. Its own description of where exposure begins is the NICU and the well-baby nursery, followed by the home, school, the neighbourhood, and recreational settings. It carries seven recommendations, and sound machines are one of them. The other six cover personal listening devices (confirm the child can hear when spoken to, encourage device breaks), noisy venues such as concerts and sporting events (hearing protection, earmuffs for young children or properly inserted earplugs for older ones), impulse noise such as firearms and fireworks (avoid, or use double protection), age-appropriate toys and screen devices (volume control, tape over speakers, limiting frequency and duration), adolescent occupational and leisure exposure, and hospital settings.
Two things readers often expect to find in it are not there. It is not a statement about noise during pregnancy: unlike the 1997 predecessor, which was titled Noise: A Hazard for the Fetus and Newborn, the 2023 statement is framed around infants, children and adolescents, and none of its recommendations address maternal or occupational noise exposure in pregnancy. Nor is it a sound-machine document: the sound machine passage is one recommendation inside a paper mostly concerned with personal listening devices and recreational noise through childhood and adolescence.
On the hospital side, the recommendation pairs two things: provide hearing protection to pediatric patients undergoing MRI scans, and limit noise exposure in neonatal intensive care units to less than 45 dB. That 45 dB figure is continuity rather than news. The 1997 statement had already recommended that average NICU sound levels not exceed 45 dBA, citing US Environmental Protection Agency standards. NICU staff, incubator manufacturers, and unit designers are the audience for this part.
What the statement actually says about sound machines
The sound machine passage is short. The statement notes that pediatricians can counsel parents who use infant sleep machines about safe use, that some studies show potential benefits from these devices, and that one study (Hugh 2014) raised concern about the sound levels they can reach. Its recommendation is to encourage safe usage practices: locate the device away from the infant, set the volume low, and limit the duration of use to less than 8 hours. Two of those three are qualitative; the duration carries a number. From that, practitioners and consumer publishers derived three practical rules, and in doing so added two numbers the AAP had not:
- Place the machine as far from the baby as practical. The AAP says only to locate the device away from the infant. The 7 ft figure is a consumer rounding of 200 cm, the furthest distance tested in the Hugh study, and it is rooted in the inverse-square law: doubling distance roughly quarters sound intensity. See the dedicated 7 ft placement page.
- Keep the volume as low as possible. The AAP states this qualitatively; it does not give a decibel number for sound machines. The widely quoted 50 dB target is the recommended noise limit for infants in hospital nurseries, the benchmark Hugh 2014 measured against, and it sits well below NIOSH adult exposure limits. It is detailed in the 50 dB ceiling page.
- Keep use under 8 hours, and off maximum volume. The 8 hour cap is the AAP's own wording. The 85 dB figure often attached to it is not: that comes from the Hugh 2014 audiology study (the Hugh 2014 explainer), which found three of fourteen consumer machines produced more than 85 dBA at maximum volume and noted that at those levels for more than 8 hours they exceed adult occupational exposure limits. A sleep timer or fade-out is the common practical implementation: see all-night vs sleep timer.
This guidance applies equally to dedicated sound machines, smart speaker routines, white noise apps on a phone, fans used for masking, and any other acoustic source. What matters is the sound reaching the baby's head, not the technology generating it.
What changed from the 1997 statement
The 1997 statement, also published in Pediatrics (1997; 100(4): 724-727), was titled Noise: A Hazard for the Fetus and Newborn and covered fetal exposure and the NICU environment. It did not address consumer sound machines, which were not yet a widespread household item. Its NICU recommendation, that average sound levels not exceed 45 dBA, carries through to the 2023 statement, which recommends keeping NICU noise below 45 dB.
Three things are different in 2023. First, the framing moves off the fetus and newborn and onto infants, children and adolescents, with exposure described as beginning in the NICU and the well-baby nursery rather than in utero. Second, it addresses consumer sound machines for the first time, citing the Hugh 2014 study and recommending safe usage practices (locate away from the infant, volume low, under 8 hours) rather than setting decibel or distance numbers. Third, it gives far more attention to recreational and personal-audio noise (headphones, concerts, venues, impulse noise) across childhood and adolescence, which is where most of its recommendations now sit.
The 2023 statement also puts environmental noise in the frame as background context. It notes that environmental noise such as traffic noise can affect learning, physiologic parameters, sleep and quality of life, that environmental noise exposure falls disproportionately on underserved communities, and that noise is under-recognised as a serious public health issue in the United States, where exposure limits are enforceable only in workplaces and not for the general public.
What the statement does not say
Three areas where readers commonly extrapolate beyond the statement deserve flagging.
The statement does not recommend a specific brand, model, or sound colour. There is no AAP-approved sound machine list. The recommendations are about output level and placement, not product certification. Marketing claims of “AAP-approved” or “pediatrician-endorsed” without specific dB measurements at the listed distance are not grounded in the policy statement.
The statement does not say that white noise machines cause hearing damage or developmental delay. The concern it records is that improper use, particularly at high volume or close placement, presents a plausible risk, and that concern rests on device measurement studies and on extrapolation from adult occupational data rather than on an outcome study of babies. The statement points to no cohort study documenting harm from properly-used infant sound machines, and it does not claim one exists.
The statement does not provide a hard age at which sound machine use should stop, and it does not stratify its sound machine advice by age at all. Any age-graded volume table you encounter, including ours, is a practical convention rather than an AAP threshold. Our version is laid out in safe volume by age.
How the statement is being applied in practice
In practice, the statement matters most as the authoritative reference parents and clinicians point to when discussing safe sound machine use. What tends to happen in consumer coverage is that the AAP's qualitative advice arrives with numbers bolted on, and the numbers are attributed to the AAP. That is worth knowing if you are checking a claim: a parenting article that says the AAP recommends 50 dB at 7 feet is describing a consumer convention, not the policy statement.
For families, the practical takeaway is simple and unchanged by the wording details: keep the machine well away from the cot, keep the volume low, do not run it at full output, and keep a session under 8 hours. The 8 hour figure is the AAP's. The decibel target most often cited (50 dB or below) is not, but it is a sensible conservative ceiling, and it is the hospital-nursery limit that the Hugh study used as its benchmark.
Frequently asked
What distance and volume does the AAP recommend for a baby's white noise machine?
The AAP states no distance and no decibel figure. It advises locating the device away from the infant and setting the volume low, and it does put a number on duration: less than 8 hours of use. The 7 ft (about 200 cm) distance and 50 dB volume that parents often cite are consumer and hospital-nursery figures, not AAP sound-machine standards. The 85 dB figure also circulates as AAP guidance but comes from the Hugh 2014 study, which found three of fourteen machines produced more than 85 dBA and noted that at those levels for more than 8 hours they exceed adult occupational exposure limits.
Where can I read the full statement?
The statement is ‘Preventing Excessive Noise Exposure in Infants, Children, and Adolescents’, Pediatrics 2023; 152(5): e2023063752, doi 10.1542/peds.2023-063752. The companion technical report is e2023063753, doi 10.1542/peds.2023-063753. Both are behind the journal’s paywall; AAP members and many institutional subscriptions provide full-text access, and the abstracts are free on PubMed (PMID 37864407 and 37864408).
Is the statement legally binding on manufacturers?
No. AAP policy statements are clinical guidance, not regulations. They influence manufacturer behaviour through professional consensus and consumer expectation rather than through enforcement. The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission has not adopted a binding decibel standard for infant sound machines.
Does the AAP recommend any specific sound colour?
No. The statement is colour-agnostic. Its safe-use advice (distance, low volume, limited duration) applies equally to white, pink, brown, and other colours. See the colour deep-dives for the spectrum-specific arguments.
Has the statement been updated since 2023?
We re-checked in October 2026 and found no successor statement: the November 2023 policy statement and its technical report are still what the AAP has published on this. AAP policy statements are reviewed on a rolling basis and individual points can be revised by subsidiary clinical reports, so check publications.aap.org for the current status before relying on it clinically.
Sources
- Balk SJ, Bochner RE, Ramdhanie MA, Reilly BK; AAP Council on Environmental Health and Climate Change and Section on Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery. Preventing Excessive Noise Exposure in Infants, Children, and Adolescents (policy statement). Pediatrics 2023; 152(5): e2023063752. Companion technical report: e2023063753, doi 10.1542/peds.2023-063753.
- American Academy of Pediatrics, Committee on Environmental Health. Noise: A Hazard for the Fetus and Newborn (policy statement). Pediatrics 1997; 100(4): 724-727. The 1997 predecessor, cited here for the 45 dBA NICU recommendation and for scope comparison.
- Hugh SC, Wolter NE, Propst EJ, Gordon KA, Cushing SL, Papsin BC. Infant sleep machines and hazardous sound pressure levels. Pediatrics 2014; 133(4): 677-681. Source of the 85 dBA finding, the 200 cm test distance behind the 7 ft rule, and the 50 dBA hospital-nursery benchmark.
- WHO Make Listening Safe, who.int. Cited here for WHO safe-listening context, not as a source for the AAP statement's contents.
- NIOSH occupational noise and hearing loss prevention, cdc.gov/niosh/noise. Source of the 85 dB over eight hours adult occupational limit.