NVH Lab: Car Noise Meter

Measure cabin noise, diagnose why your car is loud — tires, wind, drone, rattles — and prove the fix with before-and-after drive tests.

Turn your iPhone into a practical car noise meter, NVH test journal, and noise diagnosis tool.

NVH Lab helps drivers measure cabin sound, diagnose why a car is loud, and compare repeatable drive tests. Use it to establish a baseline, document a new hum or rattle, and check whether a tire, road, or vehicle change altered the sound you experience.

CAR NOISE METER Record A-weighted cabin sound levels during a repeatable route. Save the test conditions so your next result is easier to compare.

FREQUENCY SPECTRUM See where sound energy appears across the frequency range. The spectrogram helps distinguish low-frequency rumble from mid-frequency hum and high-frequency hiss.

NOISE DIAGNOSIS — WHY IS MY CAR LOUD? The guided diagnosis reads your recordings across speeds and road surfaces — with community data when available — and names the most likely cause: tire roar, wind and seals, engine or exhaust drone, or rattles. See the evidence, get fixes ranked by cost and effort, then prove the result with a before-and-after project.

BEFORE-AND-AFTER TESTS Compare the same vehicle before and after new tires, insulation, maintenance, or a repair. Matched route, speed, phone position, and weather make the result more useful.

GARAGE AND COMMUNITY Keep vehicle-specific recordings in your garage, follow model discussions, and contribute privacy-protected aggregate results when you choose to make a session public. Public feeds never expose recording coordinates.

BUILT FOR REPEATABILITY NVH Lab flags clipped or unstable recordings and preserves test context. It is designed for relative comparisons with the same device, not as a replacement for a calibrated professional sound-level meter or a mechanical inspection.

Results depend on the phone, microphone, placement, route, speed, and environment. Do not use the app to make safety-critical repair decisions. If a noise is sudden, severe, or accompanied by handling, braking, temperature, or warning-light changes, stop driving and seek qualified help.