Noise Complaint Guide Thailand - Acoustic Knowledge Center
Complete guide to filing noise complaints in Thailand. Learn your legal rights, noise measurement standards, and complaint procedures for neighbor, factory, construction, and entertainment venue noise.
If you found the 70 dB(A) figure and concluded you have no case, you are reading the wrong test
A great many noise complaints in Thailand end before they start, because people find the 70 dB(A) figure first, compare it with a neighbour's stereo at around 50 dB(A), and conclude there is nothing to be done. That is a comparison against the wrong test.
70 dB(A) is a 24-hour average for an area. It comes from Notification of the National Environment Board No. 15 (B.E. 2540), which sets a 24-hour average not exceeding 70 dB(A) and a maximum level not exceeding 115 dB(A). There is no zoning in it and no day/night split. Noise that runs loud for three hours and stops for the other twenty-one will almost never bring a full-day average to 70 dB(A).
The test that applies to a neighbour, a bar or a building site is a different one: Notification of the National Environment Board No. 29 (B.E. 2550), on disturbance noise levels. If the corrected level measured while the source is running sits more than 10 dB(A) above the background L90, it is legally a disturbance.
Before that comparison, the corrections in the Pollution Control Department measurement method are added:
- Add 3 dB(A) when measuring between 22:00 and 06:00, or in a hospital, school, temple or library area.
- Add 5 dB(A) when the noise is impulsive, sharp or tonal, or produces vibration.
The consequence is that a source at 50 dB(A) on a quiet street at night can exceed the limit, while sitting far below 70 dB(A). The full explanation with a worked example is at /thai-noise-laws.
What this site has, and where to start
The home page is organised by the kind of problem rather than by the law, because a person arriving here usually knows what they are hearing and not yet which statute it falls under.
- Six topic pages by source — /topics/noisy-neighbors, /topics/construction-noise, /topics/factory-noise, /topics/traffic-airport-noise, /topics/entertainment-venues and /topics/workplace-noise
- Longer explanatory pieces at /articles, and the law in full at /thai-noise-laws
- Questions from the public that have been answered, collected at /faq — searchable, filterable by topic, and each answer carries its date
- If your question is not there, it can be sent in at /ask. There is no charge, and the answer is published so the next person with the same problem can read it
- The procedural steps are at /noise-complaint-guide and /how-to-report-noise. The preparation tools are at /self-help-tools, /complaint-wizard, /noise-calculator and /resources
AAT.NEWS is published by Acoustic Alliance Thailand, an independent alliance of acoustics specialists. The site sells nothing and takes no work from the complaints it reads. Where a case genuinely needs a defensible measurement, that work belongs to accredited laboratories and acoustic consultants, and none is named here.
Who enforces it, and the one thing worth starting tonight
The power to order a nuisance abated sits with the local authority officer — the district office or the municipality — under the Public Health Act B.E. 2535, Chapter 5, Section 25(4). Not the police, and not the Pollution Control Department. Approaching the wrong body is the most common reason a complaint stalls.
Where the source ignores an abatement order, the penalty under Section 74, as amended in B.E. 2560, is up to 3 months' imprisonment, a fine up to 25,000 baht, or both.
The thing worth starting tonight is a log. Date, start time, stop time and the character of the noise, every time it happens. A log kept over several weeks carries more weight than a single recording, because it tells the officer when to come and measure — and most cases that fail do not fail on the law, they fail because the measurement was taken while the source was not running.
A decibel reading from a phone app carries no legal weight: the app is not a calibrated instrument. It is useful only to show that noise occurred, and when.