Nextriv Sense NoiseSPL and Leq noise level sensor

What it is for

Noise is the most commonly ignored comfort parameter — it shows up on no chart until someone measures it. Nextriv Sense Noise turns noise into an ordinary, measurable quantity: it hangs on the wall like a minimalist temperature sensor and reports the sound level in decibels — continuously, objectively and without involving people. Where "loud" used to be a matter of someone's opinion, there is now a number, a threshold and an alert.

The key argument is privacy by design: the device measures only the level of sound; it records nothing and recognises no conversation content. That means it can be hung legally and uncontroversially in a hotel room, a school classroom or a hospital ward — anywhere a recording microphone would be unacceptable. It is a comfort sensor, not a listening device — and that distinction is worth communicating openly to guests, patients and employees.

Beneath the minimalist housing sits solid acoustics. The sensor reports three metrics at once: the instantaneous level (SPL), the equivalent continuous level (Leq) and the maximum level (Lmax). You can choose the A-weighting curve — close to the perception of the human ear — or C for loud environments, and the fast 125 ms time constant captures impulsive noise: slams, impacts, short bangs. The 30–120 dB range covers everything from a whisper in a library to a concert hall.

There is also an element that works before any report exists: the built-in LED can act as a local "light reminder" once a threshold is crossed. In a library or classroom, its mere presence is often enough to bring the sound level down — without the teacher intervening and without waiting for a notification.

Usage scenarios

• Hotels and short-term rentals: the sensor in an apartment detects a loud party at 1 a.m. and alerts the staff before the neighbours call. Only the sound level is measured, so guests' privacy remains intact — something you can state explicitly in the house rules.
• School classroom and library: the LED on the sensor lights up once the threshold is crossed and the children police the "green" level themselves. Long-term data shows which rooms need acoustic treatment.
• Hospital, night ward: the quiet-hours policy stops being a declaration — the platform logs every exceedance with time and place, and staff respond to alerts instead of doing the rounds.
• Open-plan office: noise maps from several sensors show where focused work is genuinely possible. The facility manager relocates quiet zones and phone booths to where the data points, instead of guessing.
• Workshop and light manufacturing: monitoring the acoustic background at workstations, with an alert when levels approach values requiring hearing protection. The fast time constant catches short, impulsive bangs.
• Coworking space: quiet zones with an objective arbiter on the wall — the noise status can be displayed at reception next to desk availability.

Key features

• Three metrics at once: instantaneous level (SPL), equivalent continuous level (Leq) and maximum level (Lmax) — the complete set for acoustic comfort reports.
• Choice of A-weighting (quieter environments, perception close to the human ear) or C-weighting (loud environments).
• Fast 125 ms time constant for capturing impulsive noise with large fluctuations.
• Privacy by design: only the sound level is measured, zero recording, zero content — an argument that cannot be overstated in hotels, schools and healthcare.
• LED as a local threshold-exceedance alarm — an immediate corrective effect even before the platform sends out notifications.
• Minimalist, flat housing (68 × 65 × 20.5 mm, 79 g) — it blends into the wall instead of looking like "measurement apparatus".
• NFC configuration from the mobile app: thresholds, intervals and weighting curves set by tapping a phone.
• Mounted with screws or 3M double-sided tape — no cabling, no electrician.
• Two replaceable lithium batteries — around 3.3–5 years of operation, or roughly 1.5–1.7 years with fast time weighting enabled.
• Long-range radio connectivity — sensors throughout the building report to a single gateway.

In the Nextriv system

SPL, Leq and Lmax levels land on Nextriv dashboards as first-class metrics — you can put them on trend charts, compare several rooms side by side, or pin them into a KPI widget on the reception screen. Each metric takes four thresholds: two warning and two critical (min/max), with severity levels from informational to critical. A night-time exceedance sends notifications through your chosen channels — e-mail, SMS, web push, MS Teams, Discord or an audible alarm in the app — while deduplication ensures one loud wedding does not generate a hundred separate alarms.

Every event has a code, a status history and comments, so the morning analysis of a night-time incident takes minutes. Months of measurement history feed PDF reports and XLSX/CSV exports — hard data for conversations about acoustic treatment, house rules or complaints.

Typical deployments

• Schools and libraries: noise control in classrooms and reading rooms with local LED signalling — see solutions for schools.
• Hotels and apartments: detecting loud parties without violating guests' privacy — more in the solutions for hospitality.
• Healthcare: safeguarding night-time quiet on wards with a documented exceedance history — check the solutions for healthcare.
• Offices and light industry: open-plan acoustic comfort and workstation background noise — details in the solutions for buildings and manufacturing.