At 7 decibels, a new iMac browsing the web will be quieter than a leaf falling to the ground

Apple New Imac Spring21 Orange
Apple New Imac Spring21 Orange (Image credit: Apple)

What you need to know

  • Apple has published the new iMac's acoustic performance, saying it will run at just 7 dB when browsing the web.
  • A leaf falling to the ground generates around 10 dB of sound.

Apple's upcoming iMac has everyone talking because it comes in some pretty interesting colors, but there's one thing people aren't talking about – noise. Or in the case of the new iMac, the profound lack of it.

Apple has published the 24-inch iMac's acoustic performance as spied by Stephen Hacket and, well, your new iMac is going to be the quietest thing in your house.

According to Apple, the iMac will create just 7 decibels of sound when it's idling and that won't increase when it's browsing the web over a Wi-Fi connection. That already seems quiet – and then you realize that 10 decibels is the sound of a leaf falling and 20 decibels is the sound you hear from rustling leaves in fall. A whisper? Well, that's just 30 decibels.

An iMac, browsing the internet, will essentially be silent. Impressive stuff, indeed. And that's despite having what will presumably be a very fast Apple-designed M1 chip inside there, too. Isn't it amazing what you can do when you don't need to cool Intel's chips?

Now that you know how quiet the new iMac is, be sure to check out our best iMac deals right now. These things are so quiet that you'll hear your own tears if you overpay!

Oliver Haslam
Contributor

Oliver Haslam has written about Apple and the wider technology business for more than a decade with bylines on How-To Geek, PC Mag, iDownloadBlog, and many more. He has also been published in print for Macworld, including cover stories. At iMore, Oliver is involved in daily news coverage and, not being short of opinions, has been known to 'explain' those thoughts in more detail, too. Having grown up using PCs and spending far too much money on graphics card and flashy RAM, Oliver switched to the Mac with a G5 iMac and hasn't looked back. Since then he's seen the growth of the smartphone world, backed by iPhone, and new product categories come and go. Current expertise includes iOS, macOS, streaming services, and pretty much anything that has a battery or plugs into a wall. Oliver also covers mobile gaming for iMore, with Apple Arcade a particular focus. He's been gaming since the Atari 2600 days and still struggles to comprehend the fact he can play console quality titles on his pocket computer.