The Worst Sound in The World

Fingernails scraping down a blackboard... the scream of a baby... your neighbour's dog barking: what is the worst sound in the world? This is what this website, [Sound101] has been trying to find out.



A study, set up by Trevor Cox, a professor of acoustic engineering at Salford University, sought opinions on 34 sounds at the website www.sound101.org in the hope of learning what makes certain noises so objectionable.

There are about 30 awful sounds in the database, you may choose to listen patiencely or just feel free to stop it. You may rate for each sound you listerned, then you can see what other people voted.

Vomiting is officially the most horrible sound ever, according to over a million votes cast worldwide in a mass online science experiment. The top 10 are :

* 1. Vomiting sound
* 2. Microphone screech
* 3. Babies crying
* 3. Train scraping on tracks
* 5. Squeaky seesaw
* 6. Bad violin playing
* 7. Whoopee cushions
* 8. Argument in a soap opera
* 9. Mains hum
* 10. Tasmanian devil


Listen to the top three worst sounds in the world (mp3)

1) Vomiting
2) Microphone feedback
3) Babies crying
4) Scraping sound


Sounds provided by the University of Salford, listen to more sounds at sound101.org