To ask for your help in finding the thing that is beeping every hour

[OpheliaPlum]

Something in our house is beeping. It started about a fortnight ago and I’ve been turning off anything that might beep, like the oven, microwave or tumble drier to see if we can still hear it. I’ve discovered it beeps at ten past every hour, so this made me think it’s something with a clock. It is one electronic sounding beep, then nothing until the next hour. It is hard to localise but is definitely downstairs. Ive replaced the batteries in the two smoke alarms we have and it made no difference.

We have an intruder alarm, but there are no error messages on it. The freezer doesn’t have a clock, nor does the fridge.

What would beep once an hour and why?

A digital wristwatch?

Could be the smoke alarm - hours does that when the battery is low.

Do you have separate rooms downstairs so you can close doors? That might help localise it a bit. Do you have kids who could've set an alarm on a watch then dropped it down the back of furniture?

Yep smoke alarm

Smoke alarm

Smoke alarm or carbon monoxide detector.

Thanks everyone. Downstairs has doors. We can hear it from every room downstairs as it’s loud. Will look for digital watches and look again at smoke alarm. I have replaced the batteries recently and it made no difference but will check again as that’s the biggest vote!

OP says she has replaced the batteries in the smoke alarms so why would one of them still beep every hour?

We had next door’s old carbon monoxide alarm (in their outside bin) going off like that, till DP went and smashed to to smithereens with a hammer.

Carbon monoxide alarm.
If you have a smart meter possibly the battery.
My neighbours have a prepaid meter, they're outside, I can hear it beeping when it's low on credit.
I'm dying to know what it is now 😆

Do you have adjoining walls with your neighbours? This happened to me and it drove me mad for weeks - turned out to be next door’s smoke alarm which was fitted on the adjoining wall. The owners had moved abroad so it took months to stop it!! Gives me a headache just remembering 😂

The back up battery of your house alarm.

I have had this very same issue and this was the culprit.

Could be the fridge / freezer. Try unplugging it just before you expect the sound.

Your thermostat? Mine beeps on a very annoying fashion until I replace the batteries.

Smart meter?

We had this with the smoke alarm, they're wired in but have a backup battery. Changed the battery and gave them a good dust and they still did it then we realised that the heads expire and need replacing every 10-15 years. Bought new heads and that fixed it.

We had this at my parents’ house, but neither of them could hear it - just me and other younger visitors. It turned out to be a digital watch in a drawer!

It may take a few hours but sit next to any suspect item every 9 mins past the hour.

You're going to have to start working on process of elimination here....how many people in your household who can help?

Set a phone alarm to alert you a couple mins before the mystery alarm is due to go off each hour.

Choose a room to stand in, really concentrate, and try to determine which room the noise is coming from or is loudest within.

Once you've whittled it down to a room then tear the room apart looking!! Remove anything that could beep and put it in your car so that the next hour you know whether you've got the offending item or not.

You're going to have to invest a bit of time in this or basically be driven mad!

Good luck OP!!

Ours did it even after a battery change. It was a new build though so just walked across and grabbed the site manager. 5 minutes later he turned up, unclipped the noisy bit and put a new bit on.

Do you have a water filter on your taps or a plumbed in fridge with a water filter? Our tap water filter does this when it's time to change the filter.

A game console?
An electric toothbrush?
Laptop?
Toy?

Alexa message

Washing machine ? Ours beeps when you don’t turn it off fully after a cycle. Even if you’ve opened it and taken the clothes out.

Smoke alarm - ours did this even after we changed the batteries. Turned out the alarm itself had reached then end of it's lifespan and needed replacing.

Good luck. We moved house without ever finding ours.