- Streamers are now included in the ATSC’s loudness guidance for advertising
- Ads should not be louder than the programs before or after them
- Californian legislation is driving US-wide changes
For almost as long as there have been ads on TV, advertisers have tried to make those ads as loud as possible through various technological tricks. After many years of increasingly loud ads, the US introduced loudness limits for cable, satellite and broadcast TV, but legislation didn’t apply to streamers — until now.
ATSC, the broadcast standards organization, has published a major revision of its digital TV loudness guidance. And this version applies to streamers as well as broadcast and cable.
The document is called A/85 Recommended Practice: Techniques for Establishing and Maintaining Audio Loudness for Digital Television. And while it’s a technical document the executive summary is simple: STREAMERS, STOP SHOUTING.
What are the rules about too-loud ads?
Legislation was brought in in the early 2010s because of an advertising loudness war: studio tools such as compressors and maximizers can boost the perceived loudness of audio, so advertisers turned everything up to 11 to really capture your attention.
When the FCC’s consumer call center started reporting top complaints in 2002, loud ads were one of the most common reasons for calling.
There are two key bits of legislation regarding ad loudness in the US. The first is the US Commercial Advertisement Loudness Mitigation Act, or the CALM Act for short. That came into force in 2012 and requires commercials to have the same average loudness as the programs they accompany. It compels TV stations, cable operators and satellite TV providers to implement the A/85 Recommended Practice. Non-profits aren’t covered, but political ads are.
Streamers aren’t covered by that legislation, however, but we live in a world where not only do all the major streamers have ad-supported tiers, but today’s TVs and streaming sticks also offers lots of free ad-supported streaming TV (FAST) linear channels.
In 2015, California passed SB 576 to include streaming in its loudness reduction rules. That legislation came into force this month, July 2026, and applies to any service that serves consumers in the state. The ATSC’s revised version of A/85 effectively makes that nationwide.
The guidance isn’t just a list of “don’t do that” items. It recommends best practices in audio measurement, monitoring, production, metadata, dynamic range control and loudness management so that TV services can be consistent across multiple platforms, and viewers won’t get a different audio experience depending on where they’re getting their shows from. If you’re in California you should be hearing the benefits already.
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