That's a good idea! I bet if someone were to develop a residential smoke detector that did that it would sell well. (Especially if it had other compelling features like a 10-year battery.)

I’d be happy with one that gives battery alerts at less than maximum volume.

If a fire alarm manufacturer saw how many upvotes the parent to this comment received, particularly considering how deep in the thread it’s buried, they’d most certainly develop one.

FYI - The 9V Lithium batteries last that long.

https://www.amazon.com/Energizer-LA522SBP-Lithium-Battery-De...

Good to know! We bought a few with integrated 10-year batteries from Home Depot a few years back, but I didn't realize you could get regular lithium 9Vs that last that long in a smoke detector now.

You should replace the smoke detector after 10 years anyway so buying the disposable ones is probably safer.

!! even the hard-wired ones are supposed to be replaced after 10 years, and new hard-wired ones will automatically brick themselves after the 10 years is up !!

For anyone reading this wondering how that's safe, I believe they make noise regularly once they reach this state, to encourage you to replace them, rather than just silently failing to operate!

Yep, blip every 30 seconds for 6 weeks, until they go silent.

It'll drive you nuts, especially if your handy builder put them in out-of-reach places.

Nest Protect sort of does this.

US fire codes require smoke alarms to be replaced every 7 years.

That office building alarms are worse is all the more annoying since they theoretically shouldn't need to wake people from sleep.

Well, they do need to overcome my noise-cancelled high-volume drown-out-coworkers music...

A couple year ago, I was listening to music at a super low volume (way below that of people talking around me, if I removed the headphones) when fire alarm triggered. I didn't hear it.

A coworker did pat my shoulder to let me know, and I noticed the super loud fire alarm as soon as I removed the quiet headphones.

The headphones were not noise-cancelling or anything. Just Sennheiser HD380 Pro, which provide ~30dB isolation. I don't think it would have been possible for fire alarm to be noticeable under such conditions unless it was loud to ear-damaging levels.

This suggests that alternative indicators than just sound should be in place, such as automatically turning off lights and switching to emergency lighting.

Small children have this problem when they are sleeping. They just don't wake up from high-pitched noises, but require lower frequency alarms ideally with spoken words: https://www.bbc.com/news/health-38918056

I wonder if this is an adaptation to not be woken up by infants crying at night until they're old enough that sleep isn't as important or they're able to help?

>This suggests that alternative indicators than just sound should be in place, such as automatically turning off lights and switching to emergency lighting.

The commercial building fire alarms have flashers on them for just that reason. Deaf people need to know the building is on fire too.

At one of my former workplaces we weren't allowed to wear over-ear noise cancelling head phones because of the risk that we didn't hear the fire alarm.

Listening to high-volume music every day can damage your hearing.

With active noise cancelling, the music can be loud relative to co-workers and alarms but not dangerously loud in absolute terms.

Listening to my coworkwers can be worse!

Just sue the alarm manufacturer.