Are Hamsters Noisy at Night? [Guide]

Hamsters are quite silent compared to other common pets, but that doesn’t mean you will never hear anything while you’re around one. 

Hamsters, despite their little size, are capable of producing a significant amount of sound, and it is especially irritating when this sound is made throughout the night. Hamsters are generally nocturnal, which means that they perform all of their activities during the night, resulting in excessive noise at night. This involves activities such as digging, eating, and spinning the wheel. To avoid the noise disrupting your sleep, you can position the cage far away as possible from your bedroom.

This article explains why hamsters are noisy at night. It also discusses ways to shut out sounds and quiet your hamster.

What Kind of Noises Do Hamsters Produce?

Hamsters have various sounds that they express depending on their disposition. They will make various noises, including hisses, bruxes, squeaks, chirps, and even rare coughs and sneezes. Hamsters produce the same noise for various reasons; therefore, you must read their body language.

If you are a novice hamster owner, you may be curious about the ways in which hamsters interact with one another, as well as with their owners, and whether or not they are even capable of making sounds.

Can You Encourage a Hamster to Sleep at Night?

Because it is in the hamster’s nature to be active at night, it is impossible to encourage it to sleep during the day. However, they may be more inclined to sleep at night if the cage is kept in a dark, silent room during the day.

Changing your hamster’s sleep routine too much might create stress and disorientation. Keeping the enclosure in a dark and quiet spot during the day is the best way to do this.

Why Are Hamsters Noisy at Night?

Hamsters are nocturnal, or more precisely, crepuscular animals. This indicates that they are most active at night rather than during daytime hours. In their natural environment, they do most of their work at night to avoid being eaten by the many predators that live there.

Even in captivity, hamsters will spend most of the day sleeping, waking up only at night to feed, exercise, and play in their exercise wheels and tunnels. You may limit noise by placing the hamster cage away from sleeping rooms or training the hamster, so it goes to sleep soon.

Why Do Hamsters Play on the Wheel at Night?

You probably already know this, but it’s essential to provide hamsters with wheels in their cages. It keeps them completely busy and ensures they have a good time while working out and staying active. However, since they are most active in the evening, they must carry out their task during this period.

It’s not healthy to remove your hamster’s wheel from its cage. It would upset the hamster greatly by changing its environment, which might lead to health concerns.

Why Do Hamsters Dig and Explore at Night?

The nighttime activity of hamsters involves more than just running in a wheel. They are also quite enthusiastic about digging and exploring, often making a lot of noise.

One way your hamster may investigate its surroundings is by climbing the cage’s walls. You’d hear this noisy action at night but can’t stop it, like the wheel.

The hamsters will cause the cage to shake and make a rattling sound, and you may also hear some scratching and other stirring sounds. This is what hamsters do at night; therefore, we must accept it. This is what hamsters do at night; therefore, we must accept it.

How to Quiet a Hamster at Night?

It’s important to remember that hamsters don’t sleep like humans do before you try to calm your noisy pet. You are unable to alter the hamster’s natural sleeping cycle; however, you may take measures to lessen the amount of nighttime noise by adjusting the following factors:

• Maintain the Hamster’s Regular Sleeping Schedule

Because they are nocturnal creatures, hamsters sleep during the day and become active at night. This implies that hamsters have a reversed sleep cycle from humans.

Understanding your hamster’s sleep cycle is the first step in building a bedtime routine that will enable them to go to sleep and stay asleep earlier.

If your pet is not active during the day, you should be sure to spend more time with it at night. Change its environment when it’s asleep instead of waking it up to perform other things. It’s possible that feeding your pet late at night, right before you go to bed, might be of assistance. As a consequence of these adjustments, your hamster ought to be exhausted and ready for bed much before you do! 

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• Place the Cage Properly

Positioning a hamster’s cage in the ideal location is an additional helpful technique for reducing the amount of noise it makes. However, if you share your living space with other people and they want to sleep without hearing your pet at night, this may not be an option for you. If so, try one of these:

• Put the cage where it won’t be too loud. Since hamsters are nocturnal, if you can’t keep them away from noise throughout the day, consider doing so at night.
• You might also try putting soundproofing material in your hamster’s cage, such as carpet padding, which does an excellent job absorbing sound.
• Plastic or Glass Cage

Many hamsters chew on the bars of their cages at night, either because they are nervous or trying to wear down their teeth. Even though the latter is the more common case, both result in a large amount of noise. 

Plastic and glass hamster cages absorb sound better than metal ones since there are no metal bars for the hamsters to chew on. Hamsters will chew on other things, like food and toys.

For example, giving hamsters shelled nuts is a great way to keep them busy, so they keep their noses to the ground.

• Keep the Cage Away From Bedrooms

Leaving the hamster cage far from your bedroom is one of the wisest and most beneficial things you can do. It won’t help much if you have a tiny home or apartment, but it could make the problem less noticeable.

As long as you keep the cage out of your bedroom at all times, the noise level should not be too intolerable for you. Another helpful suggestion is to close the bedroom and hamster cage doors completely. This will filter out any noise further, and its difference could be rather noticeable.

• Silent Exercise Wheel

When hamsters run on their exercise wheels at night, they make a lot of noise. However, the quality of the wheel has more to do with this than the hamster itself.

When the hamster runs, some of the wheels shake and squeak, especially the old and rusty ones. The noise will be less if you grease these parts with things safe for hamsters, like olive oil, Vaseline, or groundnut oil. There are exercise wheels available that produce less noise, allowing you to get a better night’s rest.

• Give Your Hamster Toys

Hamsters make a lot of night noise for several reasons, but one of the most important ones is that they are bored and want to be active. Toys for your hamster are an excellent option since you can’t play with them.

You could put lots of chew toys in the cage, which is excellent for young hamsters. These non-toxic toys will entertain your hamster, and at the same time, its teeth and jaws will benefit.

• Provide Enrichment

While living in the wild, Hamsters will search for food, dig extensive tunnel systems, and run away from predators. This keeps them active, but it’s hard to recreate in captivity.

Keeping your hamster’s cage stocked with enrichment helps manage its activity, reducing unwanted noise. The following are wonderful examples of enrichment:

• Sand bath
• Coco fibre or flower-filled digging box
• Grapevine
• Cork logs
• Sprays, such as millet and flax

The best method to give your hamster a happy, stress-free existence and make it feel more at ease in its cage at night is to create an environment that is an accurate representation of its natural habitat.

• Availability of Safe Water to Drink

Like any other pet, your hamster needs clean water. A water bottle built into the hamster cage and accessible to the hamster at all times should be standard equipment.

Before you go to bed at night, you should change the water. This would prevent the hamster from getting thirsty, resulting in it screaming out, which would wake you up.

• Healthy Diet

If your hamster eats well, it will be more independent and sleep better. Give the hamster pellets, fresh fruit, and vegetables to ensure it eats well.

Your hamster will be happy, healthy, and sleep better on a balanced diet. All of these benefits should help your pet sleep well at night.