Bella the cat now holds the world record for purring

“We always knew Bella purred loudly,” says cat owner Nicole Spink of Huntingdon, England. “When she purrs, we have to turn up the TV volume so we can hear something.” But even Bella the can opener couldn’t have predicted that her cat Tiger’s purr is now officially the loudest in the world.

Dave Wilson, who checks the correct implementation of the Guinness Book of World Records if previous records are broken, and the sound engineer prepared the room to measure the volume and it soon became clear: it was the 14-year-old cat who set the current 50 dB record. According to measurements, its purr is about 54.6 decibels, the company announced on Tuesday. This roughly corresponds to the size of the boiler.

However, only Bella was able to locate the best value for a live indoor cat. Two other cats broke the record for the loudest purring ever recorded – Smokey and Merlin. Smokey from Northampton, England, hit an astonishing 67.8 decibels in 2011, the statement said. Four years later, Merlin was able to catch up.