California to bar louder streaming ads starting July 1
A new state law requires video streamers to keep commercial volume no higher than the shows and movies they accompany.
By Maya Lindqvist · Senior Technology Correspondent
3 min read
California will ban video streaming services from running commercials at a higher volume than the programming around them starting July 1. The rule matters for viewers who have faced sudden jumps in ad audio on services that were not covered by the federal TV commercial-volume law.
Gov. Gavin Newsom signed SB 576 in October 2025, according to California legislative records. The law applies to video streaming services in the state and bars them from sending commercial audio that is louder than the video content paired with those ads.
The Hollywood Reporter noted the coming deadline this week. The measure puts streaming services closer to the standard already imposed on broadcast, cable and satellite television under the federal Commercial Advertisement Loudness Mitigation Act.
The Federal Communications Commission says the CALM Act requires commercials on those TV services to have the same average loudness as the programs they accompany. Streaming platforms were not subject to that same federal framework, leaving states to address the issue for internet-delivered video.
How streamers may comply
Streaming companies have not publicly detailed how they will meet California’s requirement, according to Ars Technica. They also have not said whether they will make the same ad-volume changes for viewers outside California.
Platforms could try to limit changes to users they identify as being in California. Politico previously reported that companies may apply the adjustments more broadly, and Illinois has approved a similar requirement that takes effect for streams in that state by July 1, 2027.
TV Tech reported in December that streaming providers would need to add file-based tools and, in some cases, real-time loudness controls to systems that insert ads on the server side. The publication said that would mirror the processing streamers already use for their main programming.
Server-side ad insertion is one reason the issue can be technically complicated. A September 2025 California Assembly analysis said industry opponents argued that ad loudness can vary when commercials move through different encoding pipelines before being inserted into streams.
Industry groups opposed the bill
The Motion Picture Association, whose members include Netflix, Disney, Amazon Prime Video and Paramount, opposed the California bill, according to the Assembly analysis. The Streaming Innovation Alliance, which includes Netflix, Disney, Peacock and Pluto TV, also opposed it.
Those groups told lawmakers that many streaming services were already working to control ad loudness in server-side ad insertion, according to the Assembly analysis. They also pointed to the range of devices used to watch streams, including televisions, tablets and phones, as a factor services must account for.
The persistence of complaints in traditional TV shows that legal limits do not eliminate every volume problem. The FCC said it received at least 1,700 complaints about loud commercials in 2024, about 825 in 2023 and roughly 750 in 2022.
California’s law now gives streaming viewers in the state a specific protection against ads that exceed the volume of the content they are watching. Whether the change is noticeable beyond California will depend on how streaming services implement the new requirement.
This story draws on original reporting from Ars Technica.