How To Legally Annoy Your Upstairs Neighbors

There’s nothing quite as annoying as noisy neighbors.

Waking up in the middle of the night to ominous banging, music, shouting, and general chaos to your neighbors on either side of your apartment sucks, but when it’s somehow worse when it’s the upstairs neighbors. 

Seriously, do these people walk around wearing bricks for shoes? If you’re gonna play music at the top of the speaker’s range, you might as well make it decent music. 

Regardless of whatever you do during the day or night - whether you’re a nurse coming back from a night shift or if you work in a busy restaurant - your home is meant to be a quiet and peaceful place.

The last thing you want is to aggravate your neighbors even further by complaining. 

You might be struggling to nap, sleep, or just exist peacefully due to the constant noise emitting from upstairs.

You might find your upstairs neighbors are disrespectful and rude, and it takes everything in you to not slap them.

We’ve got you covered - we have the 10 best ways to legally annoy your upstairs neighbors. These tricks and tips won’t get you in trouble and might solve the tricky situation. 

Speak to your neighbor

Before you try any of our other tricks, you should try to speak to your neighbor first. It seems pretty obvious, but you never know - a gentle chat might be all you need. 

It doesn’t have to be an aggressive argument. Just knock on their door, explain that you’re trying to nap or relax, and you’d appreciate some silence.

Whilst lying isn’t exactly the best thing for people to do, you can always make up a little white lie. Perhaps you struggle with sleep at night, or you have a cat who is terrifying by the constant stomping. 

If your upstairs neighbors are a couple, why not try asking if everything is alright? Not only could this conversation stop the arguing, but you could be providing a lot of help for someone who is struggling. 

Whatever you say to your neighbor, make sure to talk to them politely. You won’t be the one responsible for starting a potential argument if they respond with anger.

Hopefully, they will remember your kindness and feel a bit more guilty and conscious of their actions! 

Talk to the neighbor above them 

Okay - so you’ve tried talking to them and they’re still causing a racket. The stomping/arguing/music-playing has not decreased.

You’re beginning to wonder if it’s your problem and not theirs.

For your peace of mind, try talking to the neighbor above them (if there is a neighbor above them). They might find that they struggle with the flat below them because of their noise levels.

Together, you could figure out a plan of action. Safety in numbers, and all. Your new friends can become allies as you precariously (yet bravely) knock on your neighbor’s door once again. 

The only way this could backfire is if the neighbor above your neighbor doesn’t notice any noise. If anything, they could be the source of the problem.

What if your upstairs neighbor is making so much noise to annoy their upstairs neighbor? It’s an endless cycle of stomping.  

Be persistent and passive-aggressive

Here’s where it starts to get slightly petty. You might have tried speaking to your neighbors several times, but the message just isn’t getting through. It’s time to be persistent. 

Just keep knocking on their door and talking to them. Eventually, they might get to a point where you have become so annoying that they take the hint. Their incessant noise-making days could be over. 

We’re not proud of this, because we don’t want you to become that person, but nothing is legally stopping you from giving them the odd written note.

Scribble some frustrated words underneath their door (anonymously might by the key here to prevent pass-agg repercussions), or even stick a post-it note on their door. Whatever you choose to write on this note is up to you. 

Knock randomly

You’ve tried the last few steps with no positive change, so it’s time to upgrade to another level of pettiness. 

We’re not saying you should play Knock, Knock, Run (because we are adults here), but that doesn’t mean you can’t irritate your upstairs neighbor by knocking on their door at inconvenient times for inconvenient requests. 

• Knock at 10 pm asking for coffee. 
• Knock again at 11 pm to get the name of the TV show you heard from upstairs. 
• Knock at 11.30 pm to ask if they want to hang out. 
• Knock at 7 am to see if they want to go to the gym with you.
• Knock at 8 am to ask if they have a splash of milk for the coffee you took from them the night before.

Knocking at the door with a genuine question or query is much less aggravating than knock, knock, run games - but infinitely more useful.

Think about it - your neighbor might hear you arrive home after work and, in fear of hearing your inevitable late-night knock for something ridiculous, might become silent to pretend they’re not in.

The stomping might turn into tip-toeing around the apartment. 

Don’t be bitter, be better 

By “be better”, we don’t mean you should rise above it and be the bigger person. It’s time for subtle revenge. Whatever they do, you should do back, but louder. 

Blaring music or films at top volumes is the best for this. If you’re really committed, why not invest in some wall-mounted speakers that are conveniently placed towards the ceiling?

The key to playing music loudly is to do it at inconvenient times, such as late at night or early mornings. 

The only issue with this is that you might end up bothering your next-door neighbors or the neighbors below you, and soon enough, the whole apartment block is loud 24/7. 

Alarm clock

We are programmed to react to alarm clocks. Our modern-day brains only need to hear a split second of the dreaded noise to immediately be awoken - even if the sound is coming from the apartment below you. 

Taking another step ahead in pettiness, you could always find a really loud alarm clock to blare at ungodly hours in the morning.

You could set it off at 5 am, go to the bathroom, and then turn it off and go back to sleep. 

If you want to go even further, you could set your alarm clock for times when you aren’t in the apartment.

Make sure you know when your neighbors are at home because it won’t work if the upstairs apartment is empty. Perhaps set it off at 8 pm when you are at the bar or at work. 

Again, this might backfire by irritating your other neighbors, but it could be successful. 

Petroleum jelly on their doorknob 

It’s time to unleash maximum pettiness. You could have some fun with your noisy upstairs neighbors. Harmless pranks, after all, are always hilarious and legal. 

Petroleum jelly or vaseline on a doorknob is a wonderful little harmless prank. Everything will become greasy and slippery as they try to turn the doorknob to get into their apartment.

The key with harmless pranks is persistence - the odd prank won’t make any sense to them.

If you’re trying to annoy your upstairs neighbor to the point of pure frustration, you have to repeat the prank again and again. 

If your neighbor has a car, you can also rub the jelly, vaseline, or even butter on the handles. It’s a weird, random, and frustrating prank that will do nothing but annoy your neighbor. Just picture their face. 

You have to be sneaky with this, though. Your neighbors might get so frustrated that they ask to see the apartment building’s CCTV footage to find the culprit.

They might even have a hidden camera in their doorknob, which will blow your cover immediately. 

Also, make sure to only rub the petroleum jelly or vaseline on the handle and not near the lock, because you’ll probably have to pay for damages. 

Tennis/racquetball practice on the ceiling

When trying trick #4 (knock randomly), try to squeeze into a random conversation that you’ve picked up tennis or racquetball recently.

They might assume it’s small talk and won’t think much of it, but in reality, you have just planted a seed that will bloom into a beautiful tree of revenge. 

Even if you’re not actually planning on taking up tennis or racquetball, it doesn’t mean you can’t practice your newfound skills on the ceiling.

Try not to disrupt your other harmless neighbors on either side or below you by just focusing the ball on the ceiling. Bonus points for if you follow the pattern of their feet. 

Oh, you’re arguing in the kitchen? Funny that, I’m just practicing my tennis skills underneath your kitchen. Would be a shame if your argument was disrupted by an irritating and continuous noise. 

If they ask you to be quiet, just say you had your headphones in and didn’t realize how loud you were being.

Continue practicing your ball skills against the ceiling. If they come down again, tell them you’re training for a local competition. 

If they continue to make noise, then so can you. Ultimate pettiness. 

Ceiling vibrator 

If you’re committed to investing in a permanent feature to annoy your upstairs neighbor, you should try a ceiling vibrator. 

A ceiling vibrator is a gadget developed in China that creates vibrations when stuck on the ceiling of your apartment - and therefore the floor of your annoying neighbor’s apartment.

These aren’t the easiest gadgets to find, but you could always get creative by making your own (we’ll leave that up to your imagination). 

The best time to use a ceiling vibrator is at really inconvenient times, like at 3 am when you know they’re asleep. 

It’s kind of like when you have a really noisy washing machine that vibrates throughout the whole apartment, except it’s stuck on your ceiling.

It won’t teach your upstairs neighbors to be less noisy, but it will surely annoy them. Committed pettiness. 

Call the cops

So, it’s gotten to the point where you have been distracted every single moment of being in your apartment.

You might have skipped past the petty tricks to annoy your neighbors because you want to teach them a lesson. 

You haven’t slept properly in weeks, and your noisy neighbors just aren’t getting the hint. 

It’s time to call the cops. 

It’ll have to be a serious case of annoying, noisy, disruptive, and rude upstairs neighbors for the cops to take you seriously.

You need to catch them at the right time, because you don’t want to call the cops only for your neighbors to stop making a noise only minutes before the cops arrive. 

Wait until the noise is so obscene that you have no choice. If you’re really scared of being an enemy to your neighbors, you could always talk to their upstairs neighbors for some help.

Or, you could call the cops anonymously. 

The appearance of cops is enough for someone to get the hint that the noise complaint is a serious issue.

Calling the cops could even be a life-saver for a couple who seem to argue every single day because it might be exactly what the situation needs. 

Either way, if you have tried absolutely everything to teach your upstairs neighbors a lesson, then trying to get the cops to make an appearance is enough to scare them. 

Tips to Avoid Noisy Upstairs Neighbors

Whilst our tricks will annoy your neighbors enough to provide some entertainment and minimal justice on your behalf, they won’t necessarily make your situation any better.

If you’re going to be petty, what’s to say your neighbors won’t be petty back? Soon enough, you’ve got the whole apartment block playing pranks on each other, and it’ll soon become a place of chaos. 

The best way to avoid noisy upstairs neighbors is to look for top-floor apartments.

Sure, you might become a noisy upstairs neighbor for the apartment below you, but at least you won’t have to suffer through it again. 

Whilst you could have some serious fun with the harmless pranks and annoyances, in all seriousness, you should approach these situations with maturity and peace.

It’s boring, sure, but you’re more likely to amend the situation by being patient and respectful when talking to your neighbors. If they respond back with anger or harshness, then it’s their problem and not yours. 

Why You Should Keep It Legal 

We can all agree that it’s never good to do something illegal.

It doesn’t matter how much you want to kidnap and hide your annoying upstairs neighbors, because it’s more likely to backfire on you. You don’t have to make a mountain out of a molehill to amend the situation. 

Harmless pranks like spreading vaseline or butter on doorknobs aren’t illegal and won’t get you into trouble if you’re sneaky about it.

Make sure to avoid cameras and hide your identity, because you never know how your neighbors will react. Your landlord might even get angry at you because landlords like to use anything and everything against their tenants. 

In short, you’ll probably miss the sound of your upstairs neighbors screaming compared to the silence behind bars (in the worst-case scenario). 

Final Words

You can afford to get really creative when coming up with ways to annoy your upstairs neighbors.

Whether they’re particularly loud-footed, constantly screaming, or blaring music from giant speakers, it’s worth getting a bit petty in revenge. 

Giving your annoying upstairs neighbors a taste of their own medicine should never be achieved through illegal activities.

Don’t try to smuggle drugs into their home and dog them in to the cops, because it’s not worth it. You can just put vaseline on their doorknob instead.