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It depends on the day, and the record says so in numbers: 3 out of 5, the middle of the barking scale. A Weimaraner has a voice and uses it, for alerts, for greetings and for the occasional opinion, but it is not among the breeds that narrate their whole existence. This is a Sporting breed from Holy Roman Empire with a Bright, cooperative, outdoorsy and loyal temperament, and its voice is a tool it uses rather than a soundtrack it lives inside. For most households the volume is unremarkable, noticeable on the day the doorbell rings six times and invisible for the quiet weeks between, which is exactly what a middle score is supposed to mean.
The Weimaraner was a nobleman's all purpose gundog, hunting everything from birds to boar beside its owner, and it still behaves like a professional partner: energetic, intelligent, demanding and utterly devoted. Puppies are exuberant, mouthy and busy; adults settle into athletic dignity provided the work is real. They are good with children, good with other dogs and friendly with strangers, which makes them poor guards and excellent family adventure partners. The adult stands 23 to 27 in at the shoulder and weighs 55 to 90 lb. Bred to work all day beside people, this breed is miserable without exercise and company, and delightful with both.
It helps to see the rating in its cluster. The Weimaraner's record reads Good with children for children, Good with dogs for other dogs and Friendly with strangers for strangers, and a dog's barking is mostly aimed at exactly those three audiences: the family it lives with, the dogs it meets and the strangers it announces. It is a large dog of 55 to 90 lb from the Sporting group, developed in Holy Roman Empire, with a Bright, cooperative, outdoorsy and loyal temperament. Read together, those lines describe how much dog is making the noise, how often it is likely to feel like making it, and how much of the household's week the dog occupies, which is the real context any barking verdict needs.
Other dogs feature, but moderately. The Weimaraner is rated Good with dogs, and its barking at other dogs is usually the greeting kind rather than the argument kind: a few barks at the park fence, a commentary when a neighbor's dog starts first. A dog passing the house, a noise in the night that does not resolve, a squirrel at close quarters: reported, briefly. What a middle score means in practice is that the list is short and the reports end. The Weimaraner's Bright, cooperative, outdoorsy and loyal temperament and its 60 to 90 minute exercise need set the baseline, and a dog that has had its exercise and its company files fewer reports than one that has had neither.
Apartments are not ideal, in the record's own rating, because size, energy and voice all push the other way. Owners who exercise, train and include this dog get a devoted, funny, athletic companion of rare intensity and beauty. The breed excels at gundog work, tracking, agility and obedience.
For completeness, the record's remaining lines: the Weimaraner comes from Holy Roman Empire, in the Sporting group, and its color line reads: The standard accepts a range of colors and patterns, and individual markings vary a lot. Its coat is recorded as Short, smooth, sleek coat in silver gray, lying flat and feeling dense to the hand. The breed's known health watch points, Bloat (gastric dilatation volvulus), Hip dysplasia and Eye conditions, quietly shape the noise question in the senior years, when senior status arrives around age 7 years and hearing, joints and routine all change how a dog experiences its street. The barking verdict on this page describes the typical adult; the whole record describes the dog whose barking it will actually be.
The comparison set on the record sharpens the picture. The Weimaraner's closest matches here, the Grand Griffon Vendéen, the Wetterhoun and the Chesapeake Bay Retriever, carry their own barking scores, and the spread across that shortlist shows how much the voice can move inside one build and coat type. Each score on the record was assigned breed by breed, and the shortlist exists for comparison, not for averaging.
Managing a middle voice is mostly about not accidentally training it upward. The commonest household error is paying barks with the thing barked for: the door opens, the visitor enters, the dog is let out, while it is still barking, and the lesson lands cleanly. Windows improve with access management: film on the lower glass, a garden layout that does not post the dog at the fence for the whole day. The Weimaraner's trainability, rated 4 out of 5, is more than enough for this program; what it needs from the owner is consistency, because a mid-score breed keeps a precise ledger of which barks worked.
Old Weimaraners stay attached, watchful and unbothered by the idea of retirement. Adolescents hit maximum energy and cleverness together, and sport plus training carry the household through.
The numbers an owner plans around: a Weimaraner stands 23 to 27 inches, weighs 55 to 90 lb and lives 10 to 13 years. Its exercise need is 60 to 90 minutes a day, and that line is the single strongest predictor of tonight's noise level in most homes. Barking 3 of 5, energy 5 of 5, trainability 4 out of 5. A small dog's 3 out of 5 and a giant dog's 3 out of 5 are different acoustic events, which is why the size lines belong on a page about noise: pitch, volume and the neighbor's tolerance all scale with the dog producing them.
Start with the cause, not the noise. With the Weimaraner, whose typical weight runs 55 to 90 pounds and whose lifespan reaches 10 to 13 years, the honest answer also changes a little across the dog's life, from puppyhood to senior status at about 7 years. Meet the exercise need first, 60 to 90 minutes daily, then teach a settle cue in calm moments so it exists in loud ones, and reward the pauses after barking rather than shouting through them. Manage the stages the dog performs on, windows, fences, the front door routine. At 3 out of 5, this breed's trainability of 4 out of 5 makes the program very workable, but it is a program of weeks. Anyone selling you a silent Weimaraner by Friday is selling you fear, not training. The famous trait is attachment: Weimaraners follow their people from room to room and suffer when excluded or left long hours.
Sometimes, and sometimes it gives you stereo. The Weimaraner's own numbers frame it: shedding at 3 out of 5, grooming at 3 out of 5, and a height of 23 to 27 inches, which is the household this voice has to fit into. A companion can drain the boredom and loneliness out of a Weimaraner's day, and boredom is a common fuel for barking in a breed needing 60 to 90 minutes of exercise and company to match. But dogs also learn each other's songs: pair a vocal dog with another vocal breed and the duet is a real risk. Choose the second dog for its own record, its bark score included, and introduce it as company, not as a noise treatment with a heartbeat.
That is the core of the breed's vocal life, and its strangers rating reads Friendly with strangers. For the Weimaraner specifically, a Sporting dog whose exercise needs run 60 to 90 minutes a day, that plays out in daily routines rather than in occasional big fixes. A Weimaraner with a bark score of 3 out of 5 announces unfamiliar people as a matter of course; whether the announcement is a single bark or a full report depends on the score, the dog and how the visitor behaves. Friends who visit often graduate quickly to the greeted list. Strangers who behave strangely, lingering at the fence, staring in at the window, get the extended edition whatever the score says.
Last updated: November 11, 2026