Smoke alarms are available with a pause or hush button that can be used to temporarily silence the alarm. This is a convenient way to deal with nuisance alarms, such as those caused by burning toast or opening smoky ovens, without disabling the alarm. The hush button will silence the alarm for several minutes and then automatically reset itself. Smoke alarms with this feature discourage the dangerous practice of removing the battery or disconnecting the power source as a method of dealing with frequent nuisance alarms. When purchasing smoke alarms, look for alarms with a hush feature, especially if the alarm will be installed near a kitchen or bathroom.
It should be noted that many alarms with a hush feature will chirp intermittently while in hush mode. The chirping will stop once the alarm resets itself.
If smoke continues to build from a real fire while the alarm is in hush mode, the smoke will override the silence feature and the smoke alarm will resound.