This document describes systems, devices, and methods for detecting or validating cardiac beats, such as in the presence of myopotential or other noise. In one example, an amplitude peak, which is a candidate for a detected cardiac beat, is used in a weighted average, along with a preceding and subsequent sample. The weighted average is compared to a noise threshold. Based on the result of comparison, the amplitude peak is either deemed an actual cardiac beat, or otherwise is deemed noise. The described systems, devices, and methods improve the accuracy of detecting an actual cardiac beat in the presence of noise, during normal sinus rhythm or during an arrhythmia such as ventricular fibrillation. This, in turn, improves the accuracy with which therapy is delivered or withheld by an implantable cardiac rhythm management device. In one example, such as where the system includes a cardiac signal detector with automatic gain control (AGC) circuitry, the weighted average is normalized.