How to use the less number of array elements to receive a good spatial resolution and find the location of noise sources accurately are always the problems that people concerned with. In this paper, it introduces near-field noise source location method based on Maximum Likelihood Estimation and the maximum likelihood estimate of the global optimal solution by using of genetic algorithm—to achieve near-field noise source location—which has higher spatial resolution comparing to conventional focused beamforming, and can achieve the coherent near-field sound source position effectively. Through computer simulation of a detailed analysis of signal to noise ratio, measuring the distance and array aperture positioning on the algorithm performance, it can be known that only by the use of small aperture array it can achieve high-resolution positioning of noise source near-field radiation. Finally, through lake test experiments it verifies the validity of the method—which has a certain engineering applications value.