Hearing loss is very serious. You know your body better than anyone else so don't be afraid to be its biggest advocate and protector. Nobody else will.
I once had tinnitus for a week after a concert and it was one of the worst weeks of my life, it felt like it would last forever (and for some people, it does). I had pristine, "golden ears" for audio engineering and was afraid about how much I'd be able to recover. I missed even the boring high pitched squeaks of doorknobs, faucets, etc. Everything was muffled. Since then, I've been wearing Etymotic earplugs at concerts (the few I went to).
There is research on proper restoration of the cilia (ear hair that allows us to hear), but we don't know if it's a "hardware" problem (these hairs), "software" problem (brain), or both, in what amounts. So it's far away (EDIT: if it's even possible at all...). Hearing aids are not something you want to fall back on. It's not like eyes with glasses and contacts. Be careful.
There is no cure for hearing damage. Your body can recover from slight damage after a few weeks but generally trauma to hair cells, synapses and auditory nerve is accumulative and overtime they loose their ability to recover.
There's currently no way to regenerate these. There was a promising company attempting to do this and they recently announced discontinuation of phase 3 trials as their drug showed no significant change against placebo.
The drug was in development for almost 9 years before it reached phase 3 and failed.
There's no silver-bullet cure for hearing damage, but there are cures and effective treatment for the underlying causes, which can result in a cure for hearing damage.
The treatment and prognosis is highly dependent on the underlying cause. Cilia damage probably won't be curable until after a lot more stem cell research. Neurological damage is hard to impossible to cure depending on the age and neuroplasticity of the patient. TMJ or Eustachian tube dysfunction can lead to hearing damage that goes away once the underlying issue is treated.
This misinformation has killed people. Texas Roadhouse CEO Kent Taylor committed suicide after being diagnosed with tinnitus and being told it was untreatable, even though his tinnitus was caused by a COVID-19 infection causing inflammation. The treatment for that, which is highly effective, is two weeks of prednisone, with intratympanic steroid injections in severe cases.
In my experience and according to literature, there are cures for hearing damage. N-acetylcysteine, for one.
I had been taking N-acetylcysteine (NAC) regularly for a while for reasons completely unrelated to hearing. I unmistakably noticed my hearing to improve. High frequency hearing once lost came back.
I didn’t believe it. Looked on Google Scholar. The effect is known.
There may be cures in future (ways to regenerate all the areas that are involved in hearing - Auditory nerve, synapse and OHC, IHC) but there currently is no way to regenerate HC after apoptosis in Humans. Recovery of damaged/stressed HC, auditory is shown to happen naturally to a degree and -might- be helped through supplements.
I take NAC myself and a few other supplements, the idea is to help support and lessen the effects of oxidative stress. I wouldn't promote any of my protocol since the literature is too weak and from various hearing related forums I read, efficacy highly subjective.
If you're wondering - 7,8 Dihydroxyflavone (DHF) shows promise and there's some literature on frontiersin on this but delivery was done intratympanic injection to the RWM and on animals. Taking the it as a oral supplement may raise risks of some cancers.
Thanks! Yes, it’s important to distinguish between cure-some-types-somewhat-sometimes and cure-almost-any-type-consistently.
I’ve been very surprised in recent years to learn just how much actionable information is in the scientific literature. More is known than is known, sort of.
Thanks for that update, I heard about it only once years ago. Yeah safest thing is to assume it can't come back, and be aware of the accumulation, as you said.
Yeah it can’t be stressed enough, if you go to live events, get concert earplugs and wear them religiously. You hear the music better anyway.
It’s been sad to see friends fail to heed this advice. You don’t want to be that person who needs hearing aids at age 50 due to something you could have prevented with a little forethought.
Etymotic are great and were my standby for years. Recently upgraded to Earasers on the recommendation of a musician friend and I am very happy with them, frequently forget they are even there.
I recently got earasers, mainly to make it easier to hear people over music (I have auditory processing disorder), however I have found them just to muffle everything, making the music a good level, but speech unbearable.
Is this your experience?
Wondering because maybe I'm doing something wrong or maybe I chose the wrong level of them (I think I chose the regular EU level).
Hah hah. Good for you being able to recover. Got permanent tinnnitus from one mistake on not wearing hearing protection once when cutting stone table and i was hoovering the dust. Good thing is, you get used to it. Whatever you thought total silence was, it is gone now. Just have to work your brains towards not givin an f and you should be fine living with hearing damage. Just dont make it worse. You'll remember then the initial anxiety of losing it in the first place.
This is impossible for me. As a self proclaimed hypersensitive person with hyperacusis and misophonia, I would rather fight and claw my way out of any kind of concert or disco rather than suffering from the loud noises. Any kind of concert or disco noise means intense pain to me. Like getting stabbed in the ears.
I found a solution and peace in ear plugs, with them I can enjoy discos and anything else like normal people.
Now one question for you: I do realize the majority of humans can stand those levels of noise without earplugs and without any apparent discomfort. Do all you normies and neurotypicals simply do not have this intense pain reaction to loud noise? How the hell could you suffer through a concert so loud it gave you tinnitus without passing out from pain?
> Now one question for you: I do realize the majority of humans can stand those levels of noise without earplugs and without any apparent discomfort. Do all you normies and neurotypicals simply do not have this intense pain reaction to loud noise? How the hell could you suffer through a concert so loud it gave you tinnitus without passing out from pain?
Most venues have terrible sound. This can be the result of bad acoustics, a poor quality/poorly tuned sound system, or performers who don’t know what they are doing and think loud = good sound. When I’m in one of those I have your reaction.
In venues with a well-tuned, high quality soundsystem being used properly, your ears shouldn’t hurt much.
But why run the risk of damaging your hearing? Everyone should be wearing earplugs at live events anyway.
Musical noise rarely gives me any issues, though some of the weirder electronic/noise/artsy punk shows have been problematic. Usually it is in short bursts though, I can't think of a show I actually left due to the noise. I enjoy music I can feel but I am very diligent about earplug usage to the point that I bring extras to share just in case. I typically pull each earplug out for a few seconds on each side to see if I'm missing much. There is something very different about listening to Earth for example at show volume. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UiCIW04PF3I
Unfortunately my tinnitus stemmed from lightning. I'm fortunate that it doesn't seem noticeable all the time.
I'm the exact same way. I assume our brain translates loud noises into physical side effects while normal brains just don't. Same way anxiety, or an anxiety disorder, can cause physical effects like sweating or increased heart rates when having symptoms.
Personally, I like it because I worry about hearing loss and it's a kind of protective measure, while other people don't seem to care when they're damaging their ears. I also hate it because I can look like a lunatic getting physically uncomfortable when everyone else is fine.
Yes, yes, I prefer having this warning mechanism over not having it. I keep ear plugs in all my pockets, you never know when you end up in clearly harmfully loud environments even if it‘s just walking past a jackhammer.
I can not even imagine what normal people experience and feel at that point where noise and loudness turn into PURE PAIN for me. The accoustic equivalent of looking into the sun or lasers!
I also use airpod pros as alternative to earplugs and I do feel the ANC pressure and weirdness, but it doesn‘t feel painful in any way.
Most people don't feel pain at the concert and they only notice the tinnitus the following day.
I used to go to thrash punk gigs years ago - but not many so didn't do noticeable damage before I learned about the risk and started wearing ear plugs.
I got tinnitus at 15 from an airplane ride maxxing out my headphones. So 15 years ago. Its fine, you get used to it after 2-3 weeks. Yes it never went away. Buckle up butter cup.
And all of them used with current iOS, iPadOS, and MacOS offer default volume limits and proactive notifications about excess decibels, set quite low, and iPhones themselves offer environmental volume warnings as well now.
To get hearing damage generally requires disabling or raising levels on this feature not on offer from most players+headsets.
Generally, sure. But some of us are raising the possibility that there's something else going on that isn't captured by the limits, notifications and warnings. I didn't mention it in my original post but I always used my AirPod Max with the hard cap decibel limit set to the minimum value, and even then I wouldn't have them turned all the way up.
I have AirPods and get tinnitus which comes and goes. At max volume they sound good but will make my ears ring after. It's the same for any headphones / loud noise source really. The answer is to turn it down a bit. I'd be willing to bet its the sound level that's the main thing rather than the type of headphone. For me 80db is fine, 100db causes issues but I'm sure people vary.
There are so many variables to this it's obnoxious. What do you define as loud? Are you using them in ANC? Is it regular Airpods or Airpods Pro? Do you notice tinnitus after using ear plugs for a while? When listening to music other ways?
I have tinnitus due to ear infections when I was younger. In my subjective experience, my AirPod Pro's have not changed it in any meaningful way. I use them enough that I have two pairs of APP so I can swap when the batteries die. Now I also have added AirPod Max when I don't want the "joys" of fully in ear. Only mention that because they have similar ANC.
The challenge with tinnitus is that it's highly subjective and can vary based on a lot of things. Just take a skim of https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/tinnitus/symp... -- There are 8 "Other causes" listed, with the last one being "including diabetes, thyroid problems, migraines, anemia, and autoimmune disorders such as rheumatoid arthritis and lupus have all been associated with tinnitus."
There are certainly days when my Tinnitus is worse, to the point where I have to have sound on to keep me mentally stable. Other days when I forget I even have it.
TLDR: If you have ringing in your ears that is bothering you, see a doctor.
the basic answer is that tinnitus is inflammation. so in order we reduce inflammation is either sumpplementation of food or avoidance of behavior that induces that response so the avoidance is possible through strength and conditioning like another commentor mentioned tensor tympani muscle activation is primary defense. secondary would be healthy diet.
furthermore : a device that augments noise cancellation invokes a third princiople regarding muscles use it or lose it.
theres a single cause to this which is damage to cilary hairs now under my own subjective belief is that these are a growable or compensatable based on the outcome of blind patients with increased hearing ability
conclusion: ears do heal if the body is subjected with significant stress invoking amplitude
same with any other possiblw ailment
also finally since this was orignal about ringing in ears. this is overcomeable the ringing might be there still but the closest analogy i can give is layering. the human mind can extroplolate patterns amplify them
I wonder if it's the noise cancellation causing problems. I definitely hear a high-pitched noise from the noise cancellation feature and rarely use it at all specifically because of that, except very infrequently like on planes. Maybe the high frequency noise is damaging the ear drums at high frequencies?
But I can definitely say I do not have tinnitus despite wearing AirPod Maxes quite often.
Ummmm. ANC attenuates certain frequencies and fails to attenuate other frequencies. Which you would end up hearing anyway if you weren’t wearing the headphones. So effectively the sound power reaching your ears didn’t change for those frequencies.
I have worked on ANC systems in automotive applications.
theoretically. it's never going to match the input exactly though and therefore it will generate noise of its own. it's conceivable that there would be less variation in this noise, due to quantized nature of the system that synthesizes the cancellation, and that a fixed synthesized signal for long durations could exhaust parts of the cochlea that are used to the high variability of natural sounds and/or trigger an adaptation in auditory cortex.
or the software is bad or the anc mic fails, and it generates a high pitched whine that causes short term tinnitus.
just spitballing because it's fun. would be interesting to analyze the frequency responses to benchtop and realistic scenarios for anc in modern earbuds.
also would be interesting to understand the psychophysical response to those behaviors!
Thank you. I would love for someone go down this rabbit hole and see what they find. Maybe it turns out the answer is "none of the above" but these feel like productive lines of inquiry.
They are a attempt to replicate, in written form, the rhythm of conversation that is typically encountered when two or more people speak in person, face to face.
The "Ummmm" we see in the present example, expresses doubt in what was just said (written, really), and foreshadows that the statement to follow (from speaker #2) may be disagreeable to the other person (speaker #1).'
Similarly, it is not uncommon to find the word "Hmmm" as a preface to some statement. This expresses a notion of "I will need to think about this." But in some contexts, "Hmmm" can convey skepticism. In real-life conversation, people frequently exploit this ambiguity, as a clever way to signal that they are skeptical but will not state so out loud.
It wasn’t meant to come across as passive aggressive. When I make a statement that contradicts the original post, I try to be mindful and human. Instead of saying ‘you’re blatantly wrong’ I am hoping to not come across as a rude guy on internet. I’ll probably explore other ways.
Your ears are a complex system. Just like when your eyes think it's darker, your pupils dilate, your ears have a similar method of controlling how much sound gets to the sensitive bits.
It's possible that ANC convinces your ear to open up a bit more, leading to damage in the frequencies that it doesn't attenuate.
I wonder if the ANC is actually bringing out latent tinnitus that was already there, but we don't often experience sudden transitions to and from silence where tinnitus becomes most notable.
There's evidence that in urban environments street noise is loud enough to cause hearing loss over time. Millennials or younger have basically worn headphones their whole lives as well, and only recently have devices started alerting for dangerous exposure. If you've listened to music or a podcast on a plane or the bus with earbuds then the volume would have been at dangerous levels.
I don't want to imply ANC may not cause tinnitus (this should be explored), but I suspect the reason people feel it wares off also has to do with the brain acclimating to background noise again.
I'm convinced that this is it. The DSPs and speakers aren't fast enough to instantly create a counterwave, so I guess sometimes it will amplify the external sound, even in some kind of distorted manner since even the amplification-component won't be identical to the incoming external sound.
I was looking for this comment - I have a different ANC headphone, and I definitely noticed that it puts a new kind of pressure on my ears. Not often, but only when the ANC is activated, and when I have been using it for an extended time. No tinnitus here either, just something I noticed.
I also don't have tinnitus, and like you don't use noise cancellation much at all (planes being just about the only time). I find the Maxes sound very good in normal mode and block out a lot of noise on their own. But these noise cancellation modes could be a cause for concern.
Yes. There's been suggestions from multiple papers that exactly this is the case. Granted, "you get what you search for" on the internet, but I think you'll agree that search results for this are more than that.
This is very interesting. I've noticed my tinnitus has seemed to be worse as of late. I exclusively use AirPods Pro. I wouldn't say I listen to loud music, but I'm wondering if the noise cancellation could have something to do with it...
AirPods Pro noise cancellation almost definitely gave me temporary tinnitus after a few months of usage even though I never listened to music that loud. Switched to regular AirPods two years ago and the tinnitus entirely went away.
Same here, just having ANC enabled without any audio for 1-2 hours and tinnitus is clearly noticeable. For that reason I’ve discarded all AirPods Pro in my family
I have tinnitus and AirPod pros and haven’t noticed any difference. I do find that not drinking out of straws or especially camelpak style bottles with straws really minimizes it. Also, more sleep, less tinnitus
I have had tinnitus for years, and have never felt comfortable with noise cancelling headphones. Purely anecdotal, of course, and even regular headphones are uncomfortable after awhile, but active noise cancellation is unbearable for me
Yeah I feel like the total silence causes me to focus on the ringing, which raises the intensity -- I think it's a mental thing.
Whenever I use noise cancelling headphones (or really any headphones), I always have something playing even at a really low volume to drown out the tinnitus.
I'm a bit odd in that I prefer total silence, though my wife needs background or white noise.
I'd rather just have the ringing in my ears than ringing PLUS something else. There's something distinctly different between ANC and true silence, and despite several attempts I've never found an ANC that proved otherwise.
I don't own AirPods, but one of the things that I've struggled with after the proliferation of headphone jack removal is that on all the Bluetooth headphones/earbuds I've tried the lowest volume setting is still too loud. I normally use Shure SE215s wired, but I've tried the Sennheiser PXC550, Sony WH-1000XM3, Jabra Elite 7 Sport with similar impressions, and tried using my work 2021 MacBook Pro as the audio source instead of my phone. Surely I'm not the only one who feels this way?
On my Samsung phone, I've had to manually set individual app volumes to 80% via Sound Assistant, have additional volume steps enabled, and have the system sound set to the lowest setting when using Bluetooth.
Bought 1MORE BT per Wirecutter’s recommendation and I’ve had the exact same problem, complete with tinnitus tendencies. The minimum volume seems highest when connected to my iPad.
I have pretty much stopped using my AirPods (and mostly headphones connected to the iPhone) after reading that emergency alerts can cause hearing damage:
You can turn these off in the US, although not in some other countries (like Canada). Go to Settings -> Notifications, scroll down past the long list of apps, and then disable (as of this writing) AMBER Alerts, Emergency Alerts, Public Safety Alerts, and Test Alerts.
That said, I live in a part of the country where the government won't be able to tell you that a horrible disaster is coming (earthquake country). If I lived in Tornado Alley or someplace that floods, I'd have mulled over the emergency and public-safety alerts switches longer.
But I don't want to turn it off. We got a useful warning about a nearby fire causing soot (this is in The Netherlands), allowing us to close our windows timely.
Are there any software approaches that can properly modulate and equalize sound based on the various hardware factors and user preference? It seems like it should be possible.
More anecdotes! I use the AirPod Pros many hours a day and have mild tinnitus. I find the noise canceling makes me more aware of the singing in my ears. I don't live in a place where silence happens, but the cancelling will kill the outside noise enough for me to remember that the ears are always singing to themselves.
For people experiencing loud noises, be aware that if the microphones can come loose, then they can get weird transients from vibration, shock, or even the sound being driven through the AirPods. The original AirPods were subject to that, I had mine replaced once and when they came loose again stopped using them. (Gross note: the original ones made me more subject to disgusting things happening best left unmentioned when used many hours a day. That was most of the reason for not getting them replaced again. The new ones definitely breathe better and don't cause me trouble.)
Yeah, I got a very early pair and they started to break down after about a month. Random pops and sharp high-pitched sounds, before eventually they stopped working at all
A few months ago I decided to see if they'd worked out the kinks and got a new pair of Gen 2 ones. Those have been working pretty much flawlessly
This is my biggest reservation against using (any) noise cancelling headphones.
IIUC, they work by emitting the same frequency sound, a bit delayed, which cancels the sound in the targeted place - but doubles its amplitude in vicinity, because this is how waves work (feel free to correct me if I'm wrong).
I can't imagine being blasted with a loud sound in the vicinity of our hearing organs is very healthy. Instead, I just use those big headphones that cover my ears and dampen surrounding sounds somewhat. They're not stylish though.
Early forms of active noise reduction did create the comb filtering effects that you describe, but these were never inaudible. Modern noise reduction is much better about this, however, and higher level products are actually used for hearing protection - this is used in headphones for fighter pilots.
The problem isn't the noise cancelling as much as people turning up the volume in loud environments, since earbuds don't reduce the outside volume as much as covered headphones do. So then they get the outside noise, plus the increased volume from the earbuds.
OT tip - I bought a pair of cheap $30 noise protection ear muffs that I am rarely without when travelling on damagingly loud public transit, such as when I'm commuting on underground rail. They are conspicuously large and odd looking, but my earbuds fit nicely under them, and the travel and listening experience is greatly enhanced, and pleasantly much quieter.
> Early forms of active noise reduction did create the comb filtering effects that you describe, but these were never inaudible. Modern noise reduction is much better about this, however, and higher level products are actually used for hearing protection - ...
But surely the physics is the same, is it not? The only thing they can improve is timing and where the doubled waves go. Unless they work by using some other principle?
I don't have experience in active noise cancelling design, but I would guess that lower latency hardware probably plays a large part in the improvement, given the nature of the problem - a chip set that couldn't 'keep up' with changes in the audio signal would be late in responding, resulting in comb filtering. No doubt, people also improved the algorithms over time too.
Ok, so the design improvements made sounds more synced, but imho that doesn't solve the problem (it might even make it worse? Not sure...). The combing effect is there because the sources of the sound and the "anti-sound" are not in the same position. Lower latency helps that the signals are perfectly cancelled in some predefined direction, but you still get twice the sound amplitudes at a different angle (towards the head).
you would hear it, and it would not work. it works because it emits at the right time, not delayed, to cancel it so perfectly that it's below the noise floor for your ears
usually what we hear is the shitty Bluetooth and coil whine
I’m no expert, but I thought they worked by destructive interference? i.e. they emit the opposite sound, and (providing they can match the amplitude) reduce the incoming wave to nothing, which is why we don’t hear anything.
That energy has to go somewhere. As I understand that resulting energy is mostly not directed towards the ear (probably as heat?). But tinnitus isn't purely physical, there are psychoacoustic mechanisms at play as well, which noise canceling might cause.
I started getting spasms of my tensor tympani muscle around the time I began using AirPods with noise cancellation. Could hear it clearly and had a doc visually confirm.
Correlation not causation, but weird enough that a stopped using them.
Interesting same thing happened to me - a very strange sensation. I was using Galaxy Buds every day for work and have since stopped using any earbuds and the issue has pretty much gone away. Can’t say for sure it was the buds but… felt correlated enough that I’m wary to use them again.
If it was the buds maybe they caused temporary harm while the Apple ones are causing lasting harm. To date Samsung's innovations haven't been like Apple's butterfly keyboard. I have Samsung buds and they are pretty impressive but I think if they were more powerful it would be weird.
Poor man’s AirPods: construction earmuffs over old-school wired Apple earbuds. You can keep the actual volume setting quite low, and the suppression of outside noise is powerful. Feels like you’re underwater or you’re Frodo wearing the One Ring.
I used to do this to make life in the cube farm at Google tolerable. The advantage of construction/shooting earmuffs is that they also cancel out conversations really well.
Barnucles Nerdgasm made a video a while ago where he combined construction earmuffs with headphones and it turned out pretty well:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KjjgLcAUyRE
"As a matter of fact, I carry a pair of earplugs in my pocket, just in case I encounter anything loud that would damage my hearing."
Fun fact: Frequently using earplugs is also a cause of tinnitus (through at least 6 identified routes.)
I'm not suggesting that this person's use of earplugs is the source of their tinnitus, but it does help demonstrate that tinnitus has a mind-bogglingly large range of sources such as immune disorders/allergy, infection, ear wax impaction, and conditioning, along with being a side effect to a long list of medical conditions.
I noticed some mild tinnitus I must have already had when I first tried out the ANC. It didn't take me long to acclimate and stop noticing it, but it was pretty noticeable at first
I highly suspect wearing mx3s in my home office with needless noise cancellation on during the first 1.2 years of the pandemic gave me tinnitus... Esp paired with a barely perceptible capacitor wine from a printer. That probably enter frequency is about where my tinnitus frequency is. I don't use noise cancellation anymore. Switched to some Sennheiser game ones ... Noise cancellation was useful in the office... But home office is silent
My very good friend works in a hospital as an otorinolaryngologist, specializing in hearing damage and hearing aids. I actually met her today for a long walk.
According to her, tinnitus rates have absolutely exploded over her career (since 2002) and the correlation with frequent use of earbuds is very obvious.
I know that correlation neq causation and all the stuff about anecdata, but I am not willing to dismiss concern of a doctor who, in the last 20 years, has seen thousands of people with hearing problems.
A popular YouTube channel recently recommended wearing Airpods with noise cancelling on the London underground because sounds routinely exceed 100 decibels sometimes.
Unless my understanding is flawed but the mechanical / energy potential is still reaching your ear drums, cochlear and in turn the hair cells. How would equalising the sound with an opposite sound help reduce the damaged caused here?
Airpods Pro are not exclusively reliant on active noise cancellation to reduce noise alone-- the tips seal in your ear canal and provide passive isolation as well, similar to how earplugs or conventional IEMs (in-ear monitors) work. AirPods are not rated as earplugs and I wouldn't suggest relying on them alone to prevent hearing damage in loud environments (buy real earplugs for that), but they will provide some reduction in the noise that reaches your ears even when turned off.
Also, active noise cancellation does actually cancel noise (it's not some kind of psychological effect making noise "invisible"); sound is a pressure wave and ANC works by moving air in the opposite direction to eliminate or reduce that pressure wave-- the mechanical energy from that sound is not reaching your ear drum if you don't hear it. This doesn't work perfectly, of course (the higher the frequency, the harder it is to eliminate with ANC for a bunch of acoustic and processing-related reasons), but, generally, if you're not hearing it, it's not reaching your eardrums and it's not doing damage.
Is it possible that for brief moments (on the order of one oscillation, so for 10kHz it'd be on the order of 0.1ms) the noise canceling messes up and is in phase with the incoming sound, blasting your ears with double the amplitude before correcting itself? It could be for such a short time you don't consciously hear it, but it could still be enough to damage your ear.
The energy is reaching your ear in the form of sound waves.
The ANC tech (when done correctly) is sending an antiphase (inverse) wave with the same amplitude but inverted phase timed exactly to the original sound wave.
Effectively the two waves destructively interfere with and cancel each other out - it's not 100% but when done well is pretty effective for regular/consistent sounds
If it's not 100% for any particular reason then you are effectively adding noise and prolonging it's duration. I certainly wouldn't trust the speaker response to exactly match what the DSP is trying to produce over the wide range of audio that you could be listening to.
It may even be worse if you're here a wide spectrum of noise as some components may be canceled while others, particularly high frequencies, may be amplified.
I would always try to make passive cancellation work for my use case first, and only use active cancellation if it was absolutely required.
If you’re wearing headphones you have a physical object blocking external sound waves from reaching your eardrums. Kind of like wearing earplugs but not as effective, although properly fitted airpods pro probably come close.
I have tinnitus and I do not see any issues with my WH1000XM4s making it any worse. It does feel like I can hear the tinnitus a bit worse with the headphones on, but I think that's just the ANC cutting out low frequency noise as expected. I've been using XM4s and XM3s for years, and my tinnitus has been steady, so I assume not all ANC makes tinnitus worse inherently. It is possible AirPods Max would also not increase tinnitus for me, but I am not going to use them because I do not use Apple products for much currently and so I am sure it'd be a pain to update and configure them. (Not to mention, it's nice being able to use LDAC in Pipewire, or Multipoint, and I don't know if Apple supports either of these options.)
Try blowing into the xm4's microphone on passthrough mode, and you'll discover it can work as a loudspeaker (it will amplify the noise).
This discovery made me a little worried that there's no volume limit that can be transmitted to your ears. Then again, someone blowing directly into your ear is probably worse :D
I have the feeling that this is related to noise cancelling in general. I have some Sennheiser over-ear headphones with ANC and initially I had the same feeling. After using them I notice that my ringing (I already had tinnitus) got worse. It wears off after half a day or more, but it's slowly getting worse overall.
My theory is that it's not possible to create an exact counterwave, so occasionally the delayed ANC "counterwave" will add up to the external sound, increasing it. Maybe this happens is very short bursts or mostly at frequencies which are too high to be really noticeable.
My totally non-scientifi guess why ANC is uncomfortable is that it could be ear ”fatigue”. What you said about the imperfect noise counterwave is what I’m guessing is the source of fatigue in the ear, because even though your surroundings sound more quiet, the ear canal is getting blasted by soundwaves right next to it.
If I focus I can clearly feel my ears in ”active” mode when using ANC. A sort of soft pressure. I have a feeling ANC silence is not real silence.
Based on personal subjective experience, my AirPods Max have definitely worsened my tinnitus.
Given my 30-year history of tinnitus, I'm very careful about volume levels and I am certain that "too loud, too long" is not the thing that's made things worse for me.
The only thing that changed is I started using AirPods, specifically the Max.
I immediately noticed, when I first put them on, that I could hear better with them on and in transparency mode than I could with without them. A clue that they were cleaning up and/or amplifying something.
I had no apparent problems for a few months but then started to notice that it seems liked my tinnitus was getting worse. Unfortunately for me, I didn't immediately do anything about that observation.
Then, one day, I was in the kitchen with them on in transparency mode. Listening to nothing at all. I knocked a cast iron skillet against the stove. The pain in my left ear was instantaneous. It was like a gunshot. I took the headphones off immediately. Although there was no pain in my right ear, the increased ringing in it was intense and has only subsided slightly in the weeks since then.
For weeks, the ringing was so loud that it was waking my from sleep. I couldn't drop into meditation -- as a meditation practitioner, I'm checking in with my internal experience daily, so this change was profound.
I had to go on medication to aid with sleep and anxiety.
I've regained a hold on my sanity and come to grips with the reality that my ears are never going back to my normal level of tinnitus.
Upon a web search, I found the link I've provided, with more than 2000 people upvoting the topic on Apple's discussion site. Reading through the subjective experiences reported by many people there, it certainly seems like something is going on.
I'm posting here because I was talking to a friend about his experience with AirPods that have the noise cancelling and transparency features, and he experienced tinnitus as well with his Pro and Max models. He's one of the smartest people I know, so when he was reporting the same thing that I experienced, that so many other people are reporting, I became concerned that there may be a widespread issue.
Fortunately for him, the moment he started to get ringing he thought about it and disabled both transparency and noise cancellation. So, he switched to using them as plain old headphones, basically. His tinnitus wasn't permanent and he hasn't had problems since he made that adjustment.
He's a physics guy and his hunch is that there's something going on with harmonics and the powered modes of the headphones, that we can't hear, that is screwing up our ears.
I saw an ear doctor last week. He gave me a hearing test and was confused by what he saw (apparent across-the-board hearing loss in the left year; above and below average hearing in the right ear across the spectrum). He shrugged at my questions about certain kinds of headphones causing tinnitus.
What is the experience of the HN community? Does anyone have insights into what might be going wrong here?
I have been hesitating to buy headphones with ANC after noticing similar anecdotes in reviews[0][1] of the Sony Wf-1000xm4.
As a blind person my ears are super-important to me, and I am pretty sure that something's going on here with most ANC today. This feels like it's gonna be a big deal here in a couple years with some form of class action.
I am open to the idea that these new modes could be causing this. I've used AirPods for years, almost never with any mode other than basic listening, and have never had issues with them. The transparency mode being a super crude hearing aid approximation, has some cause for concern, and it amplifying sounds you don't need amplified is a weird idea (I don't have hearing loss, and I hate transparency mode). I personally don't like how the noise cancellations feel when it is on, and only use it in truly loud environments and on planes.
TMJ problem maybe? You unconsciously clenched your jaw in just the wrong way upon hearing an unexpected noise and it caused a problem with your jaw joint, possibly exacerbated by the headphone in your ear canal?
It’s a common cause of tinnitus from what I hear, and anecdotally, my tinnitus is worse when my TMJ is worse. But mine is mild and intermittent so wouldn’t want to compare to your situation.
That's fair. I didn't mention that I've gone in for intraoral bodywork to try to address TMJ as a possible issue. It hasn't yielded results, unfortunately. That doesn't prove anything one way or the other, of course.
Your physics friend might be right that there's some ultrasonic amplification going on. But a physics guy should be able to rig up some equipment to actually measure and prove that hypothesis. I would :) But I don't have either model.
Lifelong tinnitus sufferer here. The prevailing theory (edit: this is misleading, it is not the “prevailing theory”, I typed that without thinking. It is actually a new-ish/fringe-ish alternative to the actual prevailing theory of accumulated damage to ear fibers):
The theory I subscribe to is that tinnitus is a breakdown of the ears’ and/or brain’s noise filtering and suppression mechanisms. Long-term use of white noise makes tinnitus worse, which is a particularly cruel irony since white noise also provides short term relief from tinnitus. Active noise cancelling likely shares enough properties with white noise to cause the same effect.
Some users of noise cancellation are reporting another experience, that a sudden loud noise is perceived as extraordinarily and painfully loud, to the point that even a single incident can have long-lasting effects. This is called hyperacusis, and it is highly co-prevalent with tinnitus. Essentially, every loud noise you’ve ever heard has been pre-dampened by your ears/brain’s natural noise suppression mechanisms, and in hyperacusis sometimes this dampening isn’t applied and you get the full force of the noise - meaning that noise is literally the loudest thing you’ve ever experienced (even though it is not the highest decibels you’ve ever been exposed to).
Interestingly, one treatment for tinnitus and hyperacusis I’ve had success with is listening to audio with significant instantaneous jumps and dips in volume and frequency. The suggested mechanism of action is you’re stressing your natural noise suppression and it strengthens itself in response. Similar principle to weightlifting to stress your muscles so they grow stronger in response. Perhaps active noise cancellation is causing these problems because it’s relieving the usual stresses placed on the mechanisms and thus they are atrophying.
I avoid active noise cancellation and white noise. I have found passive noise cancellation works well - ear plugs and ear muffs, basically. They have their own drawbacks as they will affect different frequencies differently, with usual speech frequencies often being the most suppressed. Thankfully, Etymotic Research (an absolutely incredible auditory-health-first audio gear company) has the excellent ER20XS and EtyPlugs designed to reduce all frequencies equally. I can’t speak highly enough of them and how much they’ve helped me with my auditory issues. https://www.etymotic.com/product/er20xs/
Most unfortunately, it seems tinnitus is highly responsive to attention: the more attention you pay to it, the worse it gets. Obsessive researching and reading about your tinnitus can and will make it worse. Sorry. Believe me I know it sucks.
My ENT recommended white noise long term especially for sleeping which I’ve been using for months. Based on everything I’ve googled the last few months this is the first time I’m reading the claim that “ breakdown of the ears’ and/or brain’s noise filtering and suppression mechanisms.” so I’m a little skeptical in what you are saying.
My understanding is that tinnitus is the damage to the hairs in the cochlea. Which causes the audio processing nerves to have issues. Not anything to do with noise filtering.
However as I’ve been suffering from tinnitus I don’t want to discount anything you are saying. Do you manually adjust volume or are you doing something automated? How can I do the same?
I’m not a doctor and your ENT is, you should listen to them and not me. I shouldn’t have said “Prevailing theory”, that gives the wrong impression. Makes it seem like “this is what doctors think” when it’s actually just what I think. I’ll edit that.
I did have a semi-automated method for causing those noise jumps, I’ll see if I can find it for you. Well, I looked, and can’t find it. It’s on a lost machine. One should always keep backups, but one rarely does. I do recall the basic structure of my solution, it was a kludge job with an AppleScript that set system volume to a random amount and a shell script that slept a random number of seconds, ran the AppleScript, and ran itself again. I vaguely recall it was hard to find programmatic system-wide equalizer settings but that may be different now, and it may be different in Linux/Windows too. It was not a comfortable experience, it definitely made listening to music into an exercise like running on a treadmill, but subjectively it was very helpful. I do recall getting the idea for this from reading medical literature on hyperacusis, so theoretically there might be some scientific support for it, but I have no citations to give.
Sounds good. I can write a script to do that. I’ll give this I try. Appreciate it. Might try to see if eqMac has AppleScript support. Hang in there. Hopefully one day hearing damage can be cured.
Thanks. It doesn’t bother me as much as my comments make it seem it does, I learned to live with it long ago. But there are people who are bothered by their tinnitus and they suffer immensely, and it’s not very empathetic to say “learn to live with it, I did”, so I don’t.
I've only heard or read various sources referencing the nerve / hair damage that you mention, with the audible noise being sometimes associated with the auditory system increasing its sensitivity in those frequencies in an effort to hear something from the damaged sensors.
> a sudden loud noise is perceived as extraordinarily and painfully loud
AIUI this is normally handled by the stapedial reflex[0], which is not simply "passive" dampening, but indeed active muscle action! So the comparison below may be very apt:
> similar principle to weightlifting to stress your muscles so they grow stronger in response
Interestingly enough, I find that since I started WFH + being unable to go out less (parenthood) I have a hard time bearing sudden loud noises (feels like being punched while caught off guard and not having time to brace for impact)... It may turn out that this reflex which used to be very efficient is now dramatically less so these days. Never thought about it this way, I just thought that I was, like, "getting older"...
Tangentially: I cannot stand active noise cancellation, it creates an instant feeling of pressure on my eardrums, which is uneasy for a few minutes until I "get used" to it... until I disable it or remove the headset, and the immediate feeling of relief only highlights that there was some form of constant stress applied unto my ears. Consequently you'll pry my collection of (wired) earcans from my cold dead hands.
Took me a long time to get over mine when I first got it. I think white noise, while a helpful temporary distraction, does ultimately become a crutch. Ultimately what helped me get over it was just letting myself hear it and ultimately making peace with it.
It’s kind of ironic in that the “cure” is to train your brain to stop seeing as a threat the noise that it’s generating itself.
Yeah i imagine it being like how your brain ignores your nose, it will get used to the tinnitus and block it out over time. Likewise, the more you focus on it the harder it'll be to ignore it
It’s unfortunately a negative feedback loop at first. Hearing it causes you to stress about it, which makes it seem worse. That’s why stuff like white noise helps at first. But ultimately you need be comfortable with when you do hear it, which is the really hard part to come to terms with.
Sometimes I wonder about electronic noise cancellation. On most of the headphones and earbuds I've tried it on, it's felt like having cotton rammed into my ears. It almost feels like a sonic version of having minor surgery/dental work with local anesthetic, like my ear is being absolutely blasted with something I can't actually hear. I worry about what the side effects could be. After all, you can't see ultraviolet light but it can still destroy your retina.
I'm wondering if there might be some kind of interaction with the drivers and amplifiers?
They've gotta be pretty wide-range drivers, and I wouldn't be surprised if there's class D amplifiers in there. That can produce loads of power, efficiently, but high-frequency switching noise could be a concern.
Might be worth measuring these with a reference microphone, capturing at something like 192k. Might only need 96k. You want to find out if it is producing 'ultrasonic' noise, particularly at high amplitudes.
To me it feels like pressure or a vacuum. I don’t know enough about physics is it just that active noise cancelling is increasing the total stimulus to your eardrum and it just sounds better because they cancel each other out but physically it’s still more soundwaves to absorb.
I only use active when I vacuum pretty much. Sometimes if the kids are really loud or there’s some obnoxious background noise
No, it’s the opposite actually, when it works. Sound is just a pressure wave traveling through air. By outputting a diametrically opposed sound wave, you’re zeroing out the pressure. Noise canceling, when it works, lessening the pressure hitting your ear. If it really want to learn more, just look up YouTube videos on destructive interference.
The problem is that it isn’t always able to do that perfectly so it could situationally increase the decibels for very short times.
I don't use AirPods specifically but every pair of ANC headphones I've used all exhibit that pressure that I feel but can't hear. I wish there was a way to dial down the ANC amount for less effective cancellation along with less ambient pressure.
If I really want quiet like on a plane, I'll use non-ANC earbuds with good passive isolation and put a light pair of Bose cancellation headphones with no signal over top.
The Sony XM5 and Nuraphones both offer variable levels of ANC. The XM5s also show the estimated dynamic pressure as you're playing audio in the companion app.
Not nearly enough people talk or are aware of dynamic pressure and how important it is.
By far my favourite headphones are the Ultrasone Signature Pros - they're wired and non-ANC but very low dynamic pressure while being studio quality, truly fantastic headphones.
If true, it’s probably either defective AirPods or less-than-stellar (but maybe within specs) ANC.
You can get a kind of tinnitus from long exposure to even low-volume continuous noise, because the ear starts to compensate for the noise (in a fashion very similar to ANC, I imagine, just on the level of the auditory neurons or the cochlea), and then continues to compensate even when the noise is gone.
I never experience tinnitus before buying the AirPods Pro.
After using them a couple of hours with anc on on low loudness I get Tinnitus that wears off after three to four days without using AirPods.
Using them without anc does not seem to trigger it.
It is reproducible, sadly.
First time I was very scared but now I understand the situation and limit anc to situations where it is really necessary.
The noise cancelling feature might be emitting ultrasonic sound, which might be causing damage. I've had tinnitus for a few decades, but I don't blame my airpods and it doesn't seem to be getting worse. (I had a hearing test a few years ago and my results were "perfect" despite the constant ringing.)
I have had hearing tests done and never had tinnitus before.
I also recently have got Airpods 2 for the last few months. Two weeks ago I started to get tinnitus. I thought it might be the sound canceling on the AP2 so I stopped using them. The tinnitus reduced.
I stated having tinnitus after wearing airpods (gen3, but dropped to gen 2 ) last year. I’d used big headphones and standard issue wired headphones for years. Even went to an audiologist to get hearing checked. I’d concurrently had a bad sinus infection, but the tinitius started earlier. I think the tinnitus has gone down in the last several months finally (or I am more used to it?) but it was intense.
For the record, I’ve played guitar for 20+ years, in bands, and listened to thousands of hours of music, been to thousands of shows, etc… so I know what tinnitus from loud music feels like. This was something else.
I stopped using headphones at home almost completely
I can relate. I, too, am a musician. And like you I would describe the tinnitus I experienced with the airpods max as "intense" and "something else." I've sworn off using headphones, too.
Airpods 100% affect / cause tinnitus. I tracked it on myself over several months once I noticed the relationship. In short, the airpods caused it and using them substantially intensifies the tinnitus I experience. I’m 24. Saddens me to know I’ll be living with this for the rest of my life.
Stumbling upon the post linked by OP after realizing the connection between my tinnitus levels and airpods is hard to put into words. The tinnitus developed during my first year using airpods. I would use them for at least an hour a day and always towards the lower 1/4 of the volume bar.
Anecdotal but I also had tinnitus after using ANC headphones for a year. Got a hearing test and an MRI scan (to rule out acoustic neuroma) and they found nothing. Switched off ANC, tinnitus went away after a few weeks.
If you search for ANC-induced tinnitus on forums, there are hundreds of anecdotes. Yet all the (few) studies that I looked at showed ANC to be completely safe and not related to tinnitus.
This incident made me consider scientific papers and my interpretation of them a whole notch more critically than before.
I developed tinnitus about 6 months ago and I’ve been using AirPods for 1 year before that. But not with noise cancelling. Independent research will need to be done on this.
Any promising cures for tinnitus in the future? I've had it since 2018 and it appeared during a time when I was very stressed out. I have learned how to tune it out and live with it most of the time, but wish I could eliminate it all together. At the beginning I would look up different tricks for dealing with it, but they all seemed to make it worse. The most effective for me was to learn to ignore it.
Ive had tinnitus for 20 years. I follow possible cures quite close. Right now the closest to a scientifically proven cure is Susan Shore's device (combination of vague nerve stimuli and sound).
There are other possible treatments but their are off label. Brazil scientists had good response with actamprostate, but no follow up was done. There are other medicines that seem to yield good results but usually have several secondary effects.
Some research has linked tinnitus with Epilepsy. It seems the brain lack of control / filtering of signals is common for both.
Probably not, especially considering how many items have been sold.
In contrast, I think ANC can be protective for your ears. The AirPods itself block loud noise a bit and the ANC helps me listening to low-volume music. For example, the Berlin underground trains make extremely loud noises. The speakers are so loud I think they should be forbidden.
i have been trying to be much more careful with my hearing stuff, including with airpods.
youtube taught me that hearing works/damages/recovers/repairs very differently than anything i'd ever imagined - like a muscle, from what i remember - no idea if it's true, tho.
after scanning that thread, i'm prob done with them forever now.
Whenever I find myself saying this music isn't loud enough I better turn it up, I stop and assume that actually means I need to do the opposite or turn it off.
Even moderate volume is bad over time, the louder the sound the less time your ears can be exposed to it. I wouldn't be surprised if this rule also applies to ANR.
Between music, podcasts, audiobooks, zoom calls, etc. I’ve spent probably years of my life with earbuds in. Maybe sad, but definitely true. I’ve expected some noticeable hearing loss or tinnitus the whole time, but haven’t developed any yet. This is anecdotal, like the original post.
Please be open to the possibility that it also might not explain it. There is going to be a natural overlap between people developing tinnitus and using Airpods considering the number of people that have them. But is there an increased rate of tinnitus among people who use Airpods?
If you don't set a volume limit on your iPhone, it will damage your hearing. Apple has a mode to do this, and I've set mine at 80 decibels and rarely have the volume all the way up. The iPhone can output over headphones at 100+.
The smart move is to get headphones that fit well that naturally dampen outside noises and to set your volume limit judiciously.
I am curious if there is data that the volume limit actually does anything to prevent tinnitus over the course of decades of headphone use, especially with active noise cancelation. I imagine enough time simply has not passed yet to know.
This is hardly exclusive to apple hardware. Putting small speakers on your ears isn't a very good idea in the first place. Let alone using them to block external sounds. You can get much, much worse tinnitus from not paying attention to the volume of your headphones.
The man reason I used ACN is to block the sounds and disruptions from a noisy open office floorpan at work. I wish more firms would consider giving knowledge workers their own small offices if they’re going to mandate regularly visiting an office.
AirPods may contribute to it, but we did just go through a few years of excessive emotional stress, a virus known to do all sorts of strange stuff, and used our wearable devices much more often.
Is this and airpod thing or noise cancel thing? Bose, Sony etc have had noise cancelling for some models for a long time. I guess release to normies is always a mistake. Next they are comming for the mechanical keyboards.
I’ve been using ANC headphones basically 24/7 for years.
I enjoy the silence. I wish in the future there’s a way to do this via a brain chip or something and maybe even selectively completely filter out noise.
There’s anecdotal correlation between neurodivergence (such as ADHD) and a difference in how people take in and process sensory input.
I interpret this as ADHD developers who see hyperfocus are able to either tune down or ignore some of that audio sensory input. But the flip side is also true where they might accidentally hyperfocus on that specific annoyance/input.
Or to put it another way: some of our brains can do this already. But be wary what you wish in terms of unintended side effects.
I am actually rather curious whether there's any difference between in-ear and over-ear headphones in terms of their effect on hearing. Assuming the same volume, content, etc.
I have used active noise cancelling headphones for almost two decades and have used them a lot. I have tinnitus but I assumed it was because I was drinking too much.
Like ultra sonic bursts from devices trying to identify other devices in the room? What a irony that would be, add tech destroying the hearing with which they try to reach the audience.
I suspect all ear plugs will always cause tinnitus. Having sound emitted so close to your ear drum is not a good idea.
Not to mention that often, air cannot escape, which increase energy and/or air pressure inside the ear canal.
A better alternative would be to have helicopter-type headset (not as much soundproof, though), so that you won't increase volume to mask surrounding noise in public transport or outside.
There are also Etymotic earbuds. I swear by them for listening to music in noisy environments such as the subway or airplanes. They cost less than ANC They do a much better job of reducing ambient noise -- I can keep the volume to a whisper even in environments where having a conversation is uncomfortable. And there aren't any batteries to worry about keeping charged.
Tinnitus can be caused by so many reasons, and affected (i.e. amplified) by a plethora of other factors. Considering the scale at which AirPods are sold, I doubt they're a direct reason but might amplify something people have already had.
I love my AirPod pros and I just leave them in for hours with ANC on because they are comfy and it’s nice. Depends on the day if they get uncomfortable, but no issues here.
I’ve rarely had the “pressure” people talk about with ANC so maybe some are just predisposed somehow.
Woah, I've never heard of this. Had COVID vaccine late April '21, developed tinnitus a few weeks later, hasn't gone away since.
As a healthy person, I'd have rather taken my chances with COVID than spending the rest of my life with tinnitus (I'm pretty sure I was exposed to COVID just before the lockdowns as I lost my sense of smell for a short while, but otherwise no other symptoms and I've never had it since).
EDIT: Not a AirPods user, I occasionally use the Apple iPhone headphones, but rarely, maybe just for a flight or occasional call.
I once had tinnitus for a week after a concert and it was one of the worst weeks of my life, it felt like it would last forever (and for some people, it does). I had pristine, "golden ears" for audio engineering and was afraid about how much I'd be able to recover. I missed even the boring high pitched squeaks of doorknobs, faucets, etc. Everything was muffled. Since then, I've been wearing Etymotic earplugs at concerts (the few I went to).
There is research on proper restoration of the cilia (ear hair that allows us to hear), but we don't know if it's a "hardware" problem (these hairs), "software" problem (brain), or both, in what amounts. So it's far away (EDIT: if it's even possible at all...). Hearing aids are not something you want to fall back on. It's not like eyes with glasses and contacts. Be careful.