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AirPods causing tinnitus?

discussions.apple.com

11–20 of 200 posts

Re: AirPods causing tinnitus?

#11

My AirPod Pros emit some loud, short static noise bursts from time to time. Mostly in situation where there is a single loud noise in the environment.

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.

Re: AirPods causing tinnitus?

#13
post #2

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 t…

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.

Re: AirPods causing tinnitus?

#15
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.)

Re: AirPods causing tinnitus?

#16
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.

Re: AirPods causing tinnitus?

#17

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 l…

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

Re: AirPods causing tinnitus?

#18
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.

Re: AirPods causing tinnitus?

#19

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.

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.

Re: AirPods causing tinnitus?

#20
post #2

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 t…

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.

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