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- Using headphones at too high a volume for long periods of time can damage your hearing.
- If your inner ear is damaged, the damage is permanent.
- Your headphones and smartphones have features to protect your hearing health.
Maintaining your hearing is an important aspect of maintaining overall health, including mental health. According to a 2020 Lancet commission report, hearing loss is one of 12 modifiable risk factors for developing dementia. This concern is very common as headphones and earbuds are constantly in and around our ears.
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Hearing health professionals recommend the 60-60 rule of listening with headphones, and as someone who always wears headphones or earbuds, I generally follow that guideline. Here’s what you need to know about it and how your device can help you keep up.
What is the 60-60 rule?
The 60-60 rule states that you should not listen to music at a volume higher than 60% of the maximum for more than 60 minutes at a time. Listening to your headphones at a safe volume is important to preserving your hearing. According to the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders, sounds at or above 85 dBA, about the sound of a gas-powered lawn mower, can damage your hearing.
Here’s how the damage happens: Inside your ear is the cochlea, a small spiral-shaped organ that converts sound vibrations into electrical waves so your brain can interpret them as sound. You have thousands of hair cells in and around the cochlea that use their sensing organelles to detect, transform, sharpen, and amplify sounds. Too much volume can damage or destroy these hairs, and they cannot regenerate. Once it’s damaged, it’s permanent.
Your devices can help you stay informed
Several headphones and earbuds include a setting in the accompanying app that can alert you if you’ve been listening too much for too long. Some headphones may automatically lower the volume if you’ve been listening too much.
It is important to protect your hearing at loud sports or music events, but it is very common to wear hearing protection at these events and attend them regularly. Experts warn that constant exposure to loud noise from regular use of headphones can lead to severe hearing loss at a young age.
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The Google Pixel, Samsung Galaxy, and Apple iPhones all have hearing health features in their health apps. You’ll get solid hearing health awareness when you pair each manufacturer’s headphones with their smartphone.
For example, your iPhone can track the headphone volume and recording levels of all the headphones you’ve connected to it, although I see the most accurate recording when I use my AirPods.
If you’re also wearing an Apple Watch, it can record ambient noise levels and let you know if your surroundings are too loud. I get this notification every time I attend an Atlanta Falcons game, with my watch recording a peak of 114 dBA. Just 15 minutes at this noise level can damage your ears.
Would noise cancellation help?
Hearing health professionals argue that active noise cancellation (ANC) in headphones and earbuds should not replace traditional, well-studied methods of ear protection, such as earplugs or earmuffs. ANC should not necessarily replace hearing protection when working in a factory, construction site, or any other noisy environment.
However, in everyday situations, ANC can reduce the noise of your living space, discouraging you from turning up the volume of your headphones, which is key. A 2022 study in the Journal of Audiology and Otology found that using headphones, especially in-ear earbuds, in a noisy environment can reduce exposure to excessive recreational noise.
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My best real-world example is the gym. On Saturday afternoons, my gym is packed. My Apple Watch recorded the noise level of the gym at 104 dBA during my recent workout.
At the same time, the noise cancellation of my AirPods provided 27 dBA of environmental sound protection, which kept my sound exposure at a low, safe level, which allowed me to keep the sound level of my headphones below 85 dBA for the 45 minutes I worked.
