Is Bone Conduction Headphones Safe and Can They Cause Hearing Loss?
Feb 08,2023 | David
Bone conduction headphones are becoming more and more popular. While running and riding, you can see people wearing a new type of music-listening device around their auricle, which is bone conduction headphones. You may be wondering, shouldn’t the earphones be plugged into the ears, or shouldn’t they cover the ears? Why can I hear the sound when I just hang it nearby my ear? Why are bone conduction headphones so amazing? Is bone conduction headphones safe?Can they cause hearing loss?Here is the answer!
Is Bone Conduction Headphones safe?Can bone conduction headphones cause hearing loss?
Bone conduction headphones can not cause hearing loss, in fact, they are the headphones that cause the least damage to hearing, and are very healthy and safe for the ears.
Bone conduction headphones do a good job of protecting the eardrum. Because the eardrum is not required to produce sound and transmit sound, it avoids possible damage to the eardrum caused by sound wave vibration. When they transmit sound, they don’t need to use the ear canal, and they don’t need to be plugged into the ear canal or wrap the ear canal when they are used, so they can keep the ear canal clean and hygienic, thereby minimizing ear diseases such as otitis media.
Bone conduction headphones do less damage to the cochlea. Because the vibration waves of bone conduction are relatively gentle and stable, they cause little damage to the cochlea.
In addition, bone conduction headphones have very little damage to the auditory nerve, because their electromagnetic waves are very weak, which is the same intensity as the electromagnetic waves existing in nature, so they will not cause damage to the human brain and hearing nerves.
Therefore, bone conduction headphones not only can not cause hearing loss but also protect hearing well. Compared with traditional in-ear headphones, they are healthier and safer for the ears.This is determined by their working principle
How do bone conduction headphones work
Before explaining how bone conduction headphones work, let me briefly explain how humans hear sound.
The most common way we hear sound in our daily life is that sound reaches our ears in the form of vibrations in the air. This vibration travels through the ear canal, vibrates the eardrum, and reaches the cochlea to help us to perceive sound. The cochlea is shaped like a snail and is responsible for transmitting sound information to the brain. But humans can also hear the sound without using the ear canal. For example, when we chew nuts, we can hear the sound without passing through the air, that is, the sound is transmitted through bone conduction.
Bone conduction technology is a mechanism that transmits sound without passing through the ear canal or eardrum, instead the bone around the ear vibrates to transmit the sound signal to the cochlea. It should be noted that we hear sound with the cochlea instead of the eardrum, which is just an intermediate step in the process of air-conducting sound. When people hear sound, whether it is air conduction or bone conduction, if the appropriate vibration reaches the cochlea, they can hear the sound.
Bone conduction headphones are sound-receiving devices made of bone conduction technology. During the sound transmission process, they directly bypass the ear canal and eardrum and reach the cochlea. Compared with air-conduction headphones, there are fewer steps for sound transmission when using them. Just because they take a shortcut, they also reduce the damage to the ear canal and eardrum, making them the healthiest headphones.
In addition to health and safety, bone conduction headphones have many advantages, such as they are more comfortable to wear, have a high waterproof level, and can be suitable for more sports scenes, etc. These unprecedented advantages have also made the headphones more and more popular.
If you are interested in bone conduction headphones,here are some excellent earphones for you all.
1.Wissonly Hi Runner bone conduction headphones
Reason for recommendation:
Wissonly bone conduction headphones insist on technology priority. The team is composed of senior experts in bone conduction technology, they have more than 10 years of technical accumulation in the field of bone conduction. This makes Hi Runner known as “the healthiest Bluetooth headphones” by many professionals.
In order to solve the problem of distortion of the sound quality of bone conduction headphones, Wissonly adopts the new generation of bone conduction technology, and use the world’s best acoustic laboratory to customize an exclusive sound quality output scheme for the unique bone conduction sound transmission method. After 3,051 hours of tens of thousands of adjustments, 21 audiologists bring users the best sound in the field of bone conduction headphones.
In terms of wearing, Wissonly Hi runner has been ergonomically designed to fit the ear to ensure that it does not fall off during exercise. Most importantly, it fits the ear while ensuring that there is no pressure and weight load, which makes it more comfortable to wear.
In terms of product parameters, Wissonly Hi Runner is even more impeccable. It has a Bluetooth 5.0 chip, which connects stably and will not drop. It has a 32G built-in storage that can store 5000 songs. Its battery life is also good, and at 50% volume, you can play music for up to 10 hours.
2. Philips A6606 bone conduction headphones
Reason for recommendation:
The A6606 has a skin-friendly material on its surface, which greatly increases its wearing comfort. It adopts a 15mm size sound unit, which produces better sound and is more suitable for noisy environments. Its bass effect has also been improved. The waterproof level of A6606 reaches IP67 level, not to mention rain, even direct rinse is no problem at all. But after all, it is not professional-grade waterproof, it cannot be used in swimming or diving.
3.AfterShokz OpenSwim bone conduction headphones
Reason for recommendation:
The body of the headphone is made of skin-friendly silicone, and its light body is only weighs 36g. It has ergonomic structure of the ear design, no matter running, jumping, wearing glasses without pressure, more intimate details. The waterproof performance of OpenSwim reaches IP68 level, which is suitable for swimmers. A long strip structure design is adopted at the sound generating part, so that the loudspeaker has a larger surface area and higher sound transmission efficiency. With its own 4G memory, it can use as a mp3 player.Its battery life reach 8 hours, no matter about long time using.But this headphones does not support Bluetooth and calling functions.
4.Earsopen peace tw-1 bone conduction headphones
Reason for recommendation:
The wearing style of Peace TW-1 bone conduction headphones is very unique. It adopts a clip-on wearing method, has a certain stability in wearing, even if in strenuous exercise it can be stably clamped on the auricle. The weight of the body is 9g, during the wearing process, it will not feel heavy. IP67 waterproof rating helps it to be worn outdoors in rainy days easily, and daily sweating is not a problem at all to it, but it can not be used in swimming.
The disadvantage is that its clip-on wearing method may cause discomfort after wearing it for a long time.
5.Haylou PurFree bone conduction headphones
Reason for recommendation:
Its body surface is made of silicone material, which is very comfortable. The small size body is its relatively big advantage, which makes it light and without a sense of weight while wearing. The sound quality is good in the field bone conduction headphones, of course, it cannot be compared with traditional noise-canceling headphones. The battery life is good, you can listen to music for 8 hours, and it also supports fast charging.
In terms of waterproof feature, its waterproof grade reaches IP67, daily sweating, short-term rain, or washing are all no problem to it, but it cannot be used in swimming.
Among the above five bone conduction headphones, Wissonly and Philips are most recommended. These two brands have the strongest technical strength and the best product quality. Among the two brands, Wissonly will have a higher cost performance.