AirPods causing tinnitus?

Same issue, and it wasn’t until I upgraded to the AirPod pros. Now I have continuous ringing for the two months I’ve had them. I keep my volume very low, and never had an issue with my regulars AirPods.

I am not sure why you posted that link? People in this thread experiences issues with a permanent high pitch sounds that we are concerned about. We trying to understand the cause and the recent use of the new AirPods pro is a suspect common denominator. I really don’t get some people’s comments and why you insist that it couldn’t be a product issue? I am Apple fan as well. I am engineer, we have all Apple products in our household but that doesn’t mean a product Apple produced could have some flaws. I now have to sleep with sleep background sounds playing to mask the ringing sound a bit.

My ringing stopped after about a week of no use. I've switched back to using wired earbuds after the problem first occurred. The sound is much softer on my wired buds than the AirPods. Wireless is great but not at the expense of my hearing which is the whole purpose of the product, right? That you can hear!

I'm a physician, and before quarantine, I used my Airpods maybe an hour a day. Since quarantine, I've been using my Airpod Pros almost all day, mostly for phone calls and zoom meetings, at a normal volume. A few weeks ago I started to feel like I was losing my hearing on one side, and eventually noticed that the more I used my Airpods, the worse my hearing was. Today, since this morning I was already having problems hearing from the left side, I thought I'd just just the left Airpod. Tonight, the ringing (tinnitus) on the left is so bad I can barely think straight. I'm going to take a two week strict break from the Airpods and see what happens. They're definitely connected in my opinion, but that doesn't mean Apple knows better and isn't telling people.

I’ve been wanting to respond and maybe provide some reassurance to folks and how I have gotten better than I was with the tinnitus. It was horrible at first and took a long time to diminish with some effort. I sent the AirPods back and was able to get a refund. I tried using over ear headphones and earbuds but both made the tinnitus worse after the ringing had started. I haven’t used ear buds (unfortunately) for a couple of months. I used masking (free Widex Zen app) to be able to sleep when it was really bad. This was recommended by my audiologist who also confirmed no hearing loss. Then I decided to try not having silence around me because that’s when I noticed it most. It seems like we can retrain the brain to ignore this signal but only by training it to be distracted by other, non harmful sound. So I listen to audiobooks on a small wearable Bluetooth speaker much of the time if there is not some other background noise. After many weeks of this I can say that my ringing in the left ear is only noticeable at times. It is much, much better, but I don’t know if I’ll be able to wear earbuds again. Hope that helps somebody.

[Link Edited by Moderator]

I recently returned my ear-pod pro’s due to a known fault and had them replaced.

After a short while I noticed a high pitched sound I can only compare to pushing a wheelbarrow with a squeaky wheel each time the wheel goes round I get an intermittent high pitched squeak.

I mostly use just one at bedtime as they are quite bulky to rest on and more often than not drift off to an audiobook or some relaxing music.

The problem occurs when I awake, it’s quite torturous and continues even when the EarPod is removed, this does not happen with the standard wired earbuds and I can only assume it must be something to do with having a battery near my ear or maybe another component… not sure.

Any one else experience this?

@Gregpillow. The majority of these comments are people mentioning their shared experience with a particular product. We are not engineering experts that understand the intricacies of active noise cancelation technology, nor do we claim to be. I'm 43, and as a musician, have taken extra precautions to protect my hearing as long as I can remember. I do not have an underlying condition and I bet most other people commenting here don't. Most of the people here, like myself, are very sensitive to changes in their hearing. This is my 3rd pair of Airpods and the first 2 caused no problems for me so I'm not here to trash any particular product or brand. In fact, I'm (usually) a huge proponent of Apple products because of their great design. But really, thanks for helping us get to the bottom of this mysterious situation though.

[Edited by Moderator]

It's so strange that this topic is still going on. Noise-cancelling headphones, including the AirPods, do not cause tinnitus. At least, not in the sense that everyone is using here. Noise-cancelling headphones are just emitting waves to cancel out the sounds. If it does a really good job, there is no sound. That does not cause tinnitus or damage your hearing. What is happening is that your brain does not get any input because there is no or so little sound. The only thing the brain has left is the slight tinnitus that ALMOST EVERYONE has. You never notice it because you don't know it is there, and always covered in background noise. Because it is the only "sound" there, your brain will amplify the sound. If the brain does that, you could start noticing it. Therefore, it is a bad idea to sleep with those things or create total silence. This will also happen if you're in a soundproof room, like those in some prisons.

People can indeed experience tinnitus after using Airpods or any good noise-cancelling headphones. It is not true that this damage is due to (dysfunctioning) Airpods. It is because of the lack of sound.

Vincee95, I’m afraid you are wrong! The theory may be correct, but I DID get tinnitus which I noticed immediately on taking off the iPods. The tinnitus lasted three weeks. Now it is intermittent. I did not have it before using the pod.

Please i am interested if anyone has a solution to this. I am 100% certain that it was caused by the apple airpod. Tinnitus is a sign of an underlying health condition or problem, in this case, it caused hearing loss for me. I have done all the test and this is evident. I had to take my airpods to apple and had them check it. Guess what, the problematic pod was exactly the side that is now damaged. Even their staff confirmed that this is a common issue with the airpod and i find it ridiculous that apple hasn't commented on it.

I also have tinnitus prior of owning the airpod pros, and yes, when I first tried the pros the tinnitus got worse, but this is not exclusive to the airpods, I get the same problem with my sennheiser gsp500, even tough I notice this with the sennheiser right away.

That said, some in ears and headphones I have actually seem to remediate the problem, like the sony mdr 1A, the razer hammerhead, and some chifi like Tinhifi P1, T4 and Ikko OH10 actually seem to work in a way that the tinnitus seem to be at a moderate level if not better, I can use the sony mdr 1a all day without much issue.

Maybe this have to do with an specific frequency response. If the iphone had some kind of system wide equalizer we could remediate this by identifying the problematic frequency and turn it down a bit.

I have tinnitus, albeit mild at this point. I've never owned or used Airpods.

Consumer headphones generally have an 85-110db limit

Apple (who I've never been affiliated with) offers these suggestions

https://www.apple.com/sound/

Stop using the airpods if they are causing discomfort.

Apple offers a 14 return policy no questions asked.

i've actually had this same problem. just bought airpods pro a week ago, put them on for the first time and this high pitched ringing sound started developing (i guess tinnitus). i hear it without the airpods pro on, and when i think it's almost gone, it gets refreshed whenever i put the airpods back on, thinking the noise wouldn't come back but it always does.

i was on the verge of returning them, but wanted to do more research. i searched this problem some more and found this other thread. i tried again, this time shoving them in my ear and making sure it's sealed, and voila, the high pitch noise is gone. granted, the tinnitus is still there from the first times i've used them (and i hope it becomes milder), but i guess i found the source of the issue.

for those of you getting a high pitch sound, make sure that the earphones are sealed when you wear them.

for those of you who don't experience the high pitch noise and want to, try wearing the airpods pro like normal earphones (hanging in your ear, not stuffed in, like normal earphones), and enjoy some high pitched ringing (warning: may cause/trigger tinnitus).

btw these experiences have all been with noise cancelling on. the other modes, transparent and off, have been fine, if not better.

as for me, i'm going to return these. as much as i want to keep them, they're too inconvenient to have to shove into my ear, or risk refreshing tinnitus (tough tradeoff lol)

In my opinion there is no reason to notify anything to Apple, your medical conditions are between you and your doctors. Apple provides adequate safety mechanisms in its products to reduce the risk of excessive audio levels which could harm hearing, the default levels being based on relevant national laws and regulations. If you have chosen to over ride the safe level settings then you have accepted full responsibility for any harm.

However if you wish to report anything to Apple the appropriate method would be the Feedback page for each product. https://www.apple.com/feedback/

Apple already provides adequate warning, both in the paper documentation delivered with the AirPods, and through the iPhone software which drives the AirPods - including an option to restrict maximum sound levels. Further information is also provided on Apple's website, https://www.apple.com/sound/