Headphone safety - reducing volume to a Bluetooth speaker

I only have one switch too on iphone 7.

Do you get a notification referencing a 7-day limit when the vol drops?

I"m guessing that since I don't use the headphones that often, and certainly not that loud, that is why I still see both switches.

That is very possible. Thanks for that.

I wonder if this is just Apple. It seems there may be some additional regulations at play here. Where are you located? Seems the settings for the US differ from those in the UK and the EU.

I had wondered that, I hope it is that simple.

I’ll have to find the Zumba lady’s post and suggest it!

I'm just going by a post I read in another thread. Sorry it doesn't work.

I agree with your logic as well.

PS this is the only article I can find and describes the situation and shows that the 2 switches are now only 1

https://piunikaweb.com/2020/11/23/ios-14-2-update-disables-option-to-turn-off-headphones-safety-setting/

I suggest you put in a feature request because this goes beyond the EU and WHO requirements.

Feedback

https://www.apple.com/feedback/iphone.html

I also have both switches and I have used mine with a couple of different BT speakers at fairly loud volume and it hasn’t change the option. I do believe the phone is set up differently for EU model phones.

FYI, I read a post this morning that recommended turning the switch on marked Reduce Loud Sounds. From there, you can adjust that to the maximum level of 100 decibels and that seemed to prevent some of the warnings.

Since the thread started we realised that a small number can still turn it off but many or most cannot.

I have suggested a workaround

In Settings, Sounds and Haptics, Headphone Safety, Turn on Reduce Loud Sounds and set to 80dB or less.

Then crank up the speaker amplifier

You may have to delete your existing Health App data as well but 80dB will give you 40 hours a week. 75dB 127 hours a week

peter_watt wrote:

I think it could work if you turned it *down* to 75 dB and rely on the bluetooth device’s amplifier (if it has one)

Hi Peter, that is a poor solution:

Any electronic audio circuitry has an inherent noisefloor, which stays the same. To have good dynamics (difference between loudest-quietest signals) one must have a sufficiently strong output signal. When you limit an output signal as low as 75dB, and amplify that, you are effectively amplifying the noisefloor as well. You'll have loud amplified music, but with poor dynamic range. On top of the fact that it is probably already a compressed inferior format like mp3. There is a reason, why the dynamic range for CD quality audio was set at 96dB, this is necessary for good audio quality with enough space for headroom, to allow a studio mix to "breathe". And keep in mind that dB is not a linear scale, but a logarithmic scale. Every 6dB step = double, so 96dB is twice as loud as 90dB. My point is: 75dB is not just marginally quieter than 96dB, when talking about audio dynamics. It's a huge difference, 75 or even 80dB is really really poor. The reason why some DJ's still swear on playing with vinyl records, is the increased dynamic range (up to 110dB for a thick record with one track per side) which sounds very good on large club soundsystems... Well, vinyl DJ's are a dying race, 96dB dynamic range in digital formats is still very good, I must admit I also converted to digital as it's much more convenient.

Long story short, if Apple doesn't provide an option to switch this off, I'll switch to android phones, and never buy an iPhone again. They shouldn't treat us as dumb toddlers. They will not dictate how loud I'm allowed to listen to music. World Health Organisation only made non-mandatory recommendations... They're not in EU laws. How else android phones do get away with only notifications that can be switched off? It's the same regulations for all manufacturers in Europe...

If 14.3 doesn't fix this, I'm selling my iPhone...

Did you turn it off in Settings>Sounds & Haptics>Headphone Safety, and turn off the two switches?

ChrisJ4203 and deggie, your are both US users. Do you have the single switch in headphone safety in 14.2 or can you still turn off the 7 day notifications?