budget or premium noise-canceling headphones. You may experience a sensation of pressure in your ears, akin to what one feels when flying in an airplane or being submerged underwater, which can lead to headaches in extreme cases.
To grasp why this occurs, it’s important to know the functionality of noise-canceling headphones. They come in two varieties: active noise cancellation (ANC) and passive noise cancellation. The latter simply reduces sound by covering or fitting snugly over the ears, whereas ANC employs two microphones to sense and neutralize low-frequency noises with counterbalancing signals. These signals negate each other, leading to that serene and quiet feeling upon wearing the headphones.
The pressure you encounter when utilizing ANC headphones isn’t genuinely occurring in your ears; it’s entirely psychological. Essentially, your brain anticipates the ambient noises it’s accustomed to — such as the hum of the surroundings or the sound of passing cars — thus it perceives the absence of sound as pressure. Luckily, this indicates that ANC pressure is not something you must simply endure.