What Are The Disadvantages of Bone Conduction Headphones and How Do They Work?

This is an era of frequent disasters, but also an era of heroes. At the scene of emergencies such as earthquakes, fires, and floods, there are always respectable firefighters who are desperate to save lives. Various equipment enters the rescue scene with firefighters, among which communication equipment is the most important. The harsh environment of the rescue site is a huge challenge for firefighters to communicate. 

To solve this problem, people have equipped firefighters with a new communication artifact--tactical bone conduction headphones to help firefighters listen to clear instructions in noisy and harsh environments, so that they can accurately and quickly reply to information. Tactical bone conduction headphones relatively bulky. Based on the same principle of sound transmission, engineers have developed this type of headphones for ordinary users. In the past two years, they have become a phenomenon-level earphone product and are very popular among young people.

What are bone conduction headphones?

Bone conduction earphones are earphones that "attach the sounding unit to the temple and other parts, convert the sound into mechanical vibration by the sounding unit, cause the bone to vibrate through the mechanical vibration, and conduct the sound to the auditory nerve from the bone". Simply put, bone conduction headphones are headphones that use human bones as the sound transmission medium.

Bone conduction headphones are a new application of mature technology. Its technology is widely used in the military, fire protection, hearing aids, and other fields. Daily listening to music is a newly expanded application field of bone conduction earphones. However, it is foreseeable that the field of listening to music will make bone conduction headphones more popular.However, bone conduction headphones also have some disadvantages

What are the disadvantages of bone conduction headphones?

While bone conduction headphones are popular, they're not perfect. They also have some disadvantages, summed up in three:

Disadvantage 1 : sound quality

Because of the design characteristics of bone conduction headphones, their anti-interference effect is not ideal when wearing them for shopping, subway, car and other noisy environments. And the sound quality is not as good as traditional headphones, because they transmit sound through the skin, skull and then to the ear ossicles, so the degree of music reproduction is not as good as traditional in-ear headphones.

Disadvantage 2 : sound leakage

The sound is transmitted through the vibration of the vibrator, so part of the sound is also transmitted through the vibration of the air, and sound leakage cannot be completely avoided. It's just that some headphones invest more research and design in reducing sound leakage, and solve most of the sound leakage problems. For example, the Wissonly Hi runner bone conduction headphones I own are excellent representatives among them.

Disadvantage 3 the price is slightly higher

The technology of bone conduction headphones is more complicated than that of traditional headphones, the materials are better than traditional headphones, and the manufacturing process is more complicated, which ultimately makes the price of them a little higher. But this year, with the rapid popularity of them, their prices have dropped significantly after the production has increased significantly.

Although bone conduction headphones have the above disadvantages, compared with these disadvantages, they have more prominent advantages, such as being safer, healthier, more hygienic, and more comfortable to wear.

Their advantages and disadvantages are determined by their working principles

How do bone conduction headphones work

The propagation medium of sound includes solid, liquid, and air. In general, there are two ways for sound waves to enter the inner ear of the human body: air conduction and bone conduction. It then travels to the inner ear via the auditory ossicles. Bone conduction is the vibration of sound waves through the bones of the head such as the skull and jaw, which transmits the sound to the inner ear. It is another very important hearing method besides air transmission. People use this method to manufacture many bone conduction hearing devices.

Traditional headphones mainly transmit sound through the air, while bone conduction headphones use the temporal bone of the head to transmit sound. It transmits sound directly to the auditory nerve in the form of sound waves, instead of passing through the air to the eardrum and then to our auditory nerve.

Currently, bone conduction hearing devices mainly include electromagnetic bone conduction headphones and piezoelectric bone conduction headphones. Electromagnetic bone conduction headphones have better working performance, but they have electromagnetic radiation, which is easy to cause harm to the user's body. Piezoelectric bone conduction headphones use piezoelectric vibrators as sounding components. When people wear it the human body is less affected by electromagnetic radiation which also has the advantages of small size and low power consumption.

If you are interested in them, please do not hesitate to buy them. They are definitely worth buying.Next, I will recommend some excellent bone conduction headphones.

1. Wissonly Hi Runner bone conduction headphones

Recommended reason:

As a veteran electronic product fans, I can responsibly tell you that the Wissonly bone conduction headphones are true bone conduction, which can protect hearing, so they are recommended by many otologists.

At the same time, Wissonly Hi Runner is also very good in terms of sound quality. It uses a 360 surround vibration unit, which can increase the vibration area by 35% compared with traditional bone conduction headphones.They reduces the loss during bone conduction sound transmission, and which makes the sound more powerful.

Wissonly Hi Runner bone conduction headphones are made of memory titanium that can be self-adjusted, which can ensure that the headphones have a good wearing experience and take into account more users.

In terms of functionality, as the flagship model of Wissonly Brand, Wissonly Hi RUNNER supports IPX8 waterproof level which is higher than the industry standard, and it can be worn in diving. It is equipped with 32G body memory, as well as the latest Bluetooth 5.0. Its product performance and experience have been comprehensively improved, truly making bone conduction headphones suitable for more life scenarios.

2. Philips A6606 bone conduction headphones

Recommended reason:

Philips A6606 adopts the latest generation of exterior design, which strengthens water resistance and slip resistance during sports for a more stable fit. The surface of its body uses skin-friendly materials, which will be more comfortable to wear. The body is also relatively light, and there is no sense of weight when wearing. It also has a night running indicator to ensure that the cyclist or vehicle behind you can see you during night running, thus you can avoid danger. From a configuration point of view, the configuration of this product may not be very high, but Philips' quality is trustworthy. The price may be slightly expensive.

3.AfterShokz OPENRUN PRO bone conduction headphones

Recommended reason:

The body of the Openrun Pro weighs only 26g, and it adopts Qualcomm QCC3024 low-energy chip +PremiumPitch 2.0 improved double suspension vibration transmission system and suspension damping technology, CVC call noise reduction algorithm and double silicon microphone. The battery life lasts for 8 hours, and the charging method is magnetic charging. The charging interface has a liquid residue detection function to ensure that it has a good waterproof performance. Its waterproof grade is IP67, and there is no problem with normal sweat. A short period of rain can be used, but it can't be used for swimming.

4 Earsopen BT5 bone conduction headphones

Recommended reason:

earsopen BT5 bone conduction headphones are originated in Japan and can play music continuously for up to 6 hours. They adopt IPX7 waterproof design, are not afraid of sweat in sports, and are very suitable for use in sports scenes. Their unique audio equalization technology and high-performance vibration unit support sound of different frequencies. BT5 have an echo reduction function to minimize echo.

5.Nank Runner CC3 bone conduction headphones

Recommended reason:

Runner CC2 is made of titanium alloy, with a body weight of 28g, and the overall wearing experience is good. The sound quality and sound leakage are better than their previous products, but they still need to be improved. The headphones also support high-definition call noise reduction, which is a plus.

The ability of this headphone is relatively average, and there are no special highlights or obvious shortcomings. As an entry-level bone conduction headphone, it is still qualified.

Consider three key points of sound quality, sound leakage reduction and comfort,Wissonly and Aftershokz are the best of the above five bone conduction headphones. If product parameters and cost performance are considered, Wissonly performs better.