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I recently acquired Earasers Musician’s Hi-Fi Earplugs and measured their performance in the HearingTracker Lab. In the video below, you can hear my overall impressions and a few audio recordings of their performance. Click play now to hear them for yourself and continue reading for my detailed review.
Earasers are a high fidelity hearing protection device designed for musicians and concertgoers. They claim to offer “the world’s first flat frequency response” in a nearly invisible non-occluding earplug. A standard, medium, and max filter are available with an associated noise reduction rating (NRR) of 5, 13 and 16 decibels (dBs), respectively. While this review will focus on the Hi-Fi Standard Filter earplug, other options are available for specific use cases such as dentistry, industry, motorsports, and more.
Earasers belong to the parent company Persona Medical which has been designing hearing aid technology for over fifty years. Consequently, certain elements of Earasers will seem familiar to those from hearing science. There are also fundamental differences in their design, function, and attenuation ideology which ultimately raises questions regarding their use.
Earasers come with a pair of earplugs and a plastic storage case. Unlike some plugs with removable ear tips, each box contains a single size ranging from extra-small to large. Starter kits are available offering multiple sizes in one box.
Extra supplies can also be purchased for cleaning and maintenance. One accessory unique to Earasers are wax guards. These serve to protect the acoustic filter within Earaser plugs from debris, such as ear wax, which can negatively affect earplug sound quality. These tiny guards sit within the inner sound bore opening and can be easily changed with the use of an applicator stick. These guards are a nice offering and can prolong the life of your earplugs—especially if you are prone to more moisture and wax.
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Waterproof keychain carrying cases are also available online and are preferable to the included plastic one. The metal case is relatively small, easily sitting alongside car keys, and can fit one pair of plugs.
I was very impressed with the comfort of Earaser plugs. Earasers are ear specific with the red and blue coloring denoting use for the right or left ear, respectively. This is part of their Smart Seal design whereby the oval curved soft silicone earplug accounts for differences between our ears. For reference, most earplugs are straight and have a series of cascading round flanges.
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I found this to be one major benefit of Earasers as they were easy to insert and remained comfortable even after prolonged use. Furthermore, their small shape and contoured design allowed for a deeper fit within my ear canals. This makes them less visible and helps reduce occlusion, or the increased perception of your voice when the earplugs are in. Removing Earasers from my ears was also easy due to the pull tab.
Earaser posits that this design ultimately removes the need for ear impressions and custom earplugs. While these devices fit well, I did not find them to outperform the comfort, seal, and sound quality of proper custom hearing protection devices.
The sound quality and overall protection of Earasers is controversial and highly debated in online forums. This is because high fidelity earplugs traditionally aim to equally reduce sound across a broad range of frequencies. For example, if an earplug offers 10 dB of attenuation at 500 Hz there should be roughly the same attenuation at 4000 Hz. This amounts to a natural sound quality as though the word was “turned down” with a volume knob.
Earasers claim to be high fidelity earplugs for musicians however, they do not follow this traditional linear, or flat, attenuation approach. Rather, they are designed with a unique “V Filter” reducing sound mainly between 2000 to 6000 Hz. This is an important range as sound induced hearing loss occurs here due to ear canal resonance. Their theory is that sound quality is preserved, and hearing loss avoided, by removing this resonance.
With that in mind, my subjective experience with these plugs is not surprising. I found the sound quality acceptable albeit deceiving and potentially dangerous. They provide little to no sound protection outside of the “V Filter” range. So while certain low and high sounds are untouched, there is a sonic hole where consonant speech sounds, the crack of a snare drum, and the string slap of a bass guitar are missing.
In these comparisons, you will hear how Earasers reduce sound entering your ear canals.
To more objectively assess device attenuation, Room EQ Wizard (REW) was used to present pure tone sweeps to a miniDSP Earphone Audio Response System (EARS) via a Yamaha HS5 powered monitor. Several measurements were taken with the earplugs being completely removed and reinserted between recordings to account for insertion variability. Sound attenuation was ultimately calculated based on the difference between the plugged and open ear manikin responses.
Average attenuation characteristics can be seen in Figure 1 where the blue line corresponds with the Earasers standard filter earplug. My measurements indicated that these devices offer little to no sound protection below roughly 2000 Hz. What’s more, the earplugs increased sound pressure levels within the manikin's ears just below this region. This is noted in Figure 1 and is likely explained as resonant effects due to the ear canal, earplug coupling, and filter sound bore. At the peak near 1600 Hz, a 7.9 dB boost was observed.
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To further illustrate the difference between uniform attenuation and Earasers V Filter, previous measurements for Eargasm High Fidelity earplugs were included. The corresponding black line remains relatively flat from 125 to 8000 Hz offering a good example of uniform sound reduction. Conversely, Earasers V Filter can be seen offering attenuation only in the higher frequencies.
My testing of the Earasers indicated a NRR of 1 dB. This is less than the advertised value however, it is overall consistent with limited sound reduction. To put this in perspective, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) recommends a 50% derating of the labeled NRR. This is because real-world sound attenuation tends to be much less than laboratory measurements. The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) is even less conservative with derating values.
Regardless, the attenuation measurements included in this article are presented for demonstration purposes only and are not meant to be interpreted as laboratory data. Measurements were obtained on an acoustic manikin that may not meet international standards for anthropomorphic head and torso simulators. Furthermore, the miniDSP EARS do not account for the roughly 40 to 60 dB attenuation limitations observed when testing on humans1.
Earasers are a unique earplug that should be fully understood before use. People may erroneously feel protected as they are wearing a well promoted popular earplug. However, all available data suggests that these devices may not provide sufficient protection—even when worn properly. Furthermore, their V Filter means critical elements of both music and speech may be difficult to hear in comparison to other ranges.
After testing these devices, I find it difficult to recommend them as a viable hearing protection device for musicians, concertgoers, audio engineers, and audiophiles. However, should you choose to use them it is highly advisable that you visit your hearing care provider to obtain a personal attenuation rating (PAR). You can also monitor your hearing and switch to a more protective earplug if you experience any signs of auditory fatigue.
While Earasers are comfortable and discreet, their “V Filter” approach makes for a very unnatural sound quality. What's more, they offer limited sound attenuation which may fail to provide appropriate protection in loud environments. The devices may have application in reducing the annoyance of higher pitched sounds; however, avid concertgoers, musicians, and audio engineers may want to look elsewhere.
Steve Taddei, Au.D., vereint seinen Abschluss in Audiotechnik vom Columbia College Chicago mit seinem Doktorat in Audiologie der Northern Illinois University, um Hörtechnologien voranzutreiben und das Bewusstsein für Hörverlust als Laborleiter bei HearAdvisor zu schärfen. Er trägt auch zu verbraucherfokussierten Bewertungen von Hörgeräten und Ohrstöpseln auf HearingTracker.com bei und inspiriert zukünftige Fachleute durch seine Positionen als Lehrbeauftragter an mehreren Hochschulen, um die nächste Generation zu ermutigen, ihre Leidenschaften zu entdecken und zu verfolgen.
