TipsEar tips on their own
Foam wears out. The driver behind it usually has years left. This is the part you replace rather than the pair, and it is the cheapest thing on this site.
A catalog built around the wire
- 1listing on this shelf
- 1color code behind it
- $7.99is where this shelf starts
- 2,243votes across the shelf
The tip gives up long before the driver
Memory foam works by being crushed and then expanding back against the walls of the canal. After a year or so of being crushed twice a day it stops expanding with any conviction, and a tip that does not expand does not seal.
What you hear when that happens is the bottom end quietly leaving. Most people read it as the earbuds wearing out and start shopping. The driver is fine. The sponge on the front of it is not.
Washing rather than replacing
These are washable, which is the whole reason to keep a set in a drawer. Warm water, work them gently between your fingers, then let them dry all the way through before they go anywhere near an ear again.
All the way through is the part people skip. Foam holds water in the middle long after the outside feels dry, and a damp tip pushed into a warm canal is exactly the situation you were trying to avoid by washing it.
Check the nozzle before you order
These tips are not tied to our earbuds. They fit the standard nozzle that most in-ear pairs use, whoever made them, so the pair you already own and still like is a perfectly good reason to be on this page.
The thing to look at is the stem the old tip pulls off. If it is a plain round nozzle with a lip near the end, these will go on. If the old tip is molded into the body and does not come off at all, no replacement tip of any kind will help.
Our named lines
Choose the plug that matches your port, then choose the shape you want. The line decides the housing metal, the cord braid and the button setup under your thumb.
Workbench articles
Getting a seal with ear tips
Sound that came out thin and tinny is almost never a broken driver. It is a tip that never closed the ear canal. How to seat foam properly and when to swap.
Keep readingWhich plug your phone takes
One look at the bottom edge of the phone settles which of our pairs will work. Here is what changed, what an adapter costs you, and why laptops are a different story.
Keep readingHow a wired pair stays quiet
No circuit, no battery, no cancellation. Just a foam tip filling the canal. What that blocks well, what it will not touch, and why we left the battery out.
Keep reading
What is your jack?
Two questions. The first is about the socket you plug into, because that rules more pairs in and out than anything else here. The second is about what you are actually doing while you wear them, because that is what each line was built around.