It’s absolutely disgusting to me just how many people fail to properly and consistently clean their earbuds. To me, wearing dirty earbuds is equivalent to rewearing dirty socks.
I clean my earbuds everytime I finish wearing them and it’s honestly become such a chore. Having hardware designs that are easily cleanable are so important. I really wish earbud manufacturers would stop putting hard right angles and recessed charging contacts into the body of earbuds because they just attract hard to clean gunk. Also, eartips should be round bulbs instead of a mushroom shape, that way it doesn’t accumulate gunk on the underside of the eartips, requiring you to tediously invert the mushroom just to get all the earwax out.
I think every single wear might be a little overkill. I clean mine maybe once a week and barely see any earwax/gunk buildup.
That effort is probably better spent on just cleaning your ears when you shower everyday.
Nah man. I saw people dropping their buds on the ground. In the subway. Into the ear canal they go!
Heh, thanks for the reminder to clean my buds!
So how do you best clean your earbuds?
My favourite thing to do is take the eartip off and kinda lightly suck on the actual speaker thing, like a weird straw. Makes them sound like new and gets dust out from inside
Google recommends not using alcohol. Alcohol is good for cleaning PCBs and charging contacts on devices, but not so great for the plastic body. It can also damage the silicone eartips.
Google’s instructions, linked from the article:
https://support.google.com/googlepixelbuds/answer/9112670?hl=en&ref_topic_7544331
tl;dr: Remove eartips, wipe gently with a lint-free cloth, add a small amount of water if you’re having trouble scrubbing anything (without getting water inside). If you have Pixel Buds Pro, they also recommend using an adhesive putty if you’re still having trouble removing any debris with the cloth.
For this and other reasons, I’m a big fan of bone-conduction systems.
