What should you know about audio before buying headphones?

There’s a lot of technical jargon regarding headphones, but it’s worth your while to understand it if you want to invest in a nice pair of headphones. These are some of the most common terms thrown around when talking about audio in headphones.

it can be a pain to go out into the world, but considering how important fit and sound quality are to your experience: we always recommend trying headphones before you buy them. Not only is it good to ensure that the products you buy will, y’know, actually fit you: it’s important to figure out if you’ll even be able to use them in the first place without eating a costly restocking fee.

If you live in an area with a HiFi shop or other electronics store that allows you to listen to headphones in-store, you should be able to figure out if on or over-ears will fit you well. Unfortunately for a number of reasons, you’re not going to be able to demo in-ears except in very certain circumstances.  You can get used to minor changes in audio quality, but you’ll never quite get over a set of headphones that are too heavy, or put too much pressure on your head.

When buying online, you won’t be able to try on headphones before you buy, so read as many headphone reviews as you can about your target product! While it won’t reflect your experiences exactly, reading multiple reviews can help you get a better picture of how well a product does what it’s supposed to, or how it will fit you.