THE ENGINEERING BEHIND NOISE-CANCELLING HEADPHONES – HOW IT WORKS

Noise-cancelling headphones are commonplace in the lives of many, but we all seem to take the engineering for granted. Here is how noise-cancelling headphones work.

The overall concept of headphones and earphones has been around since the beginning of the 20th century, and has, quite frankly, not changed much in design. All you needed was two speakers small enough to comfortably fit over the user's ears. These needed to be heard clearly, while not loud enough to disrupt people in a nearby space.

However, there was a slight flaw with them. This was the fact that you had to be in a relatively quiet space in order to hear what you were listening to, as external noises would interfere. And, the last thing you want to do is maximise the volume levels because that could permanently damage the ears.

So, what was the solution? Well, send it to the engineers of course!

Noise cancellation is a feature that a good set of headphones usually come standard with in modern times. But, how does it work?

Cleverly, the headphones are fitted with a tiny microphone embedded within the design. This microphone listens to external sounds in your area, then processes them into anti-sound waves, which cancel out those frequencies. This results in you not hearing anything besides all that punk rock goodness!

Take look at the video below by YouTube channel, Branch Education, on The Engineering Inside Noise Cancelling-Headphones.