Custom sleep earplugs are an item I'll recommend to ANYONE. Best $300 you'll ever spend and your sleep will thank you.
As for custom IEMs: I'd definitely get me a pair when a truly wireless option from a known player in this space (Campfire Audio, JV Harvey, UE, etc) that sounds great and has a great mic comes on the scene.
I tried Bragi's offering years ago. (Bragi was the first manufacturer to try at truly wireless headphones. They released before Apple launched the AirPods. The AirPods are now a billion-dollar business, whereas Bragi is defunct.) They partnered with Starkey, a very popular hearing aids manufacturer, to make the (still only) waterproof custom true wireless earbuds. The idea of using earbuds that fit me perfectly that I could shower with was awesome. My right ear canal has a weird kink that makes it difficult to use regular IEMs and impossible to use the truly wireless options at the time, thus making the Bragi's even more lucrative. They also partnered with Mimi Audio to offer an EQ that was tuned to your hearing...on iOS. Impossible to beat feature set.
Unfortunately, the earbuds were a disaster. Worst $600 I ever spent. ($600 is cheap in the world of custom IEMs; another reason why I got them.) They didn't sound very good, the audio balance would shift right after an hour of listening, the mic was AWFUL (i made many, many excuses for it, but it was just plain bad), and, worst of all, because the base of the earbud was large (stuffed with ICs) and Bragi chose to use the same case that they used for their universal offering, the nozzle didn't go deep enough to provide a truly locked-in seal. This is, like, THE reason to get custom IEMs, so them failing here was especially painful. The local audiologist (you had to go to a Starkey "dealer" to get your impressions) got tired of me coming in for refits, and I got tired of waiting three weeks to have earbuds I'd use for three days.
I was done with them when Samsung released Galaxy Buds that were compatible with iOS and had noise cancelling. Threw them in the trash. The case even had my name on it. One of the few things I ever engraved with my actual name...and I threw them out because they frustrated me so much.
ADV-Sound has an offering here, but apparently their mic is not very good, and info on these headphones is lacking, Sounds very Bragi 2.0-ish to me, so I'm passing on those.
I've been looking for earbuds for sleeping and listening to audio books before bed.
I don't think such as thing exists sadly. I had high hopes fir UE fits, but while the fit is great, they stick out too much for side sleeping.
They also had an annoying firmware issue where tapping didn't work until they quietly rolled out a fix and I happened to see it months later when I googled the issue again.
This is what kokoon is focused on, and bose also makes sleep earbuds.
We're not in the sleep earbuds space, but at https://soundmind.co we're making an eeg headband with bone conduction sound to improve sleep performance via auditory stimulation.
Auditory stim doesn't help you fall asleep, so we let you listen to whatever you want as you fall asleep, when we detect you've fallen asleep, we stop whatever you were listening to, and switch on our stim.
That sounds great, too bad I can't give you money, but I gave you my email.
I don't really care about stim,
but pausing my book after I fall asleep is HUGE.
Right now i use a sleep timer which is okay, but if the book is good and stops before I fall asleep, I need to really wake up and set a new timer.
If I set a longer timer, there is a chance I will fall asleep early and have a hard time finding my spot later
Thanks. We discussed just having a version of our product that doesn't include the stim, and perhaps we'll do that one day, but we need to be tracking in order to know when to turn off anyway. We'll see..
Do you have further recommendations on brands for both custom sleep earplugs and IEM’s? I have a pretty significant case of TMJ and no bespoke in-ear audio product will ever fit me perfectly because one canal is pretty different than the other.
But is it safe to sleep every day with earbuds on? Even if they are washable, I'm thinking closing the ear canal for prolonged periods of time and the resulting increase in moisture can promote nasty bacterial growth.
I know that you can do that but that's a lot of gear (for me) to carry for listening to music on the go. If that was the ONLY way I could use custom IEMs, I'd rather just bow down to the Lightning adapter, since iPhones have really good DACs. (Wireless options exist, but not TRULY wireless ones).
I’m using the Fostex with IEMs (non custom) and the carrying case for the fostex is actually smaller than the ones that came with my custom IEMs. You also end up losing the wires so its literally just the two earbuds you need because you technically don’t need the case. So it’s net less equipment to carry.
Did you actually look at the items? All three essentially have you completely remove the wire and attach directly via 2-pin or MMCX, so it ends up just being two ear pieces. Of course it’s no longer hot swappable to 1/8 in physical plug afterwards.
As for custom IEMs: I'd definitely get me a pair when a truly wireless option from a known player in this space (Campfire Audio, JV Harvey, UE, etc) that sounds great and has a great mic comes on the scene.
I tried Bragi's offering years ago. (Bragi was the first manufacturer to try at truly wireless headphones. They released before Apple launched the AirPods. The AirPods are now a billion-dollar business, whereas Bragi is defunct.) They partnered with Starkey, a very popular hearing aids manufacturer, to make the (still only) waterproof custom true wireless earbuds. The idea of using earbuds that fit me perfectly that I could shower with was awesome. My right ear canal has a weird kink that makes it difficult to use regular IEMs and impossible to use the truly wireless options at the time, thus making the Bragi's even more lucrative. They also partnered with Mimi Audio to offer an EQ that was tuned to your hearing...on iOS. Impossible to beat feature set.
Unfortunately, the earbuds were a disaster. Worst $600 I ever spent. ($600 is cheap in the world of custom IEMs; another reason why I got them.) They didn't sound very good, the audio balance would shift right after an hour of listening, the mic was AWFUL (i made many, many excuses for it, but it was just plain bad), and, worst of all, because the base of the earbud was large (stuffed with ICs) and Bragi chose to use the same case that they used for their universal offering, the nozzle didn't go deep enough to provide a truly locked-in seal. This is, like, THE reason to get custom IEMs, so them failing here was especially painful. The local audiologist (you had to go to a Starkey "dealer" to get your impressions) got tired of me coming in for refits, and I got tired of waiting three weeks to have earbuds I'd use for three days.
I was done with them when Samsung released Galaxy Buds that were compatible with iOS and had noise cancelling. Threw them in the trash. The case even had my name on it. One of the few things I ever engraved with my actual name...and I threw them out because they frustrated me so much.
ADV-Sound has an offering here, but apparently their mic is not very good, and info on these headphones is lacking, Sounds very Bragi 2.0-ish to me, so I'm passing on those.