My friend and old boss Ted asked about noise-canceling headphones.

Firstly, I absolutely recommend getting some sort of noise-reducing headphones for anyone who is taking an airplane trip of any length. Blocking the engine noise greatly reduced my overall stress & headache level at the end of a long ride.

I had a pair of Sony active noise-canceler headphones. They weren’t bad for noise reduction. However, they were bulky (being full-size headphones) and they had a bit of a static hiss to them (worse when canceling was on but even when turned off), which was mildly annoying. They also needed a AA battery for the active cancellation electronics, but that was not a big deal; the battery life was pretty good. Still, if I forgot to turn it off, I would drain the battery, and if I didn’t have a replacement I was stuck with headphones that didn’t block much of anything.

Later I got a pair of Sony earbuds. These are the kind that fit snugly into your ear; they have a rubber pad rather than a fuzzy one like the ones that come with iPods. These rubber seals actually do a great job of noise reduction through passive noise insulation; I’d say that they are as good as the active noise canceling on the headphones. Better yet, they are MUCH more compact (important for the plane) and don’t require any power. Furthermore, the earbuds themselves have great sound quality. I ended up giving up the active headphones and used these exclusively, both on the plane and off.

I’m happy enough with these earbuds that I’m not shopping for any new products. However, if I was, I would definitely consider going all-out with active noise-canceling earbuds, which would ideally have the best of both worlds. There’s several brands and price levels; as an example. I’ve also seen a separate active noise-canceling box into which you can plug any headset. Either way, the idea is to take a good pair of passive noise-reducing earbuds and add active cancellation for the most noise reduction you can get. That’s definitely desirable, although I wouldn’t necessarily sacrifice sound quality to get that.