Earbuds are a convenient piece of electronics. They are compact, fit into your pocket, and provide hours of great music from your media player. However, leaving them in your ears too long can have some downsides, often leading to ear pain. Here are five ways to reduce pain from earbuds and to allow a better listening experience.

1 - Keep your earbuds clean.
Unlike headphones, earbuds come into direct contact with your ear canal. This can cause germs to build up on the speakers and lead to potential painful infection. To help prevent this, make sure to clean off your earbuds regularly. If you are using foam covers, make sure to replace them every so often to prevent germ build-up.

2 – Make sure you are wearing earbuds that are the correct size.
If you have smaller ears some of the larger earbud models might not be right for you. Earbuds that are too large for your ear can cause pain by adding too much pressure to your ear canal. Make sure you purchase earbuds that fit properly in your ears. Look for models of earbuds with assorted eartips of different sizes to help with correct fitting.

3 – If you are exercising, use sport earbuds.
Although convenient, not all earbuds were made for rigorous athletic activies. When running, earbuds can bounce around in you ears which can lead to pain. Also, contantly putting earbuds back in your ears after they fall out can cause irritation after a while. There are a couple varieties of sport earbuds on the market that stay in place during sports.

The most common is the over-the-ear version of sport earbuds. These work by having a solid piece of plastic that goes over your ears and back behind your head. (Like wearing a pair of sunglasses backwards). The benefit of this design is that is prevents pain because no weight is being applied to your inner ear.

Another method that is found on the Sennheiser MX75's as well as other models is "Twist to fit". This uses an adjuster knob to lock the earbuds in place. These may take a while to get adjusted correctly so just be patient when fitting them to your ears.

4 – Turn the volume down.
Since earbuds don't cover your ears like traditional headphones, you can still hear a lot of noise in the surrounding environment. You may be tempted to turn the volume up to drown out the outside noise, but don't do this. Turning your volume up too high can lead to ear pain and potentially hearing loss. If you are concerned by hearing outside noises you may want to look at pairs of earbuds that offer noise isolation. These types of earbuds fit snugly into your ears ad reduce the amount of ambient sound that passes through.

5 – Take a break.
If you have a long flight, it may be tempting to leave your earbuds in the whole time. But earbuds cause constant pressure on your ears which can turn to pain if left in long enough. Take breaks when you are plan on wearing earbuds for long durations.