How to take the test:
- Use headphones or good speakers for accurate results
- Set volume to a comfortable level (not too loud!)
- Click Play on each frequency
- Mark whether you can hear it or not
- Test all frequencies for complete results
Age-Based Hearing Reference
About This Test
This hearing test measures your ability to hear high frequencies from 8kHz to 20kHz. As we age, we naturally lose the ability to hear higher frequencies due to damage to the hair cells in our inner ear.
Most adults can hear up to 15-17kHz, while children and teenagers can often hear up to 20kHz. Exposure to loud music and noise accelerates hearing loss.
Important Notes
- • Equipment matters: Use good headphones or speakers
- • Volume: Set to comfortable level, not too loud
- • Environment: Take test in quiet room
- • Not medical: This is for entertainment/education only
- • Hearing loss: Consult audiologist if concerned
Why We Lose High Frequencies
- • Age: Natural deterioration of hair cells
- • Noise exposure: Concerts, headphones, machinery
- • Genetics: Some people naturally have better hearing
- • Health: Certain conditions affect hearing
Protect Your Hearing
- • Lower volume: Follow 60/60 rule (60% volume, 60 minutes max)
- • Use earplugs: At concerts and loud events
- • Take breaks: Rest your ears regularly
- • Regular checkups: Get hearing tested professionally
Related tests: Hearing Age Test · Mosquito Tone · Tinnitus Matcher
Full hearing test: both ears, 250 Hz – 8 kHz
The test above finds your upper limit. This one goes further: it measures the quietest tone each ear can hear at the frequencies a standard hearing check covers, and plots the result as an audiogram you can print or save as a PDF. No email, no account.
Before you start
This test finds the quietest tone each ear can hear at 250 Hz, 500 Hz, 1 kHz, 2 kHz, 4 kHz, 8 kHz, then draws an audiogram-style chart. It takes around 6 to 10 minutes, and nothing leaves your browser: no email, no account.
- Wired or Bluetooth headphones are required, not speakers. Turn off noise cancelling and any EQ, spatial audio or "hearing" enhancement.
- Find the quietest room you can. Turn your device volume down to about a quarter before the first tone.
- A quick left/right check, then you set your volume against a 1 kHz reference tone.
- For each tone, wait for three short beeps. Press "I heard it" as soon as you hear them, even if very faint. Guessing makes the result worse, not better.
What this test cannot do
- • Consumer headphones: every model is louder at some frequencies than others, especially at 250 Hz and 8 kHz, and a loose fit leaks bass. The chart shows your ears and your headphones together.
- • Uncalibrated levels: a browser cannot know how loud your headphones are, so results are dB relative to the level you set, not clinical dB HL.
- • Noisy room: background noise hides quiet tones, low ones most of all, and makes results look worse than they are.
- • Browser and system output: changing the volume mid-test, EQ, spatial audio, noise cancelling or hearing features on your phone or earbuds all shift the result. Very quiet tones can also fall below what some devices can reproduce cleanly.
- • No diagnosis: there is no bone-conduction or masking test, so it cannot tell types of hearing loss apart. It is a screening exercise.
When to see a professional
- • Sudden hearing loss in one or both ears: treat it as an emergency and see a doctor straight away. Early treatment improves the chance of recovery.
- • One ear worse than the other, or hearing that has been getting worse over days or weeks.
- • Ringing (tinnitus) that comes with a change in hearing or sits in one ear.
- • Pain, discharge or dizziness along with hearing loss.
- • This test shows more than 15 dB between ears at two or more frequencies, and a retest on other headphones agrees.
Sources & further reading
- Hearing loss: when to see a GP or get urgent help — NHS
- Sudden Deafness — NIDCD / NIH
- Types of Hearing Tests (pure-tone testing and the audiogram) — Communication Health Support Association / ASHA
Audiogram test FAQ
Is this the same as an audiogram from an audiologist?
It borrows the layout and the method: pulsed tones at 250 Hz to 8 kHz, one ear at a time, going down 10 dB after each tone you hear and up 5 dB after each one you miss, and a chart with a red O for the right ear and a blue X for the left. What it cannot copy is the calibration. A clinic uses a calibrated audiometer in a quiet booth and reports dB HL; this test runs on your own headphones at a volume you set, so it reports dB relative to that volume. It also has no bone-conduction or masking tests, so it cannot tell types of hearing loss apart.
What does "dB relative to your reference" mean?
At the start you set your device volume so a 1 kHz tone is just comfortably audible. That level is 0 dB on the chart. A result of −45 dB at 2 kHz means the quietest 2 kHz tone you heard was 45 dB below that reference. Lower (more negative) numbers mean you heard quieter tones. Because the reference depends on your headphones and volume, the numbers are only comparable with another run on the same headphones at the same volume setting.
Why did I need more level at 250 Hz and 8 kHz?
Partly because that is normal. Human ears are less sensitive at low frequencies, and the clinical dB HL scale corrects for that while this relative scale does not. Many headphones also put out less at the very bottom and top of the range, and earcups or earbuds that do not seal leak bass. Background noise masks low tones most. So a gentle rise at the ends is expected; a difference between your two ears, or a change since your last run on the same setup, is more meaningful.
How is this different from the 8–20 kHz test at the top of the page?
The test at the top plays ten loud-enough tones from 8 to 20 kHz and asks which you can hear at all, which shows your upper hearing limit. The audiogram test measures how quiet a tone can get before you stop hearing it, separately for each ear, across 250 Hz to 8 kHz, which is the range most important for speech and the range a standard hearing test covers.
When should I see an audiologist instead of testing at home?
Straight away if hearing drops suddenly in one or both ears: sudden hearing loss is treated as a medical emergency because early treatment improves the chance of recovery. Also get checked soon if one ear is worse than the other, if hearing has been getting worse over days or weeks, if hearing loss comes with ear pain, discharge, dizziness or ringing (tinnitus), or if this test shows more than 15 dB difference between your ears at two or more frequencies.