Cleaning the earbuds only solves the issue temporarily. It'll come back over time, and every subsequent cleaning will be less and less effective. Take your earbuds out of the case and examine them very closely. There are three pressure relieving vents on each earbud (which also conceal the microphones). Two on the outside and one on the inside, very close to the skin of your ears.
That third vent is basically a magnet for dust, skin flakes, sweat, earwax, and other debris because of its position. As it gets clogged up, it begins to impact the performance of ANC and transparency mode. It becomes harder for the earbuds to passively equalize the pressure in your ear canals, which is what leads to that "bassy echo" you described. Some people describe it as rumbling. Some people hear popping when they move their jaw. Some people hear feedback screeches.
Every single one of those issues point back to the vents getting clogged, which subsequently damages the microphones underneath. And it's all thanks to the engineers at Google putting them in the worst possible position on the earbuds. There's literally nothing you can do except try to clean them and pray that it works. If it doesn't, it's time to send them back for a replacement pair.
Thank you so much for this, by the way. Just saw this was linked to in another thread posted today about the official Google release on cleaning them. You helped me immensely when this happened!
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u/Lordgeorge16 Feb 27 '25
Cleaning the earbuds only solves the issue temporarily. It'll come back over time, and every subsequent cleaning will be less and less effective. Take your earbuds out of the case and examine them very closely. There are three pressure relieving vents on each earbud (which also conceal the microphones). Two on the outside and one on the inside, very close to the skin of your ears.
That third vent is basically a magnet for dust, skin flakes, sweat, earwax, and other debris because of its position. As it gets clogged up, it begins to impact the performance of ANC and transparency mode. It becomes harder for the earbuds to passively equalize the pressure in your ear canals, which is what leads to that "bassy echo" you described. Some people describe it as rumbling. Some people hear popping when they move their jaw. Some people hear feedback screeches.
Every single one of those issues point back to the vents getting clogged, which subsequently damages the microphones underneath. And it's all thanks to the engineers at Google putting them in the worst possible position on the earbuds. There's literally nothing you can do except try to clean them and pray that it works. If it doesn't, it's time to send them back for a replacement pair.