Hearing Range Test

What it measures

This check estimates your audible frequency range — the lowest and highest pitch you can still hear. A healthy young ear hears roughly 20 Hz at the deep bass end up to about 20 kHz at the highest treble. The upper limit matters most: it tends to fall steadily with age and noise exposure, so finding where the high tones disappear gives a rough sense of your high-frequency hearing.

How it works

A single continuous pure tone plays through your headphones, and you slide its pitch up or down. In the first step you raise the pitch until it vanishes, then back off to the highest tone you can still hear and mark it. In the second step you do the same at the bass end, finding the lowest tone you can still detect. Your range is simply the span between those two edges. Because the upper edge of human hearing drops with age — the so-called mosquito or teen tone above 15 kHz is often inaudible to older adults — the high limit is the most informative part of the result.

Tips for an accurate result

• 1Hear, don't feel, at the bass end — Very low tones can be felt as a vibration or buzz even when you can't truly hear a pitch. Mark the lowest point where you perceive an actual tone, not just a rumble or a flutter from your headphones.
• 2Expect the high edge to fall with age — Most adults lose the very top of their range first. Losing tones above 15–17 kHz is extremely common past your twenties and usually causes no everyday difficulty, since speech sits far lower.
• 3Compare the same setup over time — Your result depends heavily on the device and headphones you use. To track change meaningfully, retest with the same headphones at the same volume rather than comparing across different gear.