Flare

  • Blocks high pitched noises but leaves ambient sound clear.
  • Good for conversations in restauraunts.
  • Bad for walking on noisy streets.
  • Minimal increase of volume in your ears.

Get them here

3M Earplugs

  • Get the cordless ones because the cords would rub against your shirt and make their own noise.
  • Blocks all noise, muffles speech.
  • Good for when you want total silence.
  • Bad for excessive noises like a street.
  • Increases the volume of your voice in your head the most. Mostly can’t speak at all with these in.

Get them here. You have to be careful if getting these off amazon/flipkart because sometimes they send you a random brand that are orange earplugs but don’t have 3M branding on the packaging.

Loop

  • Keeps sound clear but reduces the volume of ambient sound. Good for movie theatres and noisier restauraunts like a buffet with a lot of clattering plates and forks.
  • Waterproof so you can wear it in the shower if you get car honks in your bathroom.
  • Surprisingly good for traffic and cuts the worst of car horns but still annoying to be in them for a longer travel.
  • Increases the sound of your voice a lot so unless your ambient noise is also loud it can be harder to speak. With a lound ambient noise it’s great.

Get them here

3M Earmuffs

  • By themselves not great at reducing noise but paired with noise cancelling headphones, they’re the best defence against even walking on the road with cars around you. You’d need to play music as well through your headphones.
  • Easy to put on and take off so good for a quick walk into the kitchen to get some water if it’s noisy.
  • Difficult to wear with glasses but not impossible.

Get them searching for “3M PELTOR Optime 105 H10A”.

Airpods Pro

  • I only have the first gen and the second gen is supposed to have better noise cancellation.
  • Doesn’t increase your own volume much more but more than Flare.
  • Best when paired with 3M during car rides. Not as helpful in other situations.
  • Can be worn for work.

Sony XM5

  • Good for blocking deeper construction noises and if you need to talk as well as listen to other people speaking.
  • Uncomfortable with glasses.
  • Unsuitable for other purposes.
  • Doesn’t signficantly increase the volume of your own voice in your ears.