Headphones Only Playing In One Ear? [FIXED] | Error Fix It

Are you facing the issue of Headphones Only Playing In One Ear? Learn here how to troubleshoot and fix the sound issue. You can repair it using simple methods. The most common issue faced by headphone users is sound only coming out of one headphone.

Many headphones are very costly and simply replacing them with new headphone would be very expensive. So for costly headphones, it’s better to fix it rather than to buy a new one. Don’t worry you don’t need super skills to solve it, just a basic knowledge of soldering and wiring will be enough. You can also take help from friends who know how to do it. Please note that if you are not confident, then it’s better to repair it in the shop. Many headphones will still be in warranty period, so you can repair them for free.

If you want to proceed with fixing, then let’s start.

Headphones Only Playing In One Ear FIX

We have listed below some of the most working fixes to you. Try all these one by one.

Fix#1: Check the Audio speaker sides balance

1. Go to the Taskbar and right click on the sound icon.
   
2. Click on Sounds.
3. Go to Levels tab and click on Balance.
   
4. Make sure that both voice level are same. Sometimes other side will have less volume which can cause Headphones only playing in one ear issue.
   

If this issue still remains then let’s check for another fix. If you are using Windows 10, then you can check the issue fix here as well.

Fix#2: Check whether the track you are playing is mono

Check whether the song or video you are hearing is a mono track. Mono track plays only on one side of headphone and it may make you feel that Headphones Only Playing In One Ear. So please check it. If required, test your headphone in other computer/devices as well.

Fix#3: Using Brush Tooth pick

This fix is recommended, when your Headphone only works when Twisting Headphone Jack. You will notice that it will work in other computer/phone but in your device, you need to twist the Jack to make it work. Basically, if you use your same headphones and you pop it into the device – and it works perfectly fine after some twisting – then there’s a good chance that you have lint and debris stuck inside your headphone Jack.  So lets begin.

1. what you want to do is get one of these brush tooth picks as shown in below image. You have to get the ones that are kind of strong. you can get them out of local CVS as well or Walgreens, or a Rite Aid, or buy them online from Amazon.
   
2. So, basically, what you want to do is you want to grab this and you want to first go ahead and go into your headphone jack and you kind of want to play with a little bit. Okay. Now the thing is like it’s possible: you may have dirt or debris or lint and stuff inside there, but it’s also possible if you ever spilled anything on your phone like coffee or like soda. It could be stuck in here with the lint as well. Okay, you go ahead and stick the tip that doesn’t have the the brush, all the way in here to kind of just try to loosen some things up in there and you don’t want to go too far. Do that for some time.
   
3. Now you want to go back in here with the brush put it in there and then you kind of want to swirl it around like this and slowly move it up. Do this a couple of times, go in there and kind of scrape it a little bit, not too hard, though, and then use the brush part again, go in there and kind of want to swirl it around and twist it, and slowly bring it up okay and then hopefully your headphone is working out.
   
4. Now comes the cleaning part with some soft material. Get a q-tip and take some of the cotton off it, and then what you do from here is you want to give some rubbing alcohol and just dab it in here a little bit. You can also use saliva, if you don’t have the solution.
   
5. Put q-tip down a little bit in the headphone Jack and kind of just move it around a little bit, it will clean the fine small dust and minute debris parts sticking inside.

Hopefully now your Headphone will work on both sides without any twisting of the Jack. Is this not the issue? Let’s move on to the next fix.

Fix#4: Repairing the Headphone DIY

this fix is for the issue when the headphones are having issues with all the devices. You will observe that when you twist or bend the headphone’s wire, The headphone will start working, but soon the Headphones Only Playing In One Ear Issue will reoccur.

It might be that the headphone wire is shorted out. This issue can be easily found out and fixed. Ok, what you need to do is grab an electrical tape and apply it to the wire where it works when you bend or twist it. So, bend the wire till you find the part where the wire is shorted out. Apply the electrical tape to the shorted area (bend area). This will keep the shorted wire fixed temporarily and you will be able to hear sound from both ears. But you need a permanent Fix. So, for this you need to be familiar with tools like solder etc. If possible, take help from experts. So, let’s go to the fix.

Tools you will need for a permanent fix.

• Wire Strippers.
• Wire Cutters.
• Masking Tape Roll.
• Electrical Tape Roll.
• Sand Paper Sheet
• Solder (optional)
• shrink tubing (optional)

Before proceeding with this solution, I want to tell you that please do it with your own risk. Use this solution only after you have tried all the other solutions. As always, take the help of an expert if you are not confident and solve the Headphones Only Playing In One Ear issue. So lets begin.

1. Plug the Headphone to the Jack.
2. Play any good audio, listen to the audio and carefully move your hand up from the bottom and bend it every few centimeters and try to find the exact location where wire may have been disconnected or may have been shorted out.
3. Once you find the exact location where you can hear the sound from both ears, Mark it with masking tape to left and right and place a gap of about  inch between them.
4. Now use the wire cutters and cut the problem area. Take utmost precaution while doing this. You need to cut an Inch on each side to remove the faulty shorted wire part.
5. Now take a pair of wire strippers and strip back carefully the wire which is shielding on both sides of the remaining wire. It should expose the 3 different color wire red, white and black.
   
6. Now you need to reconnect the both exposed wires.
7. Again take the wire stripper sand use it to strip back the exposed wires. Sometimes the wire will be very small and it will be hard to strip them using wire stripper. So use the sand paper to rub and expose the wiring underneath the color code wire.
8. So once the above step is completed and the wires are exposed and stripped, You need to reconnect the exposed wire together. Its easy, you connect each clor with the same color, like red to red and white to white for example.Now splice them together. You can also solder them if you know how to do it.
9. Now play the audio and check the headphone to see if it’s working as expected.
10. If you hear sound from both ears, then the issue is fixed. Now you need to use electrical tape/shrink tube and carefully wrap the tape over the fixed area to protect it from further damage and increase the longevity of the wire. Thats It!

We hope that now you have solved Headphones Only Playing In One Ear Issue. Please do comment with your questions and suggestions.