How to Fix Broken Headphones

That terrible thing will have to come one day – when your headphones finally show up and fail. Luckily, you don’t have to immediately buy a new pair of headphones! You can fix it yourself, just stop by to buy something at the electronics store. The parts that you need to fix will be very small, so they run the risk of damage. But if your headphones are already broken, there’s not much to lose when you want to fix them.

Table of Contents

Find the problem

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Try listening while bending the headphone cord. Plug in your headphones and bend the cord while listening. If you hear music coming from the speakers, see Repairing power cables below.

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Try shaking and re-plugging the jack. If you only hear music when you try to plug in as deep as the jack can, see Repair broken jacks .

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Borrow your friends’ headphones. If you still can’t hear anything, unplug the cable from the speakerphone, connect it to another headset you borrowed from a friend, if you hear sound, see Repairing the headset speaker .

If the headphone cable cannot be pulled out, go to the next step, Use a multimeter .

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Use a multimeter. If you still can’t find the fault, use a multimeter. You can buy it at an electronics store. You will need an extra sharp knife, if you are a child, you should ask an adult to help you. Use the multimeter as follows:

Set the meter to conductive test mode ) ) ) or a similar symbol.
Insert the black jack into the hole marked COM.
Insert the red jack into the hole marked Ω, mA, or ) ) ) .

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Check with multimeter. The watch will “beep” if there is no break in the wire. Use a sharp knife to separate the insulating plastic according to the instructions below. Be careful not to cut the power cord inside.

Make an incision near the jack and one near the headphone speaker.
Copper wire is usually coated with a colorless protective coating. Use a knife to gently scrape it off. ^{[1] X Research Source}
Hold the black jack of the power meter and touch the copper wire at one end of the headphone wire, the red jack on the other end. If the watch beeps, the problem is in the headphone jack or in the speaker.
If it doesn’t chirp, make a slit in the center of the string and test each half of the rope.
Making another cut in half of the wire does not cause the meter to sound. Continue doing this until the broken wire is determined to be within a few centimeters.
Continue with the step Repair the power cable . Skip the recheck step.

Repair power cable

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Check the power cord. Put on your headphones and turn on the music. Bend the wire 90 degrees on the tip of your thumb and trace the length of the cord. When the music is noisy and broken, you have found the break. ^{[2] X Research Source} If the break is near the jack, see the Jack Repair section for repair instructions. If not, continue to the next step.

Once you’ve found the break, mark it with a piece of electrical tape.
If you found the break with the power meter, skip this step.

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Remove the wire sheath. Use wire cutters, or carefully cut around the outside of the wire with a knife. Discard about 1.25 cm of wire sheath. Extend the cut on both sides until you see where the wire is broken. This is where you need to fix.

If the wire looks like two small wires stuck together, each wire will contain in the core an insulated wire (signal wire) and a bare wire (ground wire).
Apple headphones and some other types of headphones with a power cord will have 2 wires in the insulated core (left and right signals) and one bare wire is the ground wire.

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Cut the power cord. Cut the power cord in half. If the wire inside is broken/stamped, cut both sides of the spot to repair the damage. You need to evenly cut the wire on the left and right sides. Irregular cord lengths can cause electrical damage to your headphones. ^{[3] X Research Sources}

If only one wire is broken, you’ll probably want to re-solder it without cutting or wiring. ^{[4] X Research Source} Doing so will be faster, but the weld will be less solid.

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Thread a piece of shrink tubing into the headphone cord. This is a rubber tube that looks like your headphone cable. Thread it onto the power cord for the next step. Once you’re done fixing the wire, you’ll pull it back into the exposed wiring area to secure it.

If you have to cut the rope several times to find the break, attach a piece of pipe to each cut.

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Reconnect the wires. This means that you will be connecting the wires together, be sure to connect the wires of the same insulated (or non-insulated) sheath together. You can use two ways: Braid or twist inward. ^{[5] X Research Sources}

With braiding, keep the two pieces of string you want to connect parallel to each other, then twist them to create a splice. This is quick and easy to do, but the splice will seem cumbersome.
With a twisted inward connection, hold the wire so that the small copper wires of the two wires are mixed from one end to the other. Twist the wires in opposite directions, this will be more difficult but the joint will be more compact and easy to hide.

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Solder the joints. Use a soldering iron to melt a small piece of solder on the wires. Do it again for the other wire. Let cool.

Unsheathed bare wires are usually covered with a protective coating, scrape it off with sandpaper or burn it with a soldering iron before soldering. Avoid inhaling fumes. ^{[6] X Research Sources}
Once cooled, wrap the two pairs of connections with tape to ensure that the open ends are separated from the ground wire.

Fix broken jack

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Buy a new jack. You can buy them online or at electronics stores. Choose a steel jack with a stereo connection and a spring. Make sure it’s the same type as your old jack, usually 3.5mm. ^{[7] X Research Sources}

Remove the old jack. Some jacks can be screwed out of the power cord. If your jack is mounted inside the plastic cover, you will have to cut it out, about 2.5cm from the jack.

When opening the jack, look at the wires. If it looks healthy and hasn’t been broken, just cut it off. Maybe the problem lies in the wire near the jack.

Separate the wire with wire stripping pliers. There will usually be one bare (unshielded) wire and two insulated or shielded wires. The bare wire will be the ground wire, the other wires are the left and right signal wires.

The double wire has an extra bare wire, but the other wires inside are the same as the single wire.

Connect the jack components through the power cord. Twist the new jack out. Pull the housing and spring down to the end of the wire. Remember to thread another piece of shrink tubing.

The main part of the jack should have two protruding pins at the top. If there is only one pin, the jack is mono, not stereo.

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Connect the wires to the ends of the jacks. Separate each of the three wires of the power cord. Twist the frayed ends of the cord to make it compact. Connect the wires as shown below: ^{[8] X Research Source}

The bare wire will connect to the big leg, which is the longest piece of iron. If the headset does not have a bare wire, the connector has a sheath painted in two mutually plaid colors.
The remaining two insulated wires will be connected to the other two pins (two short pins with rings on top). Since there is no convention for wire color, If you connect the wrong wires, the left and right speaker sound will be mixed together. Otherwise, the headset will work normally.

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Clip the wires to the jack pins. Use a small paper clip or tape to secure them in place, do not let the wires touch each other.

Solder the wires to the jack. Use sandpaper to roughen the edges to make it easier to weld. Place solder on the soldering iron. Heat the soldering iron to melt the tin. Do the same with the other two wires.

Screw the lid back on. Screw the cap back over the spring and jack. Try your headphones again. If you’re still having problems, it’s probably because the wires are touching each other. Open the cover and separate the wires from each other.

Repair earphone speakers

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Open the headset. The process is not the same for different types of headphones. Search online for specific guidelines for each type, or try these steps: ^{[9] X Research Source}^{[10] X Research Source}

Find the location of the screw on the headset. You will probably need a size 0 4-sided screwdriver to open them.
Gently pry off the cover. When it falls off, find the screws inside and unscrew it.
Insert a file or other thin tool into the gap between the two earcups and pry them open. This may damage some headphones, so it’s better to find a how-to guide first.
The headset cover can be removed, but you may have to find a new rubber pad. ^{[11] X Research Source} Usually the problem lies with the power cord attached to the earpiece speaker.

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Find broken wire. If you’re lucky, the problem will be very noticeable. Any broken wires inside the headphones will be reconnected to the speakers. Look for the little pins on the speaker, let’s hope one wire is attached to the other. Then solder the broken wire in its place.

If more than one wire is broken, you may need to read the instructions to see which wire attaches to where.
Make sure the wires do not touch each other.

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Replace the headset speaker. You can buy a new headphone speaker online, but it can be very expensive. If you feel the replacement is worth the price, take your headphones and the new speaker to an electrical repair shop. You can do it yourself, but there is a high risk of “healing pigs into lame pigs”. ^{[12] X Research Source}

Cut off the rubber lining around the speaker cover with a sharp knife.
Remove the old cone speaker inside.
Place the new speaker in place. Be careful not to touch the diaphragm.
If you’re not sure, put a little glue around its edges.

Advice

Practice on cheap headphones first, if you have one available.
Try not to keep the torch on the weld joint for too long, it may melt the surrounding plastic or damage the joint.
If the cover around the earphone cap has come off, you can use silicone rubber as a mold to replace it. ^{[13] X Research Source}

Warning

Be careful not to burn yourself; The soldering iron gets very hot when in use.

Things you need

Welder
Soldering tin
Wire stripping pliers
Paper cutter or scissors
Shrink plastic tube (used when fixing wires or jacks)
New jack (used when repairing jacks)
Multimeter power meter (use when you have not found the fault anywhere).

Steps