No Stupid Questions

The memory foam silicon tip replacements are the only ones that have worked for me. I use complyfoam earbud tips now because the cheap foam eartips broke when the inner silicone sleeve separated from the foam.

I have Anker Space A40 wireless earbuds which has silicon tips. They came with 3 sizes and none of them fit and didn't fall out. I bough a set of 6 different sizes of silicone tips and they still fell out. only the foam version worked for me so they might be worth a try if you already have a silicone tipped earbuds.

ear clips are better than both

I can't stand the solid ones and highly prefer the silicone tipped. The amount of low frequencies and all around sound fidelity lost when using solids makes them a non starter for me.

I don't understand how the silicone ones can stay in the ear but apparently they do for most people. The top example from the left side in the silicone photo is the only one I can actually wear. Maybe our ears just have a weird shape.

I think it’s 50/50. Reading the comments pretty much confirms this. Interesting question!

I did a diy cast of my ear canal using diy silicone... Which I fo not recommend, but look for sugru. It's silicone type I mixed with talcum powder to expose the water trapped in talcum to the silicone over a large volume in a controlled way... Then I scanned the casts and I used a DSLR to take photos of the parts at various angles and used an open source app to get 3D models from the images. Then I used freecad to cut the models with areas to mount the tiny speakers and such. Finally printed them in SLA resin. I made earplugs, IEMS and headphone adapters using the same geometry. They are very comfortable. The plugs are great for swimming.

I don't really wear earbuds because I don't actually like either style. The hard plastic ones are uncomfortable after 10-20 minutes for me and don't stay in my ears. The soft tip ones get really gross and are difficult to clean well, but a decent pair comes with different sizes of tips to better fit my ears.

I have over-ear headphones that I like, but many of them tend to be uncomfortable after a few hours. I've actually come to really like my bone conduction earbuds for general listening because it just rests on my temples with minimal pressure and there's nothing in my ears. They have pretty solid quality, but not audiophile-grade or anything like that.

Edit: I a word

I détest the silicone ones. They're uncomfortable and I always lose the tip. I only use the hard plastic ones

Silicone ones don't fit me. Tried all sizes and they all fall out. I also don't want the noise blocking they do. I also walk my dog and I want to hear bikes coming from behind or car noises and such.

I find foam ones preferable over the silicone ones

I too have issues with silicone earbuds, and also with them falling out. Which is why I was over the moon when I discovered wireless clip-on earbuds. They meet my criteria of being convenient (because wireless) while also not falling off (because clip-on). The specific ones I bought (Anker Soundcore c30i) are not noise-cancelling, but I found that I can adjust their position up or down my ears to meet conditions. For example, I wear them high up when out in public, to hear wayward automobiles that might run me down.

I'm with you, I despise the silicon ones

I have swapped from inear to clip style buds and don't look back, the soundcore aeroclips are amazing

When they fit, they're excellent. I have the ones that I can keep in while sleeping. I am still occasionally surprised by how comfortable they feel to me.

Neither, really. I much prefer the open ear headphones that sit on your ear (not the ones like Sennheiser has with the mesh).

They stay in place and are light enough that after a minute you don't even notice them.