Earlier this month, a kind of chirping, rainforest-y sound sprung up in my apartment. It came from my roommate’s room. At first, I took it for a video game, but then realized the sound materialized ...

Even the smartest people can't help but get annoyed by these unnecessary sounds. Struggling with misophonia — an experience of extremely strong anxiety, disgust, and irritation in response to certain ...

Clicking pens, popping gum, tapping of fingernails – what are common but annoying sounds for many can be especially triggering for those with misphonia, a neurological disorder characterized by ...

Is it one of the best children’s tunes? Is it annoying because of it? “Yellow Submarine” might be a fan favorite for some, but its sound effects are annoying for others. When The Beatles recorded the ...

Summer, for most, is all about rest and relaxation. But there will always be those sounds that inevitably disrupt our Zen at the most inopportune times. Whether it be something that jolts us out of a ...

Console startup sounds are supposed to be iconic. Memorable. Maybe even comforting. But let’s be honest—some of them were straight-up annoying. Whether it was the audio equivalent of a jump scare or a ...

Every worker or students who is forced to get up early has probably felt the impulse to chuck their annoying alarm clock at the wall. Now, it turns out that the harshness of one’s alarm sound may be ...

Freelance writer Amanda C. Kooser covers gadgets and tech news with a twist for CNET. When not wallowing in weird gear and iPad apps for cats, she can be found tinkering with her 1956 DeSoto. I wake ...

Before shelter-in-place orders were issued across the country and people started working from home en masse, I used noise-cancelling headphones a lot at the office. Whether to block out colleagues ...