Best Headphones for Tracking (Closed Back, Five Picks)
The best headphones for tracking are the Beyerdynamic DT 770 PRO (80 ohm) at $199.99, because a closed back cup with real isolation stops a click track bleeding out of the earcup into an open microphone two feet away. Buy the 80 ohm version, not 250 ohm, which needs a headphone amplifier. The Sony MDR-7506 at $113.00 is the studio standard and the Audio-Technica ATH-M20x at $48.00 is the sensible spare pair.
Definition: Tracking headphones are closed back monitoring headphones chosen for isolation rather than accuracy, so that the click and backing track a performer hears does not leak out of the earcup and print into the microphone.
The best headphones for tracking are the Beyerdynamic DT 770 PRO in the 80 ohm version at $199.99, and the reason has nothing to do with how they sound. It is isolation: a deep sealed cup keeps the click track inside the earcup instead of letting it leak into a condenser two feet away. If $200 is too much, the Sony MDR-7506 at $113.00 is in more control rooms than anything else and does the same job.
Tracking headphones are judged on the opposite criteria from mixing headphones, which is why buying one pair for both jobs always disappoints somebody. Tracking wants a sealed cup. Mixing wants an open one. Sealing the cup is exactly what compromises accuracy. If you can only buy one pair, buy the closed back pair, because bleed on a take is permanent and a slightly coloured mix can be checked somewhere else.
What does bleed actually sound like on a finished take?
Not like headphones. That is the problem. It sounds like a faint, slightly hollow copy of the backing track sitting underneath the vocal, phase-smeared by the couple of milliseconds it took to travel from the earcup to the capsule and by the tone of the cup itself. On a loud chorus you will never hear it. On a quiet verse where the vocal is exposed and you have pulled the fader up, it is suddenly there, and it moves whenever the singer moves their head.
There is no clean fix afterward. Gating removes it between phrases and does nothing during them. A noise reduction pass removes it and takes the air off the vocal with it. The only real solutions are prevention: a closed back pair, a sensible headphone level, and where possible a directional microphone with a tight pattern aimed away from the performer's ears. The polar pattern chart shows where each pattern is deaf, which is the part that matters here.
Which tracking headphones should you buy?
Three tiers. The beginner tier covers spares and the tightest budgets. The intermediate tier is where most people should stop. The expert tier is the pair a working room actually uses all day, and the section below says who should not spend that much.
Tracking headphone picks, beginner to expert
Audio-Technica ATH-M20x
Closed back, an honest enough midrange, 47 ohm so it plays loud from anything, and cheap enough that a second pair for a guest player is not a decision. The fixed cable and thin pads are the compromise, and neither ruins a take.
Best for: A spare pair, or a first pair on the tightest budget.
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Sennheiser HD 280 PRO
Sennheiser publish about 32 dB of attenuation, which is the highest figure on this page and the whole reason to buy them. The clamp force that achieves it is firm, and after two hours you will know about it.
Best for: Loud sources and singers who need the click pushed hard.
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Audio-Technica ATH-M40x
Flatter than the M50x and considerably cheaper, with detachable cables so a chewed lead is a five dollar fix rather than a new pair. At 35 ohm it drives easily from any interface output.
Best for: One pair doing tracking duty and occasional editing.
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Sony MDR-7506
In more control rooms than any other single model, not because they are the most accurate but because everyone already knows what they sound like, which is its own kind of reference. Coiled cable, folds flat, 63 ohm, and effectively immortal.
Best for: Tracking, editing, and checking a mix on unfamiliar gear.
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Beyerdynamic DT 770 PRO, 80 ohm
Real isolation from a deep velour-lined closed cup, comfortable enough for a four hour session, and built to be re-padded rather than replaced. Buy the 80 ohm version, which is what the linked listing is: the 250 ohm variant needs an amplifier.
Best for: Recording anything with a microphone open in the room.
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How do the tracking headphones compare?
Impedance and cable type are the two columns with practical consequences. Isolation figures are published differently by different manufacturers, so treat the column as a ranking rather than a measurement you could reproduce.
| Headphones | Price | Impedance | Isolation | Cable | Pads replaceable |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Audio-Technica ATH-M20x | $48.00 | 47 ohm | Moderate | Fixed, straight | Yes |
| Sennheiser HD 280 PRO | $89.99 | 64 ohm | Highest here | Coiled | Yes |
| Audio-Technica ATH-M40x | $109.00 | 35 ohm | Moderate | Detachable, two | Yes |
| Sony MDR-7506 | $113.00 | 63 ohm | Good | Fixed, coiled | Yes |
| Beyerdynamic DT 770 PRO | $199.99 | 80 ohm | Good, most comfortable | Fixed, coiled | Yes |
The HD 280 PRO isolates best and clamps hardest, and those are the same fact rather than two separate facts. Isolation in a passive closed back comes from cup mass, pad seal and clamping force, so the pair that keeps the most sound in is also the pair a singer will start adjusting after ninety minutes. The DT 770 trades a little isolation for velour pads and a headband that stays comfortable, which is why it is the one that gets used.
The single most useful thing I have learned about headphone mixes has nothing to do with headphones. When a singer asks for more volume, they almost never mean the track is too quiet. They mean they cannot hear themselves clearly enough to pitch against it. If you respond by turning everything up, you get a louder headphone mix, more bleed into the microphone, and a performance that keeps pushing because they are competing with what they hear. If instead you push their own voice up 3 or 4 dB and pull the busiest midrange element down, they relax, the pitch settles, and the total headphone level usually ends up lower than where you started. I set up a dedicated cue send for exactly this before I set a single microphone level.
Why does impedance decide which version to buy?
The DT 770 PRO exists in 32, 80 and 250 ohm versions and they are not interchangeable. Impedance describes how much the headphone resists the current the amplifier sends. A high impedance pair draws less current and needs more voltage to reach the same acoustic level, and interface headphone outputs are typically current-capable and voltage-limited, which is the wrong shape for 250 ohm.
What you hear from an underdriven pair is not silence. It is a quiet, thin, dynamically flat version of the mix, which is the worst possible thing to hand a performer who needs confidence. Buy the 80 ohm version for interface use. If you already own 250 ohm pairs or you are feeding several players, a four channel headphone amplifier solves both problems in one purchase.
How many pairs do you need?
One good pair and one cheap spare, and add a headphone amplifier the first time somebody else is in the room. Most interfaces have a single headphone output, so a second player means either unplugging yourself or splitting a signal and halving the level. A four channel amplifier lets each person set their own level independently, which is not a luxury: the drummer and the singer want completely different mixes and completely different volumes.
Spares get destroyed. A guest pair gets sat on, dropped, wound around a chair leg and left in somebody's car. The ATH-M20x at $48.00 is the correct answer to that problem, because replacing it is not a decision. Anything with detachable cables, like the ATH-M40x , also survives the most common failure mode, which is the cable rather than the driver.
Do headphones cause latency problems while tracking?
The headphones do not, the buffer does, and the fix is usually a switch on the interface rather than a setting in the DAW. Latency in milliseconds is:
ms = buffer samples / sample rate x 1000
So 128 samples at 44.1 kHz is 2.9 ms one way and 128 at 48 kHz is 2.67 ms. Round trip is roughly double that plus another 2 to 6 ms of converter and driver overhead, which is why the number your DAW displays never matches the delay you feel. Above about 10 ms round trip most singers start to hear themselves late and push behind the beat.
Direct monitoring removes the problem entirely by feeding the microphone signal to your headphones in the analog domain before the computer sees it. Use it while tracking. The latency buffer calculator gives the numbers for your rate, and how to fix latency in your DAW covers the settings that move it.
Who should not buy the expert tier?
Do not spend $199.99 on the DT 770 PRO if you never open a microphone. If you record guitar direct through an amp simulator, program drums and never put a condenser in front of anything, isolation is solving a problem you do not have. The MDR-7506 at $113.00 or the ATH-M40x at $109.00 does everything you need and the $87 difference buys a corner bass trap, which will change more of your records.
Second exclusion, and it catches people out: do not buy the 250 ohm version because a forum post said it sounds better. It does not sound better from an interface, it sounds quieter, and you will need a headphone amplifier to find out whether the claim was true.
What else the take depends on
Headphones are one of four things that decide whether a vocal take is usable. The others are the microphone, the room and the gain. For an untreated room a dynamic like the SM7B rejects reflections in a way no condenser can, and the dynamic microphone roundup covers that whole category. For a treated one, start with the vocal microphone roundup.
Set levels before the first take rather than during it: aim for peaks around -10 dBFS and roughly -18 dBFS RMS, taken from the loudest phrase in the song rather than a spoken test. The gain staging calculator works out the preamp gain your microphone needs, and how to record vocals at home covers the whole session in order. When you want a second pair for mix decisions, the mixing headphone roundup is the other half of this page.
Full review of the default pick
The Beyerdynamic DT 770 PRO review covers which of the three impedance versions to buy, why the fixed cable is the real long term weakness, and why these are a poor single reference if you also intend to mix on them.
Frequently asked questions
What are the best headphones for tracking?
The Beyerdynamic DT 770 PRO in the 80 ohm version at $199.99. Closed back with genuine isolation, so a click track will not bleed out of the earcup into a condenser two feet away, and comfortable enough that a singer will not start shifting them mid take. The 80 ohm version is the one to buy, because 250 ohm needs a headphone amplifier to reach a usable level.
Why do tracking headphones need to be closed back?
Because whatever escapes the earcup gets recorded. A condenser microphone at 22 mV per pascal a couple of feet from an open back headphone will pick up the click and the backing track, and that bleed is printed into the take permanently. You hear it later as a ghost of the previous mix under a quiet verse, and no processing removes it cleanly.
Should I buy 80 ohm or 250 ohm DT 770 PRO?
Eighty ohm, for tracking from an audio interface. A 250 ohm pair draws less current and needs more voltage to reach the same level, and most interface headphone outputs are voltage limited. What you hear from an underdriven 250 ohm pair is quiet, thin and dynamically flat, which is exactly wrong when a performer needs a confident monitor mix.
How loud should headphones be while recording?
As quiet as the performer can work with, and this is worth negotiating. Every dB of headphone level is a dB more bleed into the microphone, and singers routinely ask for more volume because they cannot hear themselves rather than because the track is too quiet. Push more of their own voice into the mix instead of turning everything up, and the bleed problem mostly solves itself.
Do I need more than one pair of tracking headphones?
The moment a second person is in the room, yes, plus a way to feed them. Most interfaces have one headphone output, so a four channel headphone amplifier is the cheap fix and lets each player set their own level. A pair of ATH-M20x at $48.00 is the sensible spare, because guest pairs get sat on, dropped and left in cars.
Can I use tracking headphones for mixing too?
For arrangement and balance, yes. For final decisions about depth, reverb tails and stereo width, they will mislead you. A sealed earcup reflects the rear wave back through the driver, which adds resonances and a low frequency lift that shifts depending on how well the pads seal. If you only own one pair, own a closed back pair and check your mixes on other systems.
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