A couple of months ago, when shopping around for a new smartphone for my son, I made a point of considering only models that have the 3.5mm jack. It's getting very difficult to find newer models. I am not an Apple fan so I considered only Android-based phones.

Ironically, I also don't like any of the wired earphones I have used in the last 10 years. They all seem to break within a year or two.

Several months ago my latest set of wired earphones broke down, and I gave up and bought a bluetooth set, a JBL model with a wire connecting the earphones, so it's a bit like wired earphones. I don't like them either, the sound quality is off for some reason, and I don't like having to charge them, but the battery life is pretty much as advertised. We'll see how they'll hold up. I still feel kinda dirty for buying them. At least I'm still with my 6-year-old phone with the 3.5 mm jack.

I've only tried bluetooth headphones once and I regretted it. They didn't fit right and the little mp3 player was a bit finicky getting the two to pair. I can only assume the batteries are cheap and have a low charge cycle rating if any rating at all so I expect I will reach your conclusion sooner than later. So to answer your question, yes I am already sick of them. Not a total loss as I wont buy anything without a headphone jack.

I've since gone back to my cheap old school wired headphones and they are good enough for walking and jogging. If I need headphones at home I have some mid-cost-range wired over-ear headphones that sound decent. Not as good as my old Bose wired qc-15's but I am retired and no longer need to tune out the bull-pens. Most of the time I just rock the house with some old Cerwin-Vega's I bought from a coworker 26 years ago.

You’re not wrong, but you’re also focusing on a really small part of a huge mess.

https://www.apple.com/shop/product/MNHF2AM/A/earpods-with-35...

> What can be done about it? Also, any headphones that let you replace batteries?

One thing you can do is getting something like the UTWS1 from FiiO [1], which is then connected to any IEM that has an MMCX connector. This is not cheap, and is probably not going to give you the best battery life and/or sound quality, but when the battery dies or you get tired of it you still have a perfectly functional set of headphones.

[1] https://www.fiio.com/utws1

Two of my headphones are over 6 years old. One of them is Bose QC35 which I love. The other one was "cheaper" $100 headphone, it has horrible multiple devices bluetooth connection switching. I figured I will use it as a rough-n-tough/workout/in-bed headphone until it dies. It is still going strong. I kind of hate having two headphones but this one is in pretty rough shape, so not worth selling or even giving it away.

Bose was pretty expensive, I am hoping to get 10 years out of it. If it dies before 10 years, I will be slightly disappointed but probably would still consider it a great purchase.

I use them when I exercise, and I don't want to pay a lot for something I am going to sweat all over, and probably lose.

This is why I also need the earbuds that are connected by that big brace around the back...I would loose an Airpod in a week...

Both of them had some of the plastic on the side of the band break in the last two months, in both cases I made a makeshift repair with black duct tape that looks a little ugly but could keep them going for another few years. I feel like I've already gotten my money's worth.

Marshall are also relatively good

My first marshall lasted for 18-24 months of 16 hours of daily (ab)use, battery was not an issue, just wear and tear because I've never been careful with them