Out of curiosity, what noise cancelling headphones do you have that lets you sleep through the night on a long haul?

My Airpods Pro are great but they only have a battery life of 4-5 hours per charge (20 hours in case, but you have to wake up to charge them).

My Bose QC 15 over ear headphones can stay on much longer (> 20 hours of battery life) and have great noise cancellation, but as soon as I lean my head to either of the side headrests on the seat, the noise cancellation "leaks". I've never been able to sleep on a plane with my Bose QCs.

The best solution I've found so far have been plain-old ear plugs ($5).

I have the same problem with sleeping in over-the-ear headsets. The best I've found for sleeping on long flights are the Bose QC20 - the noise cancelling is as good as their over-the-ear headsets but the in-ear design makes them much more comfortable if you happen to rest your head on one side while sleeping, and doing so doesn't interrupt the noise cancellation.

Since they're cabled to an external battery box they can easily last through any flight, and you can leave the USB charge cable connected to an in-flight power socket while you use them to keep the battery full.

Thanks for the tip! Maybe I'll try the QC20 next time I'm at Best Buy -- the noise cancellation interruption might be a design limitation of the QC15.

>Noise cancelling headphones

Any particular you know that in fact do cancel noise and really work?

The big thing is how much noise canceling you're after. A $50 set of Anker Soundcore's will remove engine noise but not a noisy neighbor - I like them for travel because the battery is solid and I won't cry if I lose them.

On the other hand, a $400 set of Sony's will basically put you in audio isolation - to the point that some people genuinely don't like them. A friend had me put his pair on in the middle of a busy restaurant at lunch time and I'm not kidding when I say it felt pin drop quiet.

Bose QC35s have been my flying companion for over four years now. Basically indistinguishable from magic.

I use noise cancelling in-ear headphones and on top of that I wear ear muffs intended for operating heavy machinery. I've never found a single pair of noise cancelling headphones that actually cancel all noise, so I layer them.