After many years loyal service, a cheap little speaker I’d been sliding under my pillow for years finally crackled and died. I’d used this speaker to listen to either podcasts or white noise, as a way to distract myself from the worries of the day and fall asleep faster. I began researching for a replacement, deciding on headphones, with a short checklist of must have features.

The headphones needed to be bluetooth, to connect to phones without a headphone jack. They needed to be comfortable enough to wear all night; that ruled out any bulky over-ear headphones. And they needed to have no audio leak, so I wouldn’t annoy my partner in the bed beside me.

I began testing through the mountain of earbuds on the review shelf, but none really fit the bill. I found most too uncomfortable to wear overnight. They’d either wake me up as I rolled onto my side, or I’d wake in the morning with an odd pain in my ear canals. Of all the standard earbuds designed for running or commuting, the only ones that were comfortable enough to wear in bed were Jaybird's Tarah, but only just.

Bose recently released a pair called noise-masking Sleepbuds. They’re in-ear buds, and are more comfortable than most, but I still found my ears felt something like fatigue after waking up with them. Bose Sleepbuds come with a mobile app loaded with white noise designed to mask the noises around you but, frustratingly, you cannot stream anything but this collection of white noise. I prefer to fall asleep to a podcast, so the Bose were not for me. And at $379, they seem far too expensive for such a niche product.

I then found a pair of headphones called SleepPhones, available online for $159. They’re designed like a sweatband, with two very thin speakers and a small, removable Bluetooth and battery unit stuffed inside. There's also a cheaper, corded version.

The speakers look not much better than headphones you might’ve used with a walkman back in the eighties, although much thinner. They sound pretty flat, with almost no bass to speak of, but that is probably for the best, considering their role.

SleepPhones are incredibly light and comfortable, perfect to wear in bed. The headband design doubles as an eye mask, further aiding in sleep. Since finding them, I’ve been falling asleep in minutes after getting into bed. More impressive, on a recent long haul flight — jammed up the back of the plane in economy — I was still able to fall asleep and stay asleep, thanks to the SleepPhones. They offered no noise cancelling of course, but the combination of eye mask and a white noise app was enough to shut out the plane around me.