Why Do I Hear a Clicking Sound in My Head When I Walk?

Hearing a soft click or thump in your head with each step is usually your own body being heard from the inside, not a sound from outside. Your skull carries vibrations from your feet, jaw, and muscles straight to your inner ear.1PubMed. Bone conduction experiments in humans – a fluid pathway from bone to ear So anything that changes how your ear handles those inner vibrations can suddenly make ordinary body noises stand out. In a small number of people, a gap in the bone around the inner ear turns these sounds up, and that cause is worth checking.

How Each Step Reaches Your Ears

When your heel hits the ground, a brief jolt travels up your legs and spine to your skull.2PubMed Central. Skeletal transients on heel strike in normal walking with different footwear Hard-soled shoes pass on more of that jolt than cushioned ones.

From there, vibrations in the skull can pass into the fluid around the brain and spread into the fluid of the inner ear.3PubMed. Bone conduction experiments in humans – a fluid pathway from bone to ear Your hearing organ picks them up as real sound, even when nothing reaches your eardrum. The same route is why your own voice sounds deeper to you than it does on a recording.

People around you don’t hear any of this because the click travels inside bone, and almost none of it leaves your body as sound in the air. Chewing crunchy food works the same way: it sounds loud to you and quiet to everyone else.4Inspire Dental. Why does my dental implant make a clicking sound when I chew?

The sound has probably always been there, but your brain normally filters it out. A quiet room removes the background noise that usually covers it, and a new pair of shoes or a harder floor can push it over the line into being noticeable.

A harmless walking click is usually a soft thud or tick in time with each footfall. It stops when you stand still, it’s similar in both ears, and it changes with your shoes or the floor surface.

Earbuds, Earplugs, and Blocked Ears

Filling the outer ear canal makes your voice, chewing, and footsteps sound hollow or booming.5PubMed. Occlusion effect Sound from your body that would normally leak out of the open canal gets trapped and builds up pressure inside it.6PubMed. The Occlusion Effect and Ear Canal Sound Pressure Level Some people with earbuds in are bothered by their own footsteps or even hear their heartbeat.7PubMed Central. A Technique for Estimating the Occlusion Effect for Frequencies Below 125 Hz

The boost is mostly a low-pitched effect, which is why footsteps and your voice turn into a dull thud or boom rather than a sharp click. Deeper, snugger fits trap more of that low-frequency energy than shallow ones, so the same earbud can sound different depending on how far in you push it. Re-seating it a little shallower is a quick, free way to see whether the thud changes.

Earwax or swelling from a cold can block the canal in the same way. Footsteps that suddenly seem loud in one ear can be one sign of wax in that ear, though other causes on this list also affect one ear.

A simple test: walk with your earbuds in, then take them out and walk again. If the thud drops sharply without them, the blocked-ear boost is the likely cause. You can also press a fingertip gently into one ear while walking to hear the same effect. If nothing changes, look for something other than a blocked canal.

To ease the effect, try open-style earbuds, which leave the canal partly open. Hearing-aid users can ask their audiologist about venting the earpiece. Softer shoes also reduce the jolt that starts the sound.

For wax, cotton buds tend to push it deeper and can worsen the blockage. Over-the-counter softening drops can help a mild buildup, and a doctor or nurse can remove stubborn wax. See someone quickly if the blockage comes with pain or discharge.

An Ear Tube That Stays Open

The Eustachian tube links the back of the nose and throat to the middle ear, and its main jobs are to even out pressure and let fluid drain. It normally stays shut and opens briefly when you swallow or yawn. Being closed most of the time shields the ear from sounds travelling up from your throat, such as breathing and your voice.

When it stays open, those sounds have a direct route to the eardrum, so they seem to echo inside one ear. Almost everyone with it hears their own voice too loudly, and over 9 in 10 hear their own breathing.8Otology & Neurotology. Patulous Eustachian Tube Dysfunction: Patient Demographics and Comorbidities About half feel fullness in the ear, and about 1 in 7 hear crackling or rumbling.9Otology & Neurotology. Patulous Eustachian Tube Dysfunction: Patient Demographics and Comorbidities About 1 in 4 find it worse with exercise, which fits noticing it while walking briskly.10Otology & Neurotology. Patulous Eustachian Tube Dysfunction: Patient Demographics and Comorbidities

A telling clue is relief when you lower your head. About two-thirds of people feel better when they tilt their head down.11Otology & Neurotology. Patulous Eustachian Tube Dysfunction: Patient Demographics and Comorbidities Some get relief by sniffing, and in about 1 in 12 a cold actually eases it.12Otology & Neurotology. Patulous Eustachian Tube Dysfunction: Patient Demographics and Comorbidities These changes help the tube close, for example by swelling its lining or increasing blood flow around it. Symptoms often get more frequent and last longer over time if nothing is done.13Otology & Neurotology. Patulous Eustachian Tube Dysfunction: Patient Demographics and Comorbidities

A blocked ear muffles outside sounds, while an ear tube that stays open makes your breathing echo, and you may hear each breath in time. Both can make footsteps louder, so the breathing clue helps tell them apart. Popping your ears repeatedly tends not to help because the tube isn’t stuck shut. If your own voice booms while other people’s voices sound normal, that points toward the open tube.

Several things are linked to it. Sudden weight loss can shrink tissue around the tube, and pregnancy and some hormone changes are linked to it. Dehydration and heavy exercise can worsen it. An ear, nose and throat doctor can look at the eardrum moving with your breathing.

Tiny Muscles in the Ear and Throat

Two tiny muscles in the middle ear can spasm, usually heard as clicking or buzzing.14PubMed Central. Middle Ear Myoclonus: Two Informative Cases and a Systematic Discussion of Myogenic Tinnitus People describe ticking, fluttering, thumping, or crackling like a grasshopper.15PubMed Central. Middle Ear Myoclonus: Two Informative Cases and a Systematic Discussion of Myogenic Tinnitus It tends to have a rhythm, steady or irregular, in one ear or both, and may come and go.16PubMed Central. Middle Ear Myoclonus: Two Informative Cases and a Systematic Discussion of Myogenic Tinnitus

Rhythmic twitching of the muscles in the roof of the mouth can rapidly open and shut the ear tube, making a click.17PubMed Central. Palatal Myoclonus Associated with Orofacial Buccal Dystonia This kind of clicking is uncommon.18International Journal of Clinical Case Reports and Reviews. Botulinum Toxin A for Clicking Tinnitus Associated with Palatal Myoclonus: A Case Report A doctor listening near your ear can sometimes hear it too.19PubMed Central. Palatal Myoclonus Associated with Orofacial Buccal Dystonia The twitch may shift pressure in the middle ear and make the eardrum flutter.20PubMed Central. Focal Unilateral Palatal Myoclonus Causing Objective Clicking Tinnitus without Uvula Elevation Diagnosed by Concurrent Auscultation

A muscle twitch doesn’t mean a nerve disease; most of the time it is a benign annoyance, though it should still be assessed.

A muscle click keeps its own rhythm whether you walk or stand still. It often happens at rest, not only when your feet hit the ground, and it may change with yawning, swallowing, or loud sounds.

Stress, tiredness, and heavy caffeine intake are commonly reported to make muscle spasms of many kinds worse, so they are reasonable things to track. Loud noise can trigger the middle ear muscles to tighten, so a click that follows sudden sound may be one clue to that cause.

When you see a doctor, say whether the click keeps going when you stop walking, whether someone else has ever heard it, and whether your jaw or palate twitches when it happens. A short phone recording and a diary of when the clicks occur help too.

A Thin Spot in the Inner Ear Bone

In a condition called superior canal dehiscence, the bone covering one of the inner ear’s balance canals is too thin or missing. The inner ear is normally a sealed system, so pressure and vibration are directed to the hearing organ in a controlled way. A thin spot in the inner ear bone acts like an extra opening, causing both hearing and balance symptoms.21PubMed. Clinical manifestations of superior semicircular canal dehiscence Vibrations get an extra pathway, so internal sounds like footsteps reach the inner ear more strongly than they should.

People are bothered by loud outside sounds and also by their own body sounds, which are abnormally amplified.22Seminars in Hearing. Hyperacusis as a Symptom of Superior Semicircular Canal Dehiscence Examples include hearing your own footsteps, eye movements, or heartbeat.

Dizziness or the world moving when you hear loud noise or strain is a classic sign. The affected canal is part of your balance system, so changes in pressure and sound can stimulate it when they shouldn’t.

Harmless footstep sounds rarely come with dizziness. Hearing your eyes move or a pulse in one ear is unusual and points away from a simple cause. Symptoms are usually in one ear, though the gap can occur on both sides.

The problem is usually confirmed with a detailed CT scan of the ear bone plus hearing and balance tests. Footstep sounds that come with these signs deserve an ear specialist’s assessment. When symptoms are severe, surgery can plug or cover the gap.23PubMed. Outcomes and complications in superior semicircular canal dehiscence surgery: A systematic review

This is a rare cause compared with blocked ears or an open ear tube. Many people with mild symptoms never need surgery, and learning what triggers the sound can help some people live with it.

Clicks From Your Jaw, Neck, and Teeth

The jaw joint sits just in front of the ear canal, so its movements are only a short distance from your hearing organ. Its clicks can feel like they come from the ear itself when the jaw is the real source.

Walking can trigger a jaw click because each footfall sends a small jolt up through the body, and a joint that is loose or irritated can shift slightly in response. Clenching your teeth while walking, often without noticing, can make this happen with each step.

To check, rest fingertips in front of your ears and open and close your mouth. A click you feel there points to the jaw. If the click disappears when you deliberately let your jaw hang loose as you walk, that points the same way.

To ease jaw clicks, avoid clenching and grinding during the day, and eat soft foods for a while to rest a sore jaw. A dentist may suggest a night guard and can check implants, crowns, or bite problems. See someone if the jaw locks or hurts.

When to See a Doctor

At the appointment, a GP will usually look in the ear for wax or infection first. You may be sent to an ear, nose and throat doctor, and hearing tests check both ears separately. Scans are kept for cases with warning signs.