Headphones are a Rare material item. They are not equipment you wear and they do not change audio or detection in any way. In practice, they exist for one purpose: recycling or salvaging into crafting components.
You’ll usually find them while looting buildings, mixed in with other household electronics. Most players treat them as mid-tier loot. They are not rare enough to feel special, but not common enough to ignore without thinking.
In actual gameplay, Headphones show up most often in:
Residential buildings
Commercial interiors
You’ll typically find them on shelves, desks, or inside containers where other electronics appear. If you are doing a slow, methodical building clear, you will see them regularly. If you focus only on high-risk outdoor areas, you may see fewer.
They do not require special tools or enemies to obtain. If you can safely loot an interior, you can find Headphones.
This depends on your current situation in the raid.
Headphones have a weight of 2.0 and stack up to three. That makes a full stack fairly heavy for what they provide. Early in a raid, when your inventory is mostly empty, they are usually worth grabbing. Later on, when weight starts to matter, players often compare them directly with other recyclable electronics.
In practice, most experienced players ask themselves two questions:
Do I still need Rubber Parts or Speaker Components?
Do I have space for something heavier later?
If the answer to both is “yes,” Headphones often get dropped.
When recycled, Headphones give:
Rubber Parts
Speaker Components
The Rubber Parts are the main reason players recycle them. Speaker Components are useful, but they drop from multiple electronic items, so they are usually not the limiting factor.
If you salvage instead of recycle, you only get a Speaker Component. Because of that, most players recycle Headphones unless they specifically need a single component fast.
Headphones sell for a fixed coin value, which is consistent but not high compared to their weight. Selling them makes sense only in a few cases:
You are short on coins and already stocked on materials
You extracted multiple stacks and want quick currency
You don’t currently have recipes that use their materials
Most players recycle Headphones early and mid-game. Coins become easier to earn later, while Rubber Parts are often a bottleneck for crafting.
Headphones are part of the background economy of Arc Raiders. They don’t unlock anything by themselves, but the materials they produce feed into many recipes.
If you are working toward unlocking or crafting new gear, you will eventually run into recipes that quietly depend on recycled electronics. This is where items like Headphones matter.
Many players start paying attention to them once they begin chasing specific upgrades or arc raiders blueprints. At that stage, even “boring” items become valuable if they move you one step closer to a build you want.
Usually, no.
Most veterans don’t target Headphones specifically. Instead, they farm areas that naturally produce electronics. Headphones come along as part of that route.
A typical pattern looks like this:
Clear residential interiors
Loot everything electronic
Recycle later based on current needs
If you find yourself actively hunting Headphones, it usually means you’re missing Rubber Parts and have already exhausted better sources.
In practice, players compare Headphones to items like speakers, consoles, and other consumer electronics.
Headphones sit in the middle:
Better than very light junk items
Worse than high-yield electronics
Their main downside is weight efficiency. Other electronics sometimes give similar materials at a better weight-to-output ratio.
Because of that, experienced players often replace Headphones later in a raid if they find something more efficient.
Storing Headphones in your stash is usually not ideal. Since they are easy to find and only convert into basic materials, most players recycle them immediately after extraction.
Keeping raw Headphones only makes sense if:
Your recycler is busy
You plan to batch recycle later
You are managing limited stash space carefully
Otherwise, converting them into materials keeps your inventory cleaner and more flexible.
New players often make a few predictable mistakes:
Treating them like a special item
Carrying them too long and losing them on death
Selling them early and then lacking materials later
Headphones are not exciting, but they are consistent. Once you understand their role, you stop overthinking them.
The best way to think about Headphones is as a steady material source, not a goal. They are part of the normal loot loop: find, recycle, move on.
Experienced players don’t remember specific runs because of Headphones. They remember the runs where having enough Rubber Parts made the difference. Headphones quietly contribute to that.
If you loot buildings regularly and recycle smartly, you will get value from them without ever focusing on them directly.
If you are unsure whether to pick up Headphones, default to this rule:
Early raid: pick them up
Late raid: replace them if needed
They won’t win fights or change outcomes by themselves, but over time, they support your progression. That’s their real use in Arc Raiders.
[Station Material Bundles] Medical Lab level 1 to 2 | Global
