[rtpg]

I remember with a pair of earbuds getting a little informational thing on the correct volume.

Their rule of thumb is if you are incapable of hearing and understanding what people are telling you without taking out your earbuds, they're too loud.

I tried this out, and found that I'm actually fine with the volume bar being maybe 30% of what I used to. Basically, put your earbuds in, play some music, and try to talk to someone. If you're unable to then you might be playing your music way too loud.

(For people using earbuds to drown workplace noise out, I'd suggest an ambient noise program like noiz.io. You can train your brain to filter ambient background noise, and its better than trying to 1-up the sounds in your office)

[randlet]

"incapable of hearing and understanding what people are telling you without taking out your earbuds"

High quality isolating earbuds should make it pretty difficult to tell what other people are saying even with no music playing! Moving to a mid-range pair of Etymotic noise isolating earbuds was an absolute revelation for me and allowed me to use significantly lower volumes when listening to music. I can't recommend high quality isolating headphones/earbuds enough.