Tinnitus is a fairly common symptom after COVID-19 — one survey of 1,331 former patients found 27.9% reported it — and it is more likely to persist when it starts out severe, though estimates vary widely.
Since early in the pandemic, tinnitus has been reported as one of the more common ear-related symptoms associated with COVID-19 infection, but as with much COVID-related research, the exact numbers depend heavily on how and when a study was done.
How common it is
Reported rates are all over the place, which is worth understanding rather than treating any single figure as definitive. A cross-sectional survey of 1,331 former COVID-19 patients found 27.9% reported tinnitus after infection. Other studies have reported rates as low as 1.2% and as high as 67%: reviews of medical records alone have put new tinnitus after infection anywhere from 1.2% to 23.2%, and the spread depends heavily on COVID-19 severity in the study population, how tinnitus was measured, and how long after infection people were surveyed. One cross-country survey found tinnitus prevalence rose over time, from 11.5% in the first week of infection to 26.2% in people with symptoms lasting more than six months — suggesting that for some people tinnitus is not just an acute symptom that resolves with the infection, but something that can persist or even develop later as part of a longer recovery.
Does tinnitus after COVID-19 go away?
It depends on how severe it is. In the survey of 1,331 former patients, the chance of natural recovery fell as tinnitus grade rose, and the most severe grade was also the most common, at 33.2% of those with tinnitus. Severe tinnitus was strongly associated with long-term hearing loss, anxiety and emotional difficulties. A history of tinnitus before COVID-19 also predicted poorer recovery (odds ratio 1.96), consistent with a pattern where the infection may reactivate or worsen an existing vulnerability rather than always creating an entirely new problem.
Why it might happen
The proposed mechanisms are still being investigated rather than settled, and several plausible explanations have been raised rather than one confirmed pathway: direct viral effects on the inner ear or auditory nerve, the general inflammatory response triggered by infection, and the indirect effects of the pandemic itself — disrupted routines, social isolation, and elevated stress, anxiety and depression, all of which are independently linked to worse tinnitus regardless of any direct viral mechanism.
A 2024 survey of 1,511 people with tinnitus points at the psychological side. Respondents were grouped by what they believed had caused their tinnitus: COVID-19 infection, long COVID, vaccination, or tinnitus that predated the pandemic. Tinnitus was less severe in the pre-existing group than in any of the COVID-associated groups, and across the COVID-associated groups, depression and anxiety explained the most variance in tinnitus severity. Disentangling "the virus affected my ears" from "the stress and disruption of getting sick made my tinnitus worse" remains difficult with the survey-based research available so far.
What to do if tinnitus started after COVID-19
The evaluation path doesn't need to be different from tinnitus with any other trigger: an audiologist can check for hearing loss, rule out other contributing causes, and start with the same evidence-based approaches used for tinnitus generally — sound therapy, addressing sleep and anxiety, and CBT if the tinnitus is significantly distressing. If tinnitus appeared alongside other lingering COVID-19 symptoms (fatigue, brain fog and similar long-COVID features), mention the full picture to whichever doctor is coordinating your care. The exception to "evaluate it like any other tinnitus" is a sudden drop in hearing alongside it, which needs urgent assessment rather than waiting to see if it settles; sudden sensorineural hearing loss explains why the timing matters.
The state of the research
This is a newer area of tinnitus research, and the evidence base, while growing quickly, is still built mostly on self-reported surveys rather than the controlled, long-term studies available for more established tinnitus causes. Expect the specific numbers here to be refined. Tinnitus reported after vaccination is a separate question from tinnitus after infection, with a separate and much smaller evidence base — tinnitus after the COVID vaccine keeps the two apart, which most coverage does not.