Pros and cons of elastic vs ties for face masks

The large majority of facemasks have elastic that goes around the ears. We have instead developed facemasks that use ties which one ties behind the head and the neck. 

Pros of elastic face masks

In our experience, it is much faster to put on a facemask with elastics. No need to tie anything and make knots behind your head. 

Cons of elastic face masks

However, experience shows that wearing a mask with elastic around the ears for a few hours hurts the ears.

People have even 3d printed pieces to relieve elastic face mask wearers from the elastic pressure on the ears. Ears are fragile and are not built or used to constant pressure for hours at a time. Here is an example:

In addition, elastics are usually a single size fits all. So for people with smaller heads, the face mask may not be tight enough and for people with larger heads, the facemask may be too tight or hurt the ears more than necessary.

Cons of tie face masks

The main con of face masks with ties is that it takes a minute to put on. You have to knot the ties behind your head. Therefore if one needs to put on and take off a mask quickly or many times it is a problem. In this case, we have been lowering the mask and putting it back up while keeping it tied the entire time.

In addition, if you tie them and untie them, again and again, the ties may get a little damaged over time.

Pros of tie face masks

However, we find that ties have three large advantages:

1. Every person can tighten the face mask to their liking.

2. The ties do not put pressure on your ears and you can wear a face mask with ties for a long time comfortably.

3. One can separately adjust the tension of the top tie vs the lower tie. So you can make the mask tighter around the nose or loser around the nose independently of what you do around the chin or mouth. 

Two tricks for facemasks with ties

The first trick for face masks with ties is to make sure the top ties do rest on top of your ears. This way the mask will stay high without having to make the ties too tight.

The second trick is that you can rotate the face mask around your head if you need to look at the knots and maybe sometimes to get out of a tight knot situation.