On Tuesday, May 15th, the internet had another meltdown, only this time it wasn’t about a poorly-lit photo of a dumb dress. This debate is like the dress debate, only it’s about a computer voice saying the word “Laurel.” Or Yanny, depending on how f–king crazy you are!! Seriously, people, how can you not hear the “L” sound??? Here’s the audio clip that was driving everyone insane on the internet:
What do you hear?! Yanny or Laurel pic.twitter.com/jvHhCbMc8I
— Cloe Feldman (@CloeCouture) May 15, 2018
Laurel. Laurel. Laurel. So how did people get Yanny? I don’t know. Truly. Some people suggested that the volume by which you listen to the clip affects what you’re hearing, and other people suggested that various computers and phones might have a different “pitch” which is throwing off the word:
Yanny or Laurel. It's all about the pitch https://t.co/J9pxpLNItC pic.twitter.com/oxeFOpA21m
— Mother Jones (@MotherJones) May 15, 2018
In that one, I can hear “Yary” (rhymes with “Gary”) but still not Yanny. This is tearing people apart. #TeamLaurel
It’s Not Yanny. It’s Laurel.
— DiGiorno (@DiGiorno) May 15, 2018
We’re team Laurel all the way. https://t.co/uTPBwB3X9C
— How To Get Away ABC (@HowToGetAwayABC) May 15, 2018
it's so clearly laurel. I can't even figure out how one would hear yanny.
— christine teigen (@chrissyteigen) May 15, 2018
Laurel.
— Zedd (@Zedd) May 16, 2018
It may be 4:26 am… and I may be bleary … but it is so clearly “yanny” that I am confused how laurel is even an option?
— Hoda Kotb (@hodakotb) May 16, 2018
Literally everything at my show just stopped to see if people hear Laurel or Yanny. I hear Laurel. https://t.co/efWRw1Gj0L
— Ellen DeGeneres (@TheEllenShow) May 15, 2018
Photos courtesy of Pexels.com.
this is stupid, but I’m with Chrissy Teigen. it’s clearly Laurel.
yes, it’s saying Laurel.
however, at higher pitches, it sounds like Yanny.
I heard Yanny on my phone, but there are twitter posts where people play with the sound levels on their computer speakers and adjust it so it says Laurel when the bass is up and Yanny when the bass is down.
scientific explanation but OMG IT’S LIKE A TOTAL MYSTERY MAN.
I listened to it on two devices, fiddled with the bass (and all other) settings, not to mention the volume… It CLEARLY says YaMMi or YaRRi every time.
It is about pitch, of course, but I don’t think the bass/volume has much to do with it.
ex mel, it could also be a combo of the bass/no bass and one’s own hearing abilities.
some folks can hear higher frequencies better (think, like a canine) and others can hear lower frequencies better (like an elephant can), so perhaps a combo of your frequency-hearing abilities AND the bass/no bass?…
all I know is I listened to it while the bass and other settings were adjusted and I heard a difference for each one.
I hear both at the same time! I hear “yanny” in a higher pitch cartoony voice and “laurel” in a deeper voice.
Same here. We’re clearly the most bestest and abundantly blessed.
I hear Yanny, too…
They played in on the news this morning, in various tones, but it was still Yanny to me!
Yanny. The first time I’ve ever heard Laurel is in the clip above when they payed both
I’ve listened to it like a dozen times and I very clearly hear Yanny! I hear zero L sounds. Even when I try to force my brain by thinking or whispering “laurel” along with the audio.
Weird!
I hear yammy. I don’t even hear the nn but an mm.
The 2nd video i hear both.
I just replayed it and now i hear laurel but the person next to me heard yanny.
Honestly.. I heard “Yelly” like Jelly.
I also saw that dress as more of a blend between the options and not an extreme to either choice. So, idk. Maybe my brain is just as indecisive as I act.
I’m with Florc, I heard “yelly”
i hear yermy. something like that. neither a clear yanny nor laurel. more yanny, if pressed, but not a peep of laurel
Same here: YaMMy (sometimes with a hint of R). On different devices.
I am suspecting a prank.
My husband also hears “Yammy ”! All I can do is laugh!
A blend for sure. Place me on the No clear side team
Yanny, loud and clear.
Same. I hear Yanny.
Yanny.
I hear a very clearly enunciated Yanny, like someone speaking on an ESL listening lesson to be sure it’s SUPER CLEAR. The Laurel thing is baffling.
I’m going with different browsers/devices doing different things. No other explanation in my mind.
No, I listened to it in three different browsers, on two devices. I hear YAMMY/YARRY.
Same for me. I try to hear laurel, but it is not there at all! It is so clearly and unmistakably Yanny that I’m wondering if people are trolling. Weird.
I could only hear Laurel yesterday no matter how hard I tried to hear yanny. Then last night right before bed I played it one more time and heard yanny (actually yammy) and I was completely unable to hear laurel. Then this morning it’s back to laurel. I’d recommend listening to it randomly at different points throughout the day and see if it changes for you.
What is so crazy is that when I heard laurel I could say it out loud and perfectly sync up with the recording saying it, then last night I was able to do the exact same thing with yammy. If I hadn’t experienced both of them like that, I wouldn’t believe it either.
I think they had two words, recorded then pasted over each other. If you have a device that plays higher pitches louder, you’ll hear one thing. If your device has more bass, you’ll hear another. Also, age changes the pitches we can hear. Older folks can’t always hear the highest pitches.
I’m 32 and my bf is 35. Sitting next to each other he heard Laurel and I heard Yanny. I’m so frustrated I want to hear both!
I don’t know if Ellen De Generes qualifies as “older” – she is 60 – but she heard LAUREL. Much younger people heard YANNI (or YAMMI, or YARRI).
I only hear yanny. I think I might be broken, because I also clearly saw a white and gold dress. Sigh.
Yammy here. And if it’s any consolation, I saw a blue AND gold dress.
Lol I also saw a white and gold dress and I can only hear yanny
LOL! Thanks guys – it makes me feel better to know I’m not alone 🙂
Me too…or something close to it. Definitely not Laurel.
i only heard laurel 2/3 into the 2nd video.
yanny for me.
Omg. I just listened through my bose headphones and I thought how could anyone hear Laurel?! The word starts with a Y and has an N in the middle! Wtf. But, then I listened to the mother jones clip and it was clearly ‘yanni’ at the low pitch and ‘laurel’ higher.
What!? I hear “Yanny” clear as a bell. Laurel? Not even close! I’m with Hoda. Don’t understand how “Laurel” is even an option.
I find this hilarious…I’ve listened to it a million times and all I hear is laurel, I don’t understand how anyone would possibly hear anything else. So weird
LOL!!! So crazy! I’m obsessed with this now. Lol.
So, I have listened to it every which way. Loud, soft, medium…different devices. Yanny Forever! [insert Wakanda handshake]. 🙂
No, but seriously. Even on the second recording, with the different pitches, I don’t hear “laurel” — at all!
Probable obsession for the day: What else do we all hear completely differently!?
It’s Laurel. How are people hearing yanny? I’m sure it’s one of those made up things to get people going. There is no yanny in this clip.
It’s not one or the other, it’s both. I’ve heard it both ways and each time I could not hear the other word no matter how hard I tried. It’s the auditory version of the young lady/old lady drawing.
If you can’t hear the other word, I’d recommend listening to it at random times throughout the day without any expectation of what you’ll hear. I finally heard yanny right before bed last night and laurel was completely gone, now it’s back to laurel.
LOL, ISSAQUEEN! Not made up; I feel the same exact way as you, except I do not understand how Laurel is an option.
Well now the word laurel sounds weird to me, but it’s definitely laurel.
For me it was CLEARLY Yanny. Then I listened really hard to the lower tone until I heard laurel. Then I went to sleep. When I woke up I saw this nonsense on Facebook again so I had to give it another listen… ONLY LAUREL NOW! I can’t even hear Yanny if I try. I want my Yanny back! This is some weird shit.
I hear Yanny lol, I don’t know if it has to do with the fact that I speak another language.
I hear YANNY !!!!! HOLY SH!T!!
Me too!!!
Yanny on the original, but I can hear both on the pitch examples.
Same
Same. I heard Yanny every time until the +8 and +5 semitone.
Same, only at 8 and 5 is laurel
My boyfriend and I listened on the same device. He heard laurel and I heard yammy, actually.
Clearly laurel.
Please I beg of the organizers, do not play this clip when Dotard, Kim and Xi are in my country!
When I heard this this morning on my phone, it was 10000% Yanny. But then when I listened to it on my work computer (…working hard today, clearly!), it was so clearly Laurel.
And there ends my helpful comment of the day!
Same!
I just listened to it, and I only can hear “Yanny”.
My husband and I listened to it on our separate phones at the same time-and on his it sounds like Laurel and on mine it sounds like Yanny.
It’s clearly about how you have your sound set up on your phone-especially the bass settings.
I can believe this. I totally heard Yanny – on one “square” of volume on an iPad.
I listened on the same phone and got both at different playings. Idk.
No, it’s a brain perception thing. I heard both words at different times on the same iPhone with the exact same volume.
I hear Laurel. However, if you watch this video, you can also hear Yanny. It’s about the frequency. It doesn’t fully explain WHY but it will make you realize you’re not loopy if you hear one or the other: https://youtu.be/c3GNT8Ac050
I watched that clip last night when I could only hear laurel (I eventually heard only yammy), but I still heard laurel when the guy was like “I hear yanny!” I can hear them both in it now. The human brain is a mystery.
As I was turning the volume up on my phone, I heard yanny. At full volume, very clearly laurel, so yeah, I think it is a volume thing.
I totally hear yanny *shrug*
Laurel. Not even remotely like Yanny at all.
I clearly heard Laurel the first time and then Yanny the second.
Laurel
A bigger mystery to me is what game was the NBA twitter watching last night? LeBron lost, guys.
LeBron definitely lost and not just by a point or two either. People on Twitter must’ve seen a different game than we did. We’ll keep on winning @lightpurple. Go Celtics!
C Us Rise!
LeBron’s teammates were sleepwalking through the game, especially in the second half. The Celtics are for real, time for everyone to catch up with reality!
Lifelong season ticket holder with the Celtics and after Gordon went down in Game 1, FIVE minutes, in Game 1, we figured this would just be a fun learning season with Kyrie teaching the kids. When Kyrie went down, we figured they would go out in Round 1. Smart and Brown are both playing hurt. Smart is hurting physically & emotionally. Every win is a hard earned gift with these kids. Ice water flows through their veins. They don’t know they’re supposed to bow to LeBron. They don’t care. True Celtics
Laurel. I listened to it both on my computer and my phone. I will say that the VERY first instance of it on my phone sounded like “yanny,” but immediately afterwards, the lower bass tones picked up and it sounded like laurel every time after that. So it’s likely that people hearing “yanny” just have bad bass reception on their speaker, lol.
I clearly heard Yanny and nothing else
+1
I have a theory that someone is trolling the internet and putting out different sounding videos just to mess with people. I’ve heard both yanny and laurel so 🤷♀️
I heard them both from the same clip at different times, it’s just a brain perception thing
#TeamYanny
I hear Laurel but my partner hears Yerry haha!
I hear “Yary” like you Kaiser, in like a French accent lol . I don’t hear a clear Yanny or Laurel. And are we pronouncing Laurel like Lorelei from Gilmore girls? Or are we pronouncing it like L-ARE-el? I’m confused.
ETA: I listened to one where they sped it up super fast and I for sure hear Laurel like Lorelei but when it’s slow I still hear “Yary” with a French accent lol. No Yanny ever, I don’t hear the letter N at all.
Ok I just have to add that I just listened to it on my iPad. Sounded like Yary again then I watched another video and went back and now it’s clearly LAUREL!! This is freaking me out. And on that second video I can’t now hear both. Maybe I couldn’t hear Laurel at first because I had just woken up and I sleep with a sound machine all night??
Low volume it’s Yanny. Turn up the volume and it’s clearly Laurel.
I’m clearly insane, because I just keep hearing “jerry”.
If you’re insane, so am I. Although for me it’s more like “yerry”
I’m team “Yary”. It sounds nothing like Laurel. But it doesn’t sound like Yanny either, it’s clearly an “r” sound in the middle.
Then I listened to the Mother Jones tape that plays the different pitches. The ones at the very end “semitones” do sound like Laurel.
I hear Yanny unless I crank the volume way up, and then I hear both.
I didn’t hear Yanny, I heard YAMMY at first, the M sound clear as a bell in a high cartoony voice. Then I noticed “Laurel” kicking in at the end in a lower bass tone. So I can hear both depending on how I train my brain. I haven’t played around with volume and device but I do think it depends how high the bass is turned up on your audio and is a volume/pitch thing depending on what device you are listening to the audio.
Listening to it at full volume on my brand new MacBook Pro…It sounds like “Yelly”
Same. I don’t hear any of the options, and thought it said Larry first.
I listened on my phone and clearly heard Laurel.
Is it like the dress thing, where it can depend what device you’re using and what photo you were looking at?
I think it is exactly like the dress thing. The bigger mystery is why so many people are utterly obsessed with this? I guess maybe people need a distraction from the otherwise generally nasty and political nature of social media these days?
Bingo, Esmom, on all counts. We need mindless distractions to allow our brains some time to heal from actual reality.
It’s like those drawings where you see a young girl until you suddenly see an old lady. It’s just a perception thing. It is easier for some people to hear the other word when the audio or volume is altered, but that is not what is causing the difference. You can play the clip on one device in a room full of people and some will hear one word and some will hear the other.
It has to do with frequencies. If you hear the higher frequencies you hear Yanny, if you hear lower frequencies better you hear laurel. I hear Yanny myself, my daughter hears yally.
Yep, this totally makes sense. I just played it on my computer so my husband could hear it at the same time and the same device, I clearly heard Laurel, he clearly heard Yanny. I have slight hearing loss in one ear and have a hard time with higher frequencies now.
What about for the people who hear both at different times? I was laurel yesterday, yammy last night, and laurel today until five minutes ago when it switched back to yammy. Same phone, same clip, same volume, and it switches back and forth for me. I think it’s just a random brain perception thing.
The first clip I heard “Yanny” the second one I heard “Yary”. I don’t hear laurel, but in my defense I have a hearing impairment and certain pitches I can’t really hear or make out so that might be why I don’t hear Laurel.
I hear both, a higher pitched yanny over a deep pitched laurel. But both clearly distinctable.
I hear Laurel, but I can understand why people are hearing Yanny. The clip sounds almost echo-y. Here’s something cool to try. Make a loose fist and put it thumb-side to your mouth, and say “girl girl girl.” It will sound like you’re saying “doy doy doy.” Why? I don’t quite know but I think that’s what’s happening here too.
For a long time when I could only hear laurel, I could also hear almost a simultaneous whisper of yanny over laurel. But when it really changed to yanny/yammy for me, it was not the same whisper, it was distinctly yanny/yammy with no trace of laurel. So bizarre.
Laurel! But I wish I could hear that high-pitched Yanny too.
Oh did hear Yanny after all! Right after Laurel, very quiet.
It’s CLEARLY “Laurel” on the original but you can hear “Yanny” in Mother Jones’ pitch tweet.
First time I heard it I heard Yanny and so did the five other people around me. Listened to it two hours later and haven’t heard anything other than Laurel now and I feel crazy.
Same. It is insane. I was 100% laurel until right before bed last night, I gave it one more shot and suddenly it was so clearly and distinctly yammy. I was in disbelief, I could not hear laurel at all. What’s weird is that I could say it out loud with the recording and each time I felt like I was completely synced up with the guy.
I heard ‘yelly’.
Ok, there is something wrong with me. I don’t hear yanny or laurel. I hear leary or leery. I’m going deaf:(
I didn’t know this debate was going on. Damn royal wedding got me distracted.
All I hear is Yammy!
I heard Laurel as well. But playing around with pitch I could hear a very nasally yanny.
When I started playing the clip, my volume was really low so I heard Yanny, but I’m thinking only because the higher pitched sounds /part of the word comes through better if my volume is low, right…? Cuz when I put the volume up so I could hear it better, it was clearly Laurel, because I could hear the lower/bass sounds… of the word… if that makes sense.. anyway it’s Laurel!!!!
I heard Laurel clear as day the first time, but now I can only hear Yanny. Even when i try to trick myself into hearing Laurel, still Yanny. So weird!
When I played that clip, I heard Laurel. But on Kyle Maclachlan’s instagram, it sounds more like Yelly.
Insane. I’ve listened to this thing a dozen times on two devices and can’t imagine how anyone could possibly be hearing “Laurel.”
I’ve listened to it over and over again, on phones, tablets and a laptop, and I can hear absolutely no L, so I also can’t imagine how anyone is hearing “Laurel.” I’ll probably drive myself crazy trying to hear what others are hearing
I year yelly.
YANNY! Its too pitchy to be Laurel, Laurel has a round soft sound…
Both.
I’m not a English native speaker and I hear Laurel but I prefer the Spanish pronunciation is more beautiful in my opinion
It’s Yanny for me.
I clearly hear only Yanny.
The first time I listened to it I could only hear Laurel. I asked my husband what he heard without giving him any details on what it was and he said Yammy. 2 hours later I listened to it again and could only hear Yammy. So I have no idea why it changed on me, but I’ve heard both, but when I hear one I can ONLY hear that one. So strange!
I wasn’t going to get involved in this silliness, but my local news decided to cover it. They just played the clip, and I clearly heard “YANNY”. My husband says he heard it as well.
I can hear both. 😀
My brother in law and I hear YARRY
You hear both!! Think about which one and you will hear it!