I bought this mute so I could practice in the evenings without disturbing anyone. It certainly does mute the violin so you can't complain about that. The issue for me is the sound that you get. When you put the mute on the bridge for the first time, you are really surprised by the sound you get (well I was anyway). The sound is pretty quiet - certainly quiet enough for evening practice, but the sound is really thin, strange and not pleasant to listen to. It does what it's supposed to, but for me, it's just not pleasant to listen to at all. This means that I only use this if I really need to practice something, but more often that not, I'll just practice the fingering on the left hand and not use my bow if I really need to. I much prefer the other orchestra mutes, but they don't reduce the volume to this extent of course. The mute is well made and basically it's a piece of heavy rubber, but I don't use it anywhere near as much as I had hoped.