Systems and methods are provided for measuring the distortion and muffling caused by a face mask. For example, in one embodiment a simulated voice source produces a sound. The sound is then acoustically coupled to a simulated vocal tract and a face mask. A microphone receives sound and produces a signal and an analyzer receives the signal from the microphone. A manikin head or other facial structure may also simulate fitting of the face mask onto a face. The analyzer may further produce a quantitative assessment of the distortion and muffling of the face mask, for example, by comparing at least one spectrum obtained with the face mask and at least one spectrum obtained without the face mask.