Sennheiser has been enjoying a good few months.

The HDB 630 made its debut in late 2025 to acclaim from our reviews team, who dubbed them some of the best wireless headphones they had heard at this premium level. A few months later, the Momentum 5 Wireless landed and, at their slightly lower price, matched their bigger brothers in earning the full five-star haul.

Great news for Sennheiser, then. But, with both premium wireless headphones accumulating significant plaudits, which do you go for? To make the decision easier, we have broken down each pair’s strengths and limitations across a range of parameters so that you can be sure you’re getting the Sennheisers that suit your needs.

Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless vs Sennheiser HDB 630: price

These are both premium wireless headphones, so you’re not going to be able to pick up a pair for the same price as your morning coffee order. Well, unless you happen to frequent a very boujee coffee shop.

At £330 / $400 / AU4749, the Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless are the cheaper of the two, with a price that undercuts that of many of the established cans at this level.

At £400 / $500 / AU$1000, the HDB 630 are slap bang in the middle of what we’d call classic premium territory – not overpriced, but certainly par for the course in the world of flagship wireless over-ears.

Still, they are undeniably more expensive than their younger siblings, so it’s the Momentum 5 Wireless winning this one.

**Winner: Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless**

Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless vs Sennheiser HDB 630: design and comfort

Sennheiser tends to have a pretty distinct design language, one that’s very much on display with both of these premium pairs.

The large oval earcups of the Momentum 5 Wireless and HDB 630 will be familiar to anyone who has seen a pair of recent wireless Sennheiser over-ears. Little touches, though, such as the attractive fabric exterior, do make the Momentum 5 actually seem a little more premium than the rather plain HDB 630.

The Momentum 5 Wireless are also a little smaller and lighter than their bigger brothers, weighing in at 290g compared with the 311g of the HDB 630. Much of that weight is housed in the HDB 630s’ earcups, which are chunkier and sport a deeper profile than those of the fifth-gen Momentums.

Comfort isn’t a problem on either pair, though. The Momentum 5 Wireless do cause some mild on-ear heating past the hour mark (many premium headphones of this type do), but we rarely experience that dull aching that you might suffer from with rivals sporting heavier weight or higher clamping pressure.

They are secure and stable, too. Even when we’re walking pretty briskly with the Momentum 5 Wireless clamped over our head, there’s little on-ear rocking or instability thanks to the headphones’ well-judged clamping force.

In fairness to the larger HDB 630, they are hardly a chore to wear either. Yes, they’re heavier overall, but the more costly cans do have slightly plusher ear padding, as well as a nicely cushioned headband, making for a comfortable, amply sealed listen.

Both pairs use touch controls rather than a predominantly button-based system, and we struggle to find any complaints with how they are implemented. We like that every touch action is acknowledged with a sound, that controls can be switched off via the app, and that our commands are responded to promptly whenever we tap or swipe on the right earcup.

It’s a tricky one. The Momentum 5 Wireless are lighter and more appealing to look at, but the HDB 630 do win back marks thanks to their slightly more luxurious earpads and headband. A tie seems like a fair result.

**Winner: Draw**

Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless vs Sennheiser HDB 630: features

Let’s start with the basics.

Sennheiser has gone big on battery life both both its premium players, with the Momentum 5 Wireless squeezing out 57 hours when active noise cancelling (ANC) is switched on and the HDB 630 just pipping them to the post with 60 hours under the same conditions.

On both, Multipoint Bluetooth is available for connecting to two devices simultaneously.

If you want spatial audio with the Momentum 5 Wireless, Dolby Atmos is on the menu when listening to supported Atmos content, with head tracking to be added via an upcoming firmware update. Be aware, conversely, that the HDB 630 don’t support spatial audio.

Dolby Atmos can be toggled on and off via the Sennheiser SmartPlus app, a platform which we find ourselves really admiring the more we use it. It’s clean and orderly, and we like the levels of customisation on offer, such as the eight-band custom equaliser and a slider for dialling up and down the strength of the ANC.

For the Momentum 5 Wireless, Bluetooth codec support is impressive, with support for the routine SBC and AAC codecs alongside higher-quality aptX HD, aptX Lossless and aptX Adaptive flavours. The cans currently use Bluetooth 5.4, but an incoming firmware update later in 2026 will push this to 6.0 and include LE Audio.

With the HDB 630, codec support comes down to the inclusion of the headphones’ included Bluetooth dongle. The HDB 630 bundle in a BTD 700 USB-C dongle that you simply plug into your smartphone device’s USB-C port to give it up to aptX Adaptive superpowers, even if the source device natively doesn't support a higher-resolution codec.

That means you can stream in aptX Adaptive quality from the usually-AAC-only iPhone, for example. You can check the quality of the signal path in the Sennheiser Smart Control Plus app’s settings, and you’ll want to ensure the ‘Audio mode priority’ is set to ‘Hi-Res 24bit/96kHz’.

You don't get Dolby Atmos with the HDB 630, but there is a ‘Crossfeed’ feature to blend left and right channels for what Sennheiser calls a “more natural sound” with certain recordings. A bass-boost button, which does exactly what you think it does, is available for both.

A close one again, with solid showings across the board. But we feel that the dongle, plus a slightly better battery life, tip things over into the HDB 630s’ favour.

**Winner: Sennheiser HDB 630**

Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless vs Sennheiser HDB 630: ANC and call quality

Noise cancelling is acceptable on both the Sennheiser HDB 630 and the Momentum 5 Wireless. It won’t be troubling the likes of the Bose QuietComfort Ultra Headphones (2nd Gen) or the Sony WH-1000XM6 class leaders, but each outshines the rather weaker efforts of the Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3.

In fact, there isn’t a huge amount to choose between the two Sennheisers. Each pair is capable of dealing with the basic humming of an air-conditioning unit during a hot day in May, all but blocking out that droning sound so that it doesn’t intrude upon our listening in any meaningful way.

Traffic noises prove a little trickier, but again, there isn’t a huge difference between the two. We feel that the HDB 630 offer a little more passive isolation due to their larger, plusher earpads, but standing next to a busy road sees both pairs dampening, not eliminating, the swooshing of cars as they pass by.

Low-frequency rumbles are perceptibly reduced, but again, they don’t disappear entirely, while high-end sound such as tweeting birds will often pass through.

Call quality is excellent no matter your choice. We take the Momentum 5 Wireless out for a chat on a blustery day, and our headphones effectively reduce intrusive wind and traffic noise while making human speech sound clear and natural.

The HDB 630 do a similarly fine job, and once again, voices come across as articulate and human rather than mechanical or robotic. Isolation is decent, too, so no need to worry about having to shout to be heard over surrounding noises.

**Winner: Draw**

Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless vs Sennheiser HDB 630: sound quality

If you like rich, smooth-sounding headphones that dig out plenty of detail and strike a fine balance precision and authority, the Momentum 5 Wireless could well be for you.

As we wrote in our review, the fifth-gen Sennheiser over-ears are “rich, smooth yet strikingly precise and detailed headphones, with an audio signature that makes listening a refreshingly undemanding experience. Sugar’s If I Can’t Change Your Mind can sound overly urgent or shrill... but the Momentum 5 Wireless have the poise and maturity to bring order to... chaos.”

If you’re after headphones that shine a sweet spotlight on your music’s midrange, the Momentum 5 Wireless demand an audition. The bass is full and a little on the rich side, but that poised midrange is a real highlight, offering a naturalness and insight that gives even more premium alternatives a run for their money.

Their qualities are further amplified when we use a wired connection, especially if you’re listening via USB-C for handling files up to 24-bit/96kHz. A wired connection lends further fullness and depth to instruments, while that outstanding midrange sounds sweeter and even more starkly defined.

In truth, the Momentum 5 Wireless never fatigue nor frustrate, instead letting music unfold naturally and precisely no matter the genre.

As you would perhaps hope, the step-up HDB 630 do take things up a notch. They’re a chunk more costly, but you’ll be rewarded handsomely by the sonic dividends that extra outlay grants.

In fact, these might well be the best-sounding premium headphones currently available – and that’s even before that clever Bluetooth dongle is in play.

Here, precision and analysis go hand in hand with drive and vigour, making for the most informative and entertaining sound we’ve heard from wireless headphones at this price, with or without the use of the dongle for higher-quality streams.

The HDB 630 are hugely natural and dare we say sophisticated-sounding wireless headphones, with a poise and precision that demands to be heard. As we wrote at the time, these Sennheiser premium cans are “wonderfully smooth and natural sounding headphones, full of shape and dynamism across the frequency range”.

Instrumental textures are replete with both depth and shape, and the HDB 630 are remarkably insightful at teasing out the emotional heart of our testing catalogue. Songs are conveyed with conviction and gusto, and the Sennheisers seamlessly switch emotional gears as they tackle our tunes with gusto and grace.

Yes, the Momentum 5 Wireless are detailed and well organised, but the HDB 630 really take things up a notch in practically all sonic departments. That becomes only truer when the dongle is called into action. And you’ll notice tangible gains in clarity and solidity when upgrading from, say, a standard AAC stream to full-fat aptX Adaptive.

However you listen, the HDB 630 are genuine benchmark-setters. The Momentum 5 Wireless are great, but the HDB 630 are ‘Great’ with a capital ‘G’.

** Winner: Sennheiser HDB 630 **

Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless vs Sennheiser HDB 630: verdict

If you can’t stretch to the HDB 630, the Momentum 5 Wireless are the logical step-down choice. They still provide excellent sound quality and bring plenty of high-performance features to enjoy, all while saving you £80 / $100 in the process.

That’s not an inconsiderable amount of money, so we completely understand why money-savvy buyers would – indeed should – pick the Momentum 5 Wireless over their bigger brothers if costs are a factor.

If you’re happy to spend more, however, go for the Sennheiser HDB 630. They are essentially in a sonic class of one at the moment, outshining not only the Momentum 5 but practically anything else we can think of at their level.

If sound is your top priority, there’s no real excuse for not checking them out.

** Overall winner: Sennheiser HDB 630 **

MORE:

Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless vs Sony WH-1000XM6: which premium wireless headphones are better?

Sony 1000X The Collexion vs Bowers & Wilkins Px8 S2: which premium headphones should you pick?

“Sound comes first” – we speak to Sennheiser about German engineering, changing ownership, and 80 years of making music

After more than five years of daily use, my AirPods Max recently stopped working.

I can't really complain. Between commuting, international travel and a house move, they'd spent years being stuffed into backpacks and suitcases before emerging to soundtrack thousands of hours of music and movies. They'd had a pretty hard life.

Rather than rushing to repair them, though, I saw an opportunity.

In the five years since I'd bought the AirPods Max, loads of exciting new headphones had launched. This felt like the perfect excuse to break away from Apple's ecosystem and find out whether anything could finally replace them.

Over the next couple of months, I spent time with headphones from Sony, Bose, Sennheiser and Bowers & Wilkins. Their relative strengths varied, but all of them sounded very accomplished with music. In the case of Sony's superb WH-1000XM6, I'd even argue the overall musical performance is better than that of the AirPods Max.

But this period of headphone flirtation had a surprising effect: my movie-watching almost ground to a halt.

For years now, I've used my AirPods Max at least as much for movies as for music. In fact, they've quietly become an essential part of my home cinema setup.

Once the rest of my family had gone to bed and it was no longer neighbourly to keep my Dolby Atmos system rumbling away, I had a simple routine. Rather than switching on Night mode and flattening every explosion, gunshot and orchestral swell, I'd put on my AirPods Max, tap the pop-up on my Apple TV 4K and carry on watching exactly where I'd left off.

The combination of the AirPods Max and Apple TV 4K remains astonishingly good. Their Dolby Atmos implementation, delivered through Spatial Audio with dynamic head tracking, creates an experience that's surprisingly easy to forget is coming from a pair of headphones. It doesn't simply sound spacious; it sounds uncannily natural.

And that's the bit I hadn't appreciated until the AirPods Max disappeared from my life. Every alternative I tried excelled with music, but none recreated that movie experience.

The closest I came was pairing Sony's WH-1000XM6 with the Bravia 8 II TV. It produced an impressively open and fairly cinematic presentation, but because the connection relied on standard Bluetooth, what I was hearing was ultimately a cleverly processed stereo signal rather than the sort of binaural Dolby Atmos experience that Apple's solution provides.

The difference wasn't night and day, but it was enough that I found myself missing the AirPods Max every time I settled down to watch a film, and that had a surprisingly big impact on my viewing habits.

If the family was asleep, I simply wasn't getting the experience I wanted. I wasn't about to hobble my main home cinema system with Night mode, but neither were the alternative headphones convincing enough to tempt me away from it.

Whether it's children, a partner or simply considerate neighbours, I suspect lots of people end up watching films after the house has gone quiet, and losing that window meant the number of films I watched absolutely tanked over the following weeks. I missed loads.

The good news is that I'm now making up for lost time, because I've managed to get hold of another pair of AirPods Max.

The whole experience taught me something I wasn't expecting, though: I'd quietly built my entire late-night movie-watching routine around one Apple feature.

That's not to say Apple has the only solution. Sony, for example, offers the little-known WLA-NS7 wireless transmitter, which promises a similar binaural Dolby Atmos experience with compatible headphones. I'll be testing that very soon.

But until something else can recreate what the AirPods Max and Apple TV 4K achieve together, they'll remain my favourite headphones for movies – even if some rivals have at least matched them when it comes to music.

MORE:

Here are the best wireless headphones you can buy right now

Check out our Apple AirPods Max review

Growing up in rural Wales, I spent my adolescence desperate for noise.

As a teenager, roaming the serene forests that surrounded my home in search of something – anything – to do, I was invariably accompanied by a headphone-rattling playlist of punk, rock and industrial music. My natural gravitation at the time was towards anything that shook things up, that challenged the serenity of my environment, and would, I suppose, give my folks a headache.

As I became an adult and my taste diversified, I nevertheless sought out places to live that fell in line with that desire for chaos. Naturally, London was my first choice: loud, relentless, sometimes frightening.

By that time, I was enjoying everything from Fela Kuti to Chopin, but amid the blaring interruptions of tube trains, traffic and street-preachers, I simply could not hear quieter tracks in my music library.

Inexplicably, I never considered seeking out noise-cancelling headphones. Having embraced the city’s clamor as an inalterable feature of my circumstances, I took up the habit of listening, almost exclusively, to music that was loud enough to drown London out. Back to punk, we go.

That all changed once I started writing about audio equipment for a living.

Within my first few weeks as a new staff writer at What Hi-Fi?, I took home a pair of Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless headphones.

A heatwave was in full force when I swapped my cheap earbuds for these more premium over-ear ANC headphones, and on the crammed train home from work, the air con was going hell for leather. Above the bustle and groans of commuters sweating through their work clothes, the AC was all but shrieking with the effort it took to cool the carriage down.

Usually, the cacophony would have droned through my music, even at full volume; but placing the Momentum 5 Wireless over my ears and then enabling their full active noise-cancelling mode, I was astonished to discover how completely the world fell away.

In our five-star review of the Momentum 5 Wireless, we mention that Sennheiser has taken pains to improve on the ANC of the Momentum 4 Wireless, using twice as many microphones (a grand total of eight) to achieve what it describes as “three times” better noise cancellation, particularly in the midrange. In our view, the improvements were a success, keeping “traffic, wind” and, crucially, “the hum of air conditioners” at bay.

As I’ve fallen into the habit of listening to music through the Sennheisers during my daily commute, an unexpected side effect of their excellent noise-cancelling has been that my appetite for sonic carnage has subsided.

In its place, I’ve started listening to classical music on a regular basis. I wasn’t formerly much of a classical listener, but with environmental sound cancelled so effectively, I have found myself enjoying the newfound ability to pick out the finer points in classical arrangements – and while commuting, at that. Needless to say, if not for trying these headphones, I would have remained oblivious to these details.

These days, among my daily listens are Ravel’s Piano Concerto in G Major, M.83: II. Adagio assai and Debussy’s La damoiselle élue, L.62: Prélude.

To my ear, each of these musical discoveries has been complemented by the Sennheisers’ sonic signature, which we describe in our review as “rich, smooth yet strikingly precise and detailed”. In La damoiselle élue, the reverberant piano conveys a striking sense of scale, giving you a sense of the space in which the piece is played, which only grows as the notes are struck harder.

But even at the gentlest touch, the Sennheisers remain expressive, thanks to the “naturalness and insight” of their midrange performance. Listening to these recordings, I even find that their bass reproduction, which we describe as “on the richer side”, lends a pleasant and proportionate weight to every note.

So, where once you might have found me blasting Black Flag, Einstürzende Neubauten and Swans, I will instead be exploring – and what’s more, thoroughly enjoying – the back-catalogues of Debussy, Wagner, Ravel, and even some ambient albums such as Thomas Köner’s Permafrost.

That’s not to say I’m ditching the punk, I get the feeling that our love affair isn’t quite at its end. But who knows, perhaps, thanks to excellent noise-cancelling and performance from headphones such as the Momentum 5 Wireless, I’ll get to keep my hearing intact for a few more moshpits yet.

MORE:

Read our Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless review

Best noise-cancelling headphones 2026 – tested by our in-house review experts

FiiO's noise-cancelling wireless headphones want to challenge Sony for entry-level supremacy

I've heard a lot of premium wireless headphones in the past few months. No, seriously, when I say a lot, I mean a lot.

The Sony WH-1000XM6, the Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless, the Apple AirPods Max 2, the Sony 1000X The Collexion, the Bose QuietComfort Ultra Headphones (2nd Gen), the Bowers & Wilkins Px8 S2; the list just goes on and on.

And yet, this Amazon Prime Day, I would pick one pair above all others. Those aforementioned headphones are all excellent, sometimes spectacular, in their own respective ways, but one pair stands head and shoulders above the rest: the Sennheiser HDB 630.

At £400 / $500 / AU$1000, they're not cheap, and discounts aren't exactly common, but if you see a drop this Prime Day, across any of the major retailers, I would urge you wholeheartedly to snap it up while you can.

In fact, even if they don't budge an inch, I'd still be urging you to get hold of the best wireless headphones Sennheiser has ever made.

It's going to be a crazy twist of fate if some of the best wireless headphones you can currently buy this Prime Day aren't currently available on Amazon. Well, it's their loss.

In truth, forget Prime Day and Amazon altogether. Forget discounts and price cuts, and even brand loyalty. Just remember one key fact: if you want the best premium noise-cancelling wireless headphones, you want the Sennheiser HDB 630. It's that simple.

Why? Well, mainly because these are sound-first headphones that have pushed the needle for how good Bluetooth over-ears can sound at this sort of price. The HDB 630 are exceptionally smooth and natural-sounding headphones, with a beautifully realised bass reproduction, a sweet, immersive mid-range and a crisp, sharply defined treble.

They're fun, dynamically adept and musically expressive, walking that tricky tightrope between analysis and entertainment with sure-footed precision.

Part of that quality comes from the Sennheiser's super-clever BTD 700 USB-C dongle that you simply plug into your device’s USB-C port to give it aptX Adaptive superpowers.

That means that any source device, including your iPhone, gains aptX Adaptive hi-res streaming up to 24bit/96kHz, even if it wouldn't natively support it. That is, quite simply, an absolute game-changer, and it works terrifically.

Plus, you get wired listening via 3.5mm and USB-C-ended cables, around 60 hours of battery life with ANC switched on, very solid noise cancelling, a luxuriously comfortable fit and very solid voice calls, all of which combine to make an exceptional all-around package.

We get that Prime Day should be all about Amazon and, of course, all about deals, but the HDB 630 are so exceptional that all sort of goes out of the window.

Discounts don't really matter (although they're great to see). Retailers don't matter. What matters is that, if you can, you pick up a pair of some of the best-sounding premium wireless headphones we've ever heard.

MORE:

Discounts galore! These are the best early Amazon Prime Day Bluetooth speaker deals

Amazon Prime Day 2026 Live Q&A: personalised hi-fi and home cinema buying advice, direct from our experts

Prime Day Predictions: the What Hi-Fi? team’s hopes, fears and dreams for Amazon Prime Day

Sennheiser has expanded its wireless mid-range Accentum roster with a brand new pair of clip-on earbuds.

The new Accentum Clip are the company's first-ever clip-on wireless buds, joining the Accentum Open from last year. They aim to offer Sennheiser's "signature" sound with a more "user-aware" form factor.

The Accentum Clip house is a set of 12mm dynamic drivers tuned "for clarity and punchy bass", with a "smooth treble that is delightful to listen to in long stretches".

The new Sennheiser buds use 'Dynamic EQ' tech, which aims to let the buds maintain sonic balance and prevent distortion, regardless of the volume they're playing at.

Similar to the configuration of the Bose Ultra Open Earbuds or the Huawei FreeClip 2, a flexible silicone bridge connects the main bud body with the battery cylinder. Sennheiser promises a "secure, barely there" fit from the new Accentum Clip thanks to each earbud weighing a measly 6.8g. For runners, an IP54 rating protects against dust and sweat.

Despite their clip-on design, the new earbuds still feature textured touch controls for handling the likes of volume adjustment and voice calls.

The latest addition to the Accentum roster boasts nine hours of battery life from the earbuds and a total of 36 hours with the case. Rapid charge technology lets you enjoy two hours of listening from 10 minutes at the mains.

The new clip-on buds feature Bluetooth 6.0, with standard SBC and AAC sitting alongside the higher-quality LDAC codec for streaming high-res audio up to 32-bit/96kHz from a compatible source device.

For voice calls, each earbud features a dual-microphone system paired with an AI noise reduction algorithm to isolate the wearer’s voice from background noise.

According to Friederike Menking, Accentum Clip's Product Manager: “In creating Accentum Clip, we wanted to elevate the standard of acoustic performance that open earbuds have traditionally struggled with. Whether you are tackling productivity, out on your own adventures, or managing the transitions in between, its thoughtful design empowers you to navigate your world without sacrificing the essence of your music.”

The Accentum Clip are available from 23rd July in Black or Cream colourways, priced at £149 / €179 / AU$290.

MORE:

"Sound comes first" – we speak to Sennheiser about German engineering, changing ownership, and 80 years of making music

The headphones World Cup: from Beats to Bose, which audio brands are winning over football's elite?

Check out our guide to the best wireless headphones we've tested and rated

We’re tempted to call Sennheiser the ‘dark horse’ of wireless headphones.

After all, our best buys have, in more recent times, been stacked to the brim with offerings from the likes of Apple, Bose and, more than any other, Sony, so it has been easy to forget the many qualities that Sennheiser brings to this particular slice of the audio terrain.

Let’s not forget, however, that this is a brand that has been around since 1945, a brand that, when not making the occasional microphone or soundbar, has built its reputation at the sharp end of both wired and wireless headphone production.

Perhaps ‘sleeping giant’ would have been a more apt moniker.

Admittedly, Sennheiser hasn’t quite been as prolific as its esteemed rivals when it comes to the actual volume of products sent to market. And the company’s ongoing search for a buyer since Swiss owner Sonova put its headphone division up for sale has naturally made waters all the choppier. From what we have seen of Sennheiser recently, though, it is still more than capable of taking the fight to the very best in the business.

The sound of success

We wonder if the release of the five-star HDB 630 will end up becoming something of a defining moment for Sennheiser.

Released just a few months before the announcement that the company’s headphone division was going up for sale – with some doom-mongers rather rashly predicting the death of entire brand – the audiophile-tuned HDB 630 now look like a major signal of intent.

We’ve always known that this is a brand capable of excellence in the wired space, though it had been a while since Sennheiser had properly flexed its wireless muscles. The soon to be phased out mid-priced Accentum line, including the Accentum Wireless and Accentum Wireless Plus over-ears, had failed to set the world alight, and it had been almost four years since we’d heard a hint of any addition to the premium Momentum Wireless range.

Rival standards were high, too. The Sony WH-1000XM6 looked unassailable at their £400 / $450 / AU$699 price, while the likes of Bowers & Wilkins, Bose, Apple and Dali were all also vying for the crown. Competition was, is, and probably always will be, incredibly fierce.

Yet the HDB 630 really pulled it out of the bag. Sennheiser’s outstanding cans set a new standard of wireless sound at this level, thanks in part to their clever bundled Bluetooth dongle, with a sonic performance that blew most of their competitors out of the water. Including Sony.

As we say in our review: “Here, precision and analysis go hand in hand with drive and vigour, making for the most informative and entertaining sound we’ve heard from wireless headphones at this price, with or without the use of the dongle.”

The Momentum 5 Wireless have repeated a similar trick, and while they’re not as boundary-pushing as the HDB 630, their aggressive price tag (£330 / $400 / AU$749) and rich, smooth sound make them a very fine alternative to the Sonys and B&Ws of this world.

Two five-star pairs with a strong focus on stellar sound and plenty of features in tow. If that isn't a warning to rivals to sit up and take notice, we don't know what is.

Take a chance on me

God loves a trier, but He also favours those who take a few risks.

It feels as though Sennheiser has recognised a need to innovate in order to get ahead of a crowded pack, and while the temptation to go in for zippy gimmicks and check-box features must have pulled hard, resisting such inclinations has paid dividends.

As has putting efforts into genuinely constructive innovation. We gave significant attention to the bundled Bluetooth dongle when reviewing the Sennheiser HDB 630 last year, and not without reason: it turned out to be the premium over-ears’ small-but-mighty secret weapon.

Essentially, it’s a clever little USB accessory that gives your phone or other audio source the same high-quality Bluetooth codec the headphones themselves support, meaning you have improved codec-support from devices which might not normally (we’re looking at you, iPhone) have supported them.

That’s a big deal, and as we wrote at the time, the “dongle proves a valuable accessory. When connected to an iPhone 16 and old Samsung Galaxy S21, upgrading their respective AAC and aptX connectivity with the headphones to aptX Adaptive, the presentation gains in clarity and solidity.”

The Momentum 5 Wireless have kept up with the times, too. There’s no dongle to be found, but with extensive codec support, wired listening via USB-C and 3.5mm, Dolby Atmos all on board, Sennheiser’s flagships have kept up admirably with the likes of the Sony WH-1000XM6 and the Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3. 57 hours of battery life with ANC on doesn’t exactly hurt, either.

The new Momentum 5 Wireless don’t necessarily have the most features of any premium pair, but in terms of quality, they’re up there with the best.

A case of re-taken identity

Perhaps ironically, and certainly impressively, Sennheiser seems to have re-found and re-established its identity at a time of not-inconsiderable uncertainty.

While the likes of the Accentum line and the disappointing Sennheiser Momentum Sport earbuds seemed to play it safe with a flat, tonally grey sound, the premium Momentum 5 Wireless and HDB 630 feel like Sennheiser returning to a place where it is the most confident and comfortable.

In fact, when we spoke recently to the German manufacturer about where it saw its future, there was a clear statement that the Momentum Wireless line would be a prospective listeners’ “entry point” into the world of Sennheiser sound.

From there, they could progress to the HDB 630 and beyond into even more premium and high-end wired options. But the message was clear: Sennheiser would be providing audiophile-type performance to proper enthusiasts.

It appears to be a sensible move. Sennheiser does great work when it targets this more audiophile-centric side of the landscape – just see the wired Sennheiser HD 820 for proof – and with so many brands already targeting mass production of cheaper, spec-heavy wireless earbuds and headphones, it make sense to stick to more rarefied territory.

And, from what we’ve heard, it’s what the company seems to rather good at.

Sennheiser’s resurgence feels like a good thing for the wireless headphones industry.

It’s good for customers to have a healthy number of options when picking out a potential product; it’s good for the market not to be strangled for a monopoly; and it’s good for rival companies to compete with one another for supremacy in order to push the needle of quality ever forward.

When working as it’s supposed to, that’s sort of the point of a free market, isn’t it?

Producing two or three excellent pairs of headphones doesn’t suddenly make you the king, especially with the likes of Sony putting out five-star headphones across the cost spectrum, over many successive years. What they do indicate, though, is that Sennheiser feels like a company finding its groove again, and, in the midst of a potentially turbulent time, re-establishing its identity amid a sea of change and challengers.

If a worthy successor to the Momentum True Wireless 4 earbuds also ends up landing later this year, we might end up looking back at 2026 as being the year of Sennheiser.

MORE:

Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless vs Sony WH-1000XM6: which premium wireless headphones are better?

"Sound comes first" – we speak to Sennheiser about German engineering, changing ownership, and 80 years of making music

Best noise-cancelling headphones tested by our in-house review experts

Sennheiser or Sony?

It's a tough question to answer, especially when both brands have put out two pairs of premium headphones – the Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless and the Sony WH-1000XM6 – adorned with glowing five-star reviews. How do you choose between two sets of over-ears from two brands working at the top of their game?

That question is only made harder by the fact that the Sennheisers are a chunk cheaper than the Sonys, meaning that price is becomes a new dimension to this already tricky conundrum. The Momentum 5 Wireless are newer, too, so now age becomes a factor to add to the mélange, and that's before we consider the usual aspects of sound quality, features, build, comfort etc.

It's a lot to consider, but don't worry, we're here to help. We've broken down the virtues and vices of these outstandingly capable noise cancelling cans to put you in the best position possible to find exactly what you're looking for.

Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless vs Sony WH-1000XM6: price

Competition at this level is fierce, but the Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless do have price on their side. At £330 / $400 / AU4749, they're cheaper than many of their premium rivals, and a good deal less than the £400 / $450 / AU$699 asking price of the Sony WH-1000XM6.

We'd caveat that slightly by mentioning the fact that the XM6's price can drop a little during sales events, though never so drastically as to come close to the price of the Sennheisers. Not yet, anyway.

In short, a clear win for the Momentum 5 Wireless for value.

** Winner: Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless **

Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless vs Sony WH-1000XM6: build and comfort

We're keen on the build and design of these rival pairs, though not necessarily for exactly the same reasons.

The Momentum 5 Wireless may be the cheaper of the two, but if anything they exude a higher perceived value than their slightly functional-looking Sony WH-1000XM6. Little touches, such as the headband’s attractive fabric exterior, go a long way to making the Momentum 5 Wireless feel more premium, and while the XM6 are well made, they keep things functional and decidedly un-flashy on the aesthetics front.

The fabric exterior of the Sennheisers' headband and carry case grant them a suave appeal, and our only real reservation is that the earcups feel just a little cheap and plasticky to the touch.

The Sonys are made pretty much entirely of plastic too, but their overall construction feels more durable and robust. They have the added bonus of folding away completely, something which the Momentum 5 can't do.

The WH-1000XM6 weigh in at 254g, a good deal lighter than the 290g of the Sennheisers, while their nicely judged clamping force and firm-yet-forgiving earpads rarely put our our ears under any undue strain or causing excess overheating over time.

To be fair to them, the Momentum 5 Wireless are also comfortable. We spend a long time listening to the Sennheiser over-ears, and though we find some mild on-ear heating past the hour mark, we generally don’t suffer with that aching feeling that can make extended listening a miserable experience.

Both over-ear designs feature a combination of touch-capacitative controls on the earcups and physical buttons. In both cases, haptics are expertly implemented, responding quickly and effectively to our commands when controlling playback or activating noise modes. You will, though, enjoy deeper levels of control customisation via the Sony Sound Connect app than via Sennheiser's Smart Control Plus platform.

This is a close one. The Sennheisers are a little more luxurious to behold, but the Sonys win back serious points for their portability, durability and greater control customisation.

** Winner: Sony WH-1000XM6 **

Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless vs Sony WH-1000XM6: features

Two pairs of premium headphones, two premium feature sets to match.

Bluetooth codec support is impressive across the board, with the Momentum 5 Wireless offering SBC and AAC codecs alongside higher-quality aptX HD, aptX Lossless and aptX Adaptive flavours. The Sennheisers currently use Bluetooth 5.4, but an upcoming firmware update later this year will push this to 6.0 and include LE Audio for reduced latency, better battery life and potentially boosted audio quality.

Conversely, the XM6 grant standard SBC and AAC and, of course, Sony's LDAC codec for streaming hi-res music at higher data rates over Bluetooth from a compatible device.

On Bluetooth, Multipoint connectivity is available on both pairs, meaning you can connect to two devices simultaneously.

Both grant app support, with respective platform a pleasure to use. The Sony app isn't the fanciest in the world, but it's certainly one of the most in-depth and customisable around, offering the likes of a 10-band equaliser and access to touch control personalisation. The Sennheiser SmartPlus app isn't quite as in-depth, but outmatches Sony for its usability and ease of navigation, and you're still able to perform useful actions such as tweaking your EQ settings or adjusting the amount of ANC you're getting via a handy slider.

Battery life is reasonably strong for the WH-1000XM6, reaching around 30 hours with noise cancelling switched on. That number is roundly beaten by the Momentum 5 Wireless: a very healthy 57 hours when noise cancelling is on and you’re playing at a reasonable volume is a very nice feather in Sennheiser’s cap,.

If you're into spatial audio, neither set will leave you feeling glum. The Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless have Dolby Atmos on the menu when listening to supported content, with dynamic head tracking to be added via an upcoming firmware update.

The WH-1000XM6 support Sony’s ‘360 Reality Audio Upmix’ tech, although you will have to go through a short set-up and ear scan if you want to make proper use of it.

Happily, you can listen to either pair via a wired connection. The Sony WH-1000XM6 grant wired listening via an included 3.5mm to 3.5mm audio cable, whereas the Sennheisers offer a wired option via either 3.5mm to 3.5mm or USB-C to USB-C, with the latter method capable of handling lossless files up to 24-bit/96kHz.

A good showing from Sennheiser, but Sony's flagship cans do have a few extra tricks up their sleeve. 'Speak-To-Chat', which drops the volume level when you start talking, is available on the WH-1000XM6, as is 'Quick Attention Mode' for letting you hear ambient sounds straight away by placing a hand on the exterior of the right earcup.

The WH-1000XM6 also make use of Sony's DSEE Extreme sound enhancement engine to bring poor-quality digital audio files nearer to high-res quality.

These two are roughly neck-and-neck when it comes to features: Sony might have a few more tricks up its sleeve that make daily portable use seamless, while Sennheiser's substantially longer battery life and inclusion of USB audio are major strengths.

** Draw **

Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless vs Sony WH-1000XM6: ANC and call quality

Sennheiser made a big effort to improve the noise cancelling for its new Momentum over-ears, with the fifth-gen cans using twice as many microphones (a total of eight) as their predecessors.

Those additions pay off. The Momentum 5's ANC doesn't clear the bar set by the Sony WH-1000XM6, but it will keep most noises – traffic, wind, air conditioners – at bay.

The overall effect does feel more like a softening of sounds rather than a complete exclusion, something which the Sonys do more effectively and more naturally. Take both pairs somewhere properly challenging, such as a public gym, and the XM6 will handle the full range of frequencies more effectively than their Sennheiser rivals.

Harsh sounds, such as clanking weights, are more convincingly filtered out by the XM6, and we feel more isolated from noises than when wearing the Sennheisers. Stand by a roadside with both pairs to hand, and the Sonys will all but eliminate those low traffic rumbles – the Momentum 5 Wireless, meanwhile, will soften rather than fully exclude them.

Call quality, meanwhile, is at a high standard no matter the cans you choose. Both pairs are excellent at reducing exterior sounds, especially the swirling bluster of wind noise, all while spotlighting human speech. The Momentum 5 make voices sound warmer and more natural, whereas the XM6 are impressively clear but can sound a tiny bit robotic by comparison.

Excellent call quality on each, but the XM6 have the noise cancelling talents to take this particular round.

** Winner: Sony WH-1000XM6 **

Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless vs Sony WH-1000XM6: sound quality

The Momentum 5 Wireless are excellent premium noise cancelling headphones, and some of the finest wireless over-ears that Sennheiser has produced in recent times.

We hear much of the same sonic DNA from the superb five-star Sennheiser HDB 630 in these more affordable headphones, with the Momentum 5 Wireless sharing the same feeling of clarity, dexterity and richness as their bigger brothers.

Their midrange is arguably their greatest strength. While the Sennheisers can be a touch rich in the lower frequencies, their midrange reproduction is superb, offering a naturalness and insight that gives the Sony WH-1000XM6 a serious run for their money. If anything, they're even better with voices than their Sony rivals, and that's really saying something.

The Sennheisers are rich, smooth and brilliantly precise headphones, with a personality that makes listening a refreshingly undemanding experience, offering levels of poise and maturity that very few comparable alternatives can match.

As we said in our review: "We could spend days on end listening to the Momentum 5 Wireless and feel neither frustration nor fatigue. While words such as 'undemanding' or 'relaxed' might otherwise be used synonymously with 'boring' or 'bland', we in fact find that these are headphones that strike a great balance between refinement and fun."

That said, if you've got the money to spend, it's definitely worth seeking out the WH-1000XM6 for a proper step up in audio quality. The XM6 don't have the midrange sweetness of the Sennheisers, but they're a punchier, more entertaining pair with ample talent across the board.

As we enthused in our review, the WH-1000XM6 "deliver the most detailed, dynamic, precise and open sound we’ve heard from a wireless Sony flagship. The headphones just seem capable of diving into any track you play and extracting an unbelievable amount of information".

Precision meets power to thrilling effect, and leading edges of notes are sharply drawn and hit with precision and force. The XM6 are great at breaking things down so that you hear each individual element of a song, but they also make sure to put everything back together again into one cohesive, thrilling whole.

While their midrange isn't quite as sweet as the Sennheisers, and they might be a touch more fatiguing to listen to over longer periods, the XM-1000XM6 are the more entertaining, musically talented of the two. Their dynamics land with more verve and contrast, while their rhythmic abilities can make the Momentum 5 Wireless sound just a touch sluggish by comparison.

The Sennheisers are superb, but the WH-1000XM6 justify their extra outlay. For us, they're the sonically superior pick if you have a bit more cash to spend.

** Winner: Sony WH-1000XM6 **

Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless vs Sony WH-1000XM6: verdict

The five-star Momentum 5 Wireless are a great reminder that Sennheiser is more than ready to take on all-comers in the premium wireless headphones space.

Their sound is easily worthy of its five-star accreditation, bolstered by a very healthy feature set, a huge battery life, and, perhaps most importantly, a lower price tag than that of the Sony WH-1000XM6. If you can't stretch to the more premium Sonys, the Momentum 5 are the logical step down.

If you do have the cash to spend and you want a great value return on your not-inconsiderable investment, we still recommending going for the Sony WH-1000XM6.

Not only are they more sonically exciting and engaging than the Sennheisers, but their massive bag of class-leading features, not to mention their effortlessly ergonomic design for daily portable use, make them the complete package. They're our current What Hi-Fi? Award-winners for a reason.

**Overall winner: Sony WH-1000XM6**

MORE:

Read our review of the Sony WH-1000XM6

Also consider the Sennheiser HDB 630

"Sound comes first" – we speak to Sennheiser about German engineering, changing ownership, and 80 years of making music

Sennheiser has announced the latest entry in its Momentum wireless over-ear headphones range.

The Momentum 5 Wireless follow the five-star Momentum 4 Wireless, and offer a host of sonic upgrades that should see them really challenge the ruling Sony WH-1000XM6.

Sennheiser says it has refined the experience "without straying from the formula" that made the M4 Wireless a favourite among the What Hi-Fi? team.

At their heart, you get the same 42mm transducer as in the previous model, which is tuned for "full-bodied sound with dynamic bass." But added to that are Hi-Res Audio certification and Qualcomm's Snapdragon Sound.

The former is an official seal of approval from the Japan Audio Society (JAS) that the cans have a frequency response of at least 40kHz and support 24-bit/96 kHz hi-res audio.

Snapdragon Sound is a blanket term for a few different technologies from Qualcomm that work together to optimise how smartphones and tablets transmit sound to audio devices like headphones.

The Momentum 5 supports the aptX Lossless Bluetooth codec for higher-quality listening, though sadly, there's no adapter like with the five-star Sennheiser HDB 630 that ensures your audio source is up to scratch on the quality front.

But you can tweak the sound using the Smart Control app, which has a new 8-band equaliser, bespoke presets and an intelligent Sound Personalisation engine.

The active noise cancellation (ANC) has also been improved. There are now twice as many microphones assigned to ANC duties – four per side.

We're promised "across-the-board improvements," though you'll have to read our Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless review to see if that's true.

Dolby Atmos with head-tracking will provide a more immersive experience when listening to spatial audio content, and updates are in the pipeline to further improve the cans' capabilities. A future firmware update that will add Bluetooth 6.0 and LE Audio (they ship running Bluetooth 5.4) has been confirmed, for example.

The Momentum 4 Wireless set a new standard in wireless cans with a 60-hour battery life. The Momentum 5 Wireless can't quite match that, but still last a very impressive 57 hours with ANC on. And the battery is removable, so you can swap it for a new one when it degrades in years to come.

The case, too, has had a refresh, and is now 20 per cent smaller and made with plastic-free packaging.

The Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless are out on 30th June in Black, White and Denim colourways. They cost £330 / $400 / AU$749, which is £30 / $50 / AU$200 more than their predecessors at launch. You can read our review (linked to below) to see if they're worth the extra cash.

MORE:

Read our Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless review

Check out the best wireless headphones we've tested

"Sound comes first" – we speak to Sennheiser about German engineering, changing ownership, and 80 years of making music

The ones to beat: Sony WH-1000XM6 review

Well, it’s been a while, hasn’t it?

If you can believe it, the Sennheiser Momentum 4 Wireless made their debut in the second half of 2022, meaning we’ve been waiting nearly four years for a fifth-gen sequel. In wireless headphone terms, that’s a long wait, especially when you consider that most manufacturers tend to update their premium lines every two or so years.

Think of the premium wireless headphones that have been released since the Momentum 4. The Sony WH-1000XM5 and the WH-1000XM6. The Bose QuietComfort Ultra Headphones and their second-gen successors. The Apple AirPods Max 2. The Dali IO-8. The Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S2, Px7 S3, Px8 and Px8 S2. That’s a lot of very impressive premium alternatives.

It might have been a long wait from one generation of Momentum Wireless to the next, but we know that Sennheiser can still compete with the best – just look at the benchmark-setting Sennheiser HDB 630 over-ears for proof. The Momentum 5 Wireless are a notch cheaper than their more audiophile bigger brothers, but if they share similar sonic talents, they might well make the case for the old adage that slow and steady really does win the race.

Price

As you might have gathered, the Momentum 5 Wireless have a lot of competition, but most of it comes at higher prices. The Award-winning Sony WH-1000XM6 are £400 / $450 / AU$699, while the Bose QuietComfort Ultra Headphones (2nd Gen) started life at £449 / $449 / AU$700 but often drop to £349 in the UK.

Let’s not forget about the five-star Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3, which will cost you £399 / $499 / AU$699 at full price, whereas the Apple AirPods Max 2 are a step up at £499 / $549.

Build & comfort

We’ve occasionally criticised Sennheiser headphones for looking a little bland or functional in the past, but that’s not an accusation we could level at our stylish ‘Denim’ blue test pair.

True, the overall design language typified by those large oval earcups will be familiar to anyone who has seen a pair of recent wireless Sennheiser over-ears, but little touches, such as the headband’s attractive fabric exterior, go a long way to making the Momentum 5 Wireless feel more premium. They’re certainly a lot more desirable-looking than their rather plain HDB 630 siblings.

To hold in the hand, the Momentum 5 Wireless don’t impress quite so much. That headband exterior looks and feels the part, but the earcups feel just a little cheap and plasticky to the touch. They’ll swivel horizontally without much trouble, but unlike the Sony WH-1000XM6 or the Bose QC Ultra Headphones (2nd Gen), they don’t fold up entirely.

Having earcups with large exterior surfaces does have its advantages, particularly when it comes to touch controls. Sennheiser’s system – customisable via the Smart Control Plus app – is really well implemented, and we find them to be intuitive and easy to manage. Whether we’re swiping up on the right cup to increase volume or across to switch tracks, everything responds crisply and quickly to what we want.

Controls aside, how are the Momentum 5 Wireless to wear? At 290g, they’re not the lightest premium wireless headphones you can find – the Sony WH-1000XM6 weigh just 254g – but they are comfortable. We spend a long time listening to the Momentum 5, and though we find some mild on-ear heating past the hour mark, we generally don’t suffer with that aching, ‘squashed ear’ feeling that can make extended listening a real chore.

They’re secure and stable, too. The Sennheisers accompany us on quite a few dog walks and the occasional trip to the shops, and even when we’re striding purposefully with our eager Labrador in tow, they don’t often feel as though they’re rocking on our ears thanks to the headphones’ well-judged clamping force.

Inside, the Momentum 5 Wireless house a pair of 42mm dynamic drivers, inspired by those found in Sennheiser’s HD 600 series of wired headphones and tuned for what the German manufacturer describes as a “full-bodied sound with dynamic bass”.

Features

When we visited their research and development labs, the team at Sennheiser described themselves as a “sound-first company". That may be so, but we’re pleased to see that Sennheiser hasn’t forgotten that wireless cans need a few mod cons to keep up with the times. As a result, we’re not left cursing a barren features list.

Bluetooth codec support is impressive, with the Momentum 5 Wireless offering SBC and AAC codecs alongside higher-quality aptX HD, aptX Lossless and aptX Adaptive flavours. The cans currently use Bluetooth 5.4, but an upcoming firmware update later this year will push this to 6.0 and include LE Audio for reduced latency, better battery life, and potentially improved sound quality.

Speaking of Bluetooth, Multipoint tech is available for connecting to two devices simultaneously, with our test headphones switching easily between an iPhone 15 and our work laptop without much fuss.

Battery life is a highlight, reaching a very healthy 57 hours when noise cancelling is switched on and you’re playing at a reasonable volume. For comparison, the Sony WH-1000XM6 and Bose QC Ultra Headphones (2nd Gen) generally top out at 30 hours with ANC in play. A nice feather for Sennheiser’s cap, then.

For spatial audio fans, Dolby Atmos is on the menu when listening to supported Atmos content, with head tracking to be added via an upcoming firmware update. We test the tech out using a few Dolby Atmos tracks on Tidal – The Rolling Stones’ Gimme Shelter and Jimi Hendrix’s Crosstown Traffic to name a few – and there’s no doubt that the Sennheisers are able to harness their Dolby powers to craft a more three-dimensional listening experience.

Dolby Atmos can be switched on and off via the Sennheiser SmartPlus app, a stable and easily navigable platform which we find a pleasure to use. We’re particularly keen on the amount of customisation on offer, be it dialling in the amount of ANC we want to experience or tinkering with the eight-band custom equaliser.

ANC & call quality

Sennheiser has stated that, in response to customer feedback from the Momentum 4 Wireless, it has made a big effort to improve the noise cancelling for its fifth-generation follow-ups, with the new cans using twice as many microphones (a total of eight) for what Sennheiser describes as “three times” better midrange noise cancellation.

Those improvements add up to a pleasing experience. The Momentum 5’s ANC isn’t on the same level as the excellent Sony WH-1000XM6 or Bose QC Ultra Headphones (2nd Gen), but it’s a good performance which keeps most noises – traffic, wind, the hum of air conditioners – at bay. Sennheiser does keep its promise of better midrange cancellation, with the Momentum 5 doing well to exclude the chatter of external voices.

The overall effect does feel more like a softening of sounds rather than a complete exclusion – something which the Sony and Bose manage more effectively – but it’s still a capable showing. Taking the Sennheisers to the gym, the ANC results in a softening of the hubbub of a busy public space, even if harsher noises, such as clanking weights, can penetrate through.

Happily, call quality is right up there with the best. We take the fifth-gen Momentum out for a test chat on a blustery day in May (thanks, British weather), and our headphones effectively reduce intrusive wind and traffic noise while spotlighting human speech. Voices are clear and natural, even making the WH-1000XM6 sound a little mechanical and bright by comparison.

Sound

For something a little different, let’s start with what the Sennheiser Momentum 5 Wireless don’t necessarily do quite so well.

The headphones’ bass reproduction is on the richer side, something which makes itself apparent when listening to Hans Zimmer’s Like A Dog Chasing Cars, and while it’s still of a high quality, some listeners might prefer a tauter reproduction at the lower end.

Further, songs with a propulsive central rhythm don’t quite clip along with the same sense of ‘momentum’ when playing via the Sennheisers as they do when switching to the more expensive Sony WH-1000XM6. Load up Radiohead’s Burn The Witch or Kid Cudi’s Day 'n' Nite, and you’ll hear what we mean – the Sonys have a forward-focused urgency to them, while the Sennheisers favour a more relaxed presentation.

Costlier alternatives, such as the WH-1000XM6 or HDB 630 will undoubtedly take things up a notch sonically, but if you’re not willing to spend that extra £80 / $50-100, the Momentum 5 Wireless are an excellent pick thanks to their plentiful sonic virtues.

Their midrange, for instance, is a real highlight. While the Sennheisers can be a touch rich in the lower frequencies, they are right at home in the midrange, offering a naturalness and insight that gives even more premium alternatives a run for their money. Marvin Gaye’s crooning on Mercy Mercy Me comes across as rich, smooth and soulful, with the Momentum 5 crafting a wondrous feeling of emotive intimacy as Gaye bemoans that “things ain’t what they used to be”.

Let’s be clear, however, that these are more than just midrange specialists. These are rich, smooth yet strikingly precise and detailed headphones, with an audio signature that makes listening a refreshingly undemanding experience. Sugar’s If I Can’t Change Your Mind can sound overly urgent or shrill via lesser alternatives, but the Momentum 5 Wireless have the poise and maturity to bring order to what could, in the wrong hands, have quickly descended into chaos.

Those qualities are only amplified when we listen using a wired connection. Both 3.5mm and USB-C options for wired audio are provided, with the latter capable of handling files up to 24-bit/96kHz. A physical connection adds fullness and depth to instrumental textures, and that lovely midrange becomes perceptibly sweeter and even more defined when we return to Mercy Mercy Me via USB-C.

Wired or wireless, dynamics are teased out ably, and the Sennheisers are subtle and delicate in the way that they communicate those key tonal shifts, with the Momentum 5's precise temperament bringing out small scale dynamic shifts superbly.

All told, we could spend days on end listening to the Momentum 5 Wireless and feel neither frustration nor fatigue. While words such as “undemanding” or “relaxed” might otherwise be used synonymously with “boring” or “bland”, we in fact find that these are headphones that strike a great balance between refinement and fun.

Verdict

With the HDB 630 and now the excellent Momentum 5 Wireless, Sennheiser has reaffirmed that it is still a key player in the premium wireless headphones space, with the Momentum 5 Wireless serving as a timely reminder of the quality the brand can produce.

If you’re willing to spend a touch more, it’s well worth considering either the Sennheiser HDB 630 or the Sony WH-1000XM6. If your budget doesn't quite stretch that far but you’re still keen on stellar sound, the excellent Momentum 5 Wireless are an obvious choice.

Review published: 25th May 2026

SCORES

• Sound 5
• Build 4
• Features 5

MORE:

Read our review of the Sony WH-1000XM6

Also consider the Sennheiser HDB 630

"Sound comes first" – we speak to Sennheiser about German engineering, changing ownership, and 80 years of making music

Best noise-cancelling headphones tested by our in-house review experts

Sennheiser is at a fascinating, potentially pivotal moment, in its history. The established German brand's headphone division is currently up for sale, with its current owner – Swiss hearing care company Sonova – looking to offload its stake in order to focus on its core market.

Sennheiser isn't some novice or niche brand that has failed to carve out much of a reputation. The 80-year-old company deals in microphones, soundbars and, most famously, headphones, and while that latter market has never been so richly competitive, Sennheiser has scored numerous recent successes to indicate that it is, in fact, more than ready to tackle the competition head-on.

Its stunning Sennheiser HDB 630 wireless headphones, for instance, set a new benchmark for wireless sound at their price, and when you're competing with the likes of Sony, Bose, Apple and Bowers & Wilkins, that's some achievement.

This is a brand, then, which clearly has the talent and resources to compete with, and even overcome, its key rivals, but with aspects of its future still uncertain, how it continues to compete and the resources it has available to do so remain somewhat up in the air.

To get a clearer picture, we headed over to the company's Hanover headquarters to see how Sennheiser operates, delve its working philosophy and, perhaps most importantly, find out where it is headed.

'German engineering' – what is the Sennheiser way?

Since its founding way back in 1945, Sennheiser has been guided by a principle which continues to guide its working culture: the idea of what head of research and development Stephan Lietz dubs "German engineering".

This being a German company – the story begins in a farmhouse near Hanover in 1945 and the production of the brand's first-ever microphone – you'd be forgiven for simply labelling this as a slightly jingoistic term espousing the superiority of Teutonic technical prowess.

Quite the opposite. German engineering isn't tied to a nation, but rather, it's an idea which refers to a pursuit of certain standards which transcend any particular place or person. In short, it's a desire to make everything better, all of the time.

As Lietz explains: "For us, we have a modern interpretation. You're never satisfied. You always strive for the best, and you look at all the different details. We have three locations, and in the R&D department, we have fourteen different nations, that means we are not a German group of people. This is about our culture and the way we work".

It's hard not to get that impression as you walk around the Hanover facility and chat to the company's engineers, most of whom reiterate, quite unprovoked, their relentless desire to make a good product better.

Much of the company's research and testing takes place in Hanover, but there's also a Sennheiser factory in Tullamore, Ireland, the main facility for manufacturing transducers found in the brand’s audiophile headphones which we visited back in 2023.

Having a taste of the precision that goes into assembling the HD 820/800S and the HD 650/660S2 wired headphones in Ireland, and then seeing the precise laser measurements required to ascertain minute variations in a drivers' air displacement in Hanover, it's easy to see how the concept of German engineering can transcend the bounds of mere geography.

"Sound comes first" – the Sennheiser philosophy

No, we're not expecting an established audio manufacturer to say that sound doesn't matter, but when we hear multiple Sennheiser employees, from engineers to high-level executives, enthusing that this is a "sound-first" company, it's hard not to feel relief and quiet pride in equal measure.

Stephan Lietz is again the one to emphasise this shared philosophy, but it's something we hear time and again as we tour around the Hanover facility: "High quality sound comes first. (We are discovering) new materials, new ways of using transducers – there is still a lot to do".

If, as we did, you get the chance to try out the iconic Sennheiser HE 1 headphones system, it's easy to see how that sound-first philosophy translates to actual production, albeit taken to the extreme in terms of performance and price. Sennheiser's integrated electrostatic headphone-cum-amplifier system costs north of £60,000, but as an expression of just how much detail you can squeeze out of a pair of headphones, there's not much else that comes close.

We dig a little deeper, keener to discover if there's a signature sonic philosophy acting as a North Star for how the German brand tunes its headphones. Again, it's gratifying to hear that Sennheiser's criteria for production correlates rather nicely with what we look for on the listening side.

That desire to reveal emotion clearly underpins all headphone and audio production, but what's interesting is how much wiggle room there is from product to product. As Lietz explains:

"It's always different. Let's say you're designing something like the HD 800, you assume the environment where the user is using this device. You have your studio, your amplifiers, your chair, you lean back, close your eyes and listen. This means the experience needs to be different".

"Momentum's use case is people on the move or sitting on your computer or couch, and therefore you have to tune differently, but haptics and materials also play a role. It should be comfortable all the time. Use case very heavily influences how you design the product".

There's an understanding, then, that different headphones serve different requirements, and while Sennheiser continues to view the Momentum line as an "entry-point" into the company's wider range, certain aspects of their tuning have been adjusted to accommodate a slightly different audience.

"If you look at Momentum, there's a lot more bass when compared with other audiophile headphones? Why? Because the user expects this and the typical music played back is mixed for this type of headphone, so our tuning is different".

Sound comes first, then, but the type of sound? That can vary enormously from headphone to headphone, person to person, use case to use case.

What is Sennheiser and where is it headed?

This is the subject that seems to rear its head time and again when chatting to the kind folk at the Hanover office: how Sennheiser communicates its identity, philosophy and vision to the customers to whom it wants to appeal.

In a world of Apples, Boses, Sonys and B&Ws, how does Sennheiser stand out for the crowd and, more importantly, ensure that it is finding a way of meeting its desired customers in the middle? It's all well and good producing great headphones, but making sure you're directing your customers to the products designed for them is a major challenge.

Much of that challenge lies more in education rather than merely marketing. As Tim Bosmans, head of portfolio management and marketing explains, there are so many potential customers who don't necessarily understand the major sonic gains available to them beyond their iPhone's tinny speakers or their £30 pair of cheap wireless earbuds.

"It's not just a matter of can we make the sound better, it's can we make it more accessible. That's where we need to play a part, and ultimately, it's about educating our consumers".

It's not an easy trick, and Bosmans is open and honest about the challenge of communicating exactly what a good pair of headphones will grant any potential customer. Better branding? More transparency with customers? Social media? Live events? Even we have to admit that, from the other side of the fence, we're sometimes left frustrated by 'proper' audio's struggle to communicate its benefits to the average person on the street.

Lilika Beck(President, Consumer Hearing) agrees, but hopes that once customers experience Sennheiser sound, there is, and increasingly will be, a clear path forward for experiencing better and better audio:

"You want to start with Sennheiser? You start with Momentum. Then for some consumers, we want to create a pathway to move into the audiophile journey. We will have more and more options from Momentum upwards".

Those are the customers to whom Sennheiser is keen to appeal, and the brand's strategy going forward looks set to realign to reflect its heritage as an audio-first manufacturer.

As Beck says: "We made the strategic decision to refocus the business on our core competencies – we are a leader in audiophile (products). There's this huge opportunity to build this for the next generation...who aren't yet introduced to these audiophile products".

What about the more affordable side of the market? It's no secret that the Sennheiser Momentum 4 Wireless over-ears started life at £300 / $350 / AU$550, with the more mid-range Accentum line – including the £160 / $180 / AU$300 Accentum Wireless cans – filling the gap as some of the cheapest headphones Sennheiser has made in the last few years.

For Beck, Sennheiser's future lies in the more premium sphere, with lower-end manufacturing representing too many unwanted challenges:

"It's red ocean. It's a lot of competition and you need a certain level of scale. There are very low margins (and) it's all about volume, so there's higher return rates, and I find that very difficult from an environmental point of view. For us, this (premium market) seems like a very natural focus.

"I think our brand has a reputation of being more premium. We want to return to that positioning".

We're fascinated to see what happens next for Sennheiser. As one of the most established names in all of headphones, be they wired or wireless, this is clearly a brand with immense knowledge, resources and, most importantly, talent at its disposal, something to which recent successes, such as the HDB 630 over-ears and Ambeo Soundbar Max, attest.

New ownership is potentially on the horizon, and with that change in owners can come a new direction.

Certainty and stability are not bad things – neither is a potential injection of capital – but with Sennheiser seemingly getting so much right on the development side, the team recognises a need to make sure that it communicates its virtues to a wider audience.

As Tim Bosmans reiterates: "If we look at our campaigns, the one thing Sennheiser hasn't done enough recently is that we need to get out there to help people understand how much is out there and how much quality you can get out of your devices".

"We're looking for someone who is very interested in the consume audio space and what we will bring to our target consumers", says Lilika Beck. That someone is yet to be decided, but whoever those new owners end up being, we hope that they stay true to Sennheiser's principle aim: to keep putting sound first.

MORE:

Read our review of the Sennheiser HDB 630

10 of the best Mogwai tracks to test your hi-fi system

Check out our guide to the best wireless headphones we've tested and rated

Sennheiser's headphone division could soon have a new owner.

Its current owner – Swiss hearing care company Sonova – wants to sell Sennheiser's headphone division and instead focus on its core business of hearing aids and cochlear implants, Heise online reports.

Sennheiser has a rich history in audio. For over 80 years, it has been making audio devices like headphones, microphones and soundbars. Highlights include the world's first open-backed headphones and the HD 25 which set the standard for pro headphones.

More recently, the HDB 630 scored five stars and elevated sound quality for premium wireless headphones, thanks in part to their handy USB dongle accessory.

Sonova took over Sennheiser's headphone division in 2021. The CEO at the time – Arnd Kaldowski – said it would be business as usual for Sennheiser. But now that Eric Bernard has succeeded Kaldowski as CEO, the plan looks to have changed.

Sonova insists it wants to find Sennheiser's consumer division "the best possible owner". But what it could mean for the business, its workforce, and its products is as yet unclear.

We've contacted Sennheiser for comment and will update this if we hear back.

There have been a lot of acquisitions and sales in the hi-fi and home cinema world recently.

TCL is buying Sony's TV business, VerVent Audio (owner of Focal and Naim) is being bought by Belgian firm Barco, while Chinese firm Skyworth is buying Panasonic.

At the end of last year, Harman bought Masimo's audio brands (including Bowers & Wilkins, Denon and Marantz).

Uncertain times. Let's hope it all works out for the best for Sennheiser.

MORE:

The best wireless headphones around

The best Sennheiser headphones

Sennheiser HDB 630 vs Sony WH-1000XM6: which are better?

We're only three months into 2026, and I've already spent most of my year listening to more soundbars than I can count from the likes of Sonos, LG, Samsung, JBL and Harman Kardon.

By that metric, I’ll have listened to hundreds of soundbars by the time 2027 rolls around. But after my latest stint with the LG Sound Suite H7, it doesn't matter how a manufacturer pitches their flagship performance if there are connectivity shortcomings.

While the wireless connectivity options found on the Sound Suite H7 are bountiful, including Bluetooth 5.4, wi-fi, Apple AirPlay 2, Spotify Connect and Tidal Connect, wired connectivity options are slightly less well served.

In fact, that soundbar has a single wired connection option, and that is HDMI eARC. This is an output socket only, and it isn't backed up by any sort of additional HDMI passthrough sockets.

In our full review of the new LG flagship soundbar, we noted that the lack of any additional HDMI socket "feels like a missed opportunity considering LG has prided itself on featuring four full-bandwidth HDMI 2.1 sockets on its TVs for quite some time".

Now, this isn't an issue that's exclusive to the LG Sound Suite H7, as its main competitor and notable What Hi-Fi? Award-winner is also missing this feature.

The Sonos Arc Ultra, which is a superb Dolby Atmos soundbar by all our metrics, is also missing an HDMI passthrough socket. Now, this is easily the best soundbar that we have on hand, and I look forward to listening to it every time I'm reviewing one of its many competitors, but I'm not sure if I could live with it day to day.

HDMI sockets are a precious commodity in my house. My Sony OLED TV is already limited in that it only has two HDMI 2.1 sockets, and the four in total that I do have are currently occupied by a PlayStation 5, a Sony UBP-X700 4K Blu-ray player, a Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Plus, and a Sky Stream box.

That leaves the rest of my AV devices (I admit I probably have more than the average Joe), such as my Apple TV 4K and Nintendo Switch, without an HDMI socket to call home; so, I rely on the very useful HDMI passthrough sockets built into my Sennheiser soundbar to pick up the slack. It's taking up a precious HDMI 2.1 port, so providing a couple of sockets in return is the least it could do.

There are some limitations, such as the fact that these sockets are HDMI 2.0 and don't support the latest gaming functions; however, my ageing Nintendo Switch doesn't support VRR or ALLM, so I'm not too fussed.

We've seen plenty of other soundbars on the market that provide HDMI passthrough sockets too. I have to give Samsung some kudos here: the HW-Q990F offers two HDMI inputs, both rated to support up to 4K/120Hz signals and Dolby Vision and HDR10+. Now that's more like it.

While I really do rate the Sonos Arc Ultra highly, I think Sonos should really consider upping its game in this specific area.

We've seen comments and feedback from various online platforms, with people venting their frustration to Sonos and, more recently, to LG about the lack of HDMI passthrough.

The really frustrating part is that the last LG soundbar that we reviewed, the mid-range, four-star S70TY, featured an HDMI 2.1 passthrough that supported 4K/120Hz gaming. It therefore feels like LG has taken an unnecessary step backwards in this regard.

Controversially, I'm at the point where I probably wouldn't even consider a soundbar unless it had HDMI passthrough.

That might sound extreme, as sound performance is and always will be paramount, but people (myself included) are expecting more from their soundbars these days.

Therefore, functionality is becoming as important as performance, and I think a few soundbar manufacturers need to recognise that.

MORE:

Read our full LG Sound Suite H7 review

As well as our Sonos Arc Ultra review

And check out our picks for the best Dolby Atmos soundbars

Sometimes less is more.

That’s certainly the case with the recent crop of cheap soundbars we have tested – and there’s one specific feature I don’t mind missing out on when I’m setting up a budget bar.

The tension of unboxing a soundbar, waiting to find out whether the app I need to test said ’bar will be usable or not, is usually unbearable.

I am, of course, in a unique position. As someone who has unboxed and set up countless soundbars, I have more applications taking up my iPhone’s storage than the average Joe.

Sonos, Sony, Samsung, LG, Sennheiser; each has its own application, and that's just to name a few.

They all vary greatly in quality, too. Samsung’s SmartThings app is intuitive, responsive, and mostly optional if you don’t plan on streaming music to your HW-Q990F from your phone. The LG Soundbar app, on the other hand, has been a bit of a buggy mess when we have used it in the past.

That app tended to crash mid-way through the setup process, forcing me to unpair the soundbar from my phone and restart the process completely when I reviewed the LG USE6S back in 2023.

Admittedly that was almost three years ago, so things may have changed; however, the LG Soundbar app currently sports an embarrassing two stars on the Apple App Store, so I'm not willing to bet it has made much progress.

Thankfully, it’s an issue that hasn’t presented itself with the last few soundbars I have looked at. None of them has an app to speak of. This is because they sit towards the more affordable end of the soundbar spectrum; and the most effective way to keep costs down, from what we've seen, is to make a soundbar “dumb”.

Cheap soundbars can teach the flagships a lesson...

Take the four-star Creative Stage Pro, which surprised us with its potent sonic performance despite its minuscule price. While we like its crisp dialogue and punchy bass, arguably its biggest draw is that it just works, and once you plug it in, you don't really need to think about it ever again.

It's a similar story for the Sony HT-SF150, which remains our reference cheap soundbar despite being more than six years old now. Its plug and play nature made it a quick and easy comparison tool to assess the Creative Stage Pro’s performance.

Stepping up in terms of price and complexity, I also helped to test the Sony Bravia Theatre System 6 (review coming soon), which also lacks wi-fi compatibility.

That soundbar does support the Sony Bravia Connect app, but it works over a Bluetooth connection and is simply an alternative way to access settings and features that can also be found on the supplied remote control.

Having an app that works with the soundbar, but isn't necessary to operate or get the best out of it, really is a best-case scenario in my opinion. In fact, it led me to a realisation.

I would take an optional or simple soundbar app over a badly optimised one that happens to be full of features any day of the week. The frustration of an app crashing mid setup can really sour the excitement of testing a new soundbar; I would rather sidestep the process completely if it’s going to be more hassle than it’s worth.

I understand that this philosophy really applies only to budget soundbars, as pricier models need a calibration system, or a way to connect external components such as wireless subwoofers and surround speakers. But that definitely leads me to wish that the flagship soundbars in question had better apps.

If I’m going to be forced to use a soundbar app, can these multi-billion-pound corporations at least make sure it’s a good one?

Maybe that’s too much to ask. So for now I’ll revel in the straightforward, plug-and-play simplicity of the budget soundbars that we’re currently testing.

MORE:

Read our full Sonos Arc Ultra review

Check out our picks for the best Dolby Atmos soundbars

As well as the best budget soundbars

If you want a great pair of premium wireless headphones, you are currently spoiled for choice. Many of the major audio brands are desperately vying for wire-free supremacy, with each sending its flagship champion out to bat armed with alluring designs, bulging feature sets and boundary-pushing sound in a bid to tempt would-be buyers into making a lasting commitment.

Sony’s What Hi-Fi? Award-winning WH-1000XM6 spent much of 2025 as the champions of the arena, but don’t think for a moment that this is a one-horse race. The Bose QuietComfort Ultra Headphones (2nd Gen) are still staking their claim as the active noise-cancelling kings, while Bowers & Wilkins’ Px7 S3 blend style and substance into one very appealing package.

Then there’s Sennheiser’s five-star HDB 630 flagship headphones which made a late play at the end of last year with one thing on their mind: knock Sony off its perch and take the premium wireless crown back to Sennheiser Towers.

We’re struggling to think of a time when this particular space has been so competitive. That’s great news for the consumer – higher standards and greater choice are never a bad thing – but all of that fierce competition can be a double-edged sword. After all, how are you supposed to know which cans deserve a place atop your noggin when they all promise potent performance and so many tantalising tricks?

That’s where we come in. Thanks to our exhaustive Group Test of the most talented premium headphones around, we're in the best position possible to let you know which wireless wonders are right for you.

We have tested the top four models across a range of criteria, including design, comfort, features and sound quality, putting you in the best position when it comes to picking your perfect pair of premium partners.

Each year, it seems, the needle is pushed further and further north, so that some brands which could once have expected a full five-star haul might find themselves outmatched by the sheer quality showcased by their talented rivals.

In isolation, Bose's flagship QuietComfort Ultra Headphones (2nd Gen are better than ever, and their punchy, entertaining sound is certainly a noticeable step up over their first-generation antecedents.

For their lightweight comfort, foldable design and class-leading noise cancelling, they have so much to recommend them, especially for frequent flyers and commuters who value noise-cancelling above all.

Bose’s problem is that it hasn’t quite kept up with the rest of the pack on the audio front. We can still see the appeal of the overall package they provide, but if you’re looking for the best sound available at this premium level, their price-comparable adversaries have widened the margin to such an extent that Bose is in danger of being somewhat left behind.

Partly responsible for such a growing divide are the Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3. While the Sony WH-1000XM6 and Sennheiser HDB 630 advance things further in the sound quality department, we can’t deny that the B&Ws’ premium quality materials and design make them worthy of their high price tag.

Their noise-cancelling abilities may not be class leading, but they deliver a rich, full-bodied sound that drops you into the centre of your music to thrilling effect.

Bluetooth codec support is impressive. The higher-quality aptX Adaptive codec is on board, and of the four pairs of headphones tested here, the Px7 S3 are the only ones to offer support for aptX Lossless, offering CD quality (16-bit/44.1kHz) audio transmission from compatible sources.

The B&Ws’ sonic talents, combined with the sleek, prestige design, will make them an eye-catching proposition to anyone who values style as much as substance.

The Sonys push those sonic boundaries even further in nearly every area, all while boasting some of the most impressive all-around credentials you’ll find. Whether it’s their excellent noise cancelling, the superbly detailed and excellent dynamic presentation, effortless usability or superb comfort, the WH-1000XM6 are headphones built to please most of the people most of the time.

Topping the might of their predecessors was never going to be easy, but clever design and performance tweaks have elevated Sony’s flagship cans to the next level.

That next level is, on the sound front at least, not quite enough to overcome the fresh challenge of the Sennheiser HDB 630 – the HDB 630 have proved themselves to be a true force of nature.

Their standard sound quality is nuanced, spacious and a detail-rich delight, outstripping the Sony XM6 for textural insight, emotional engagement and the breadth of their soundstage.

The clever USB-C Bluetooth dongle that comes bundled with the headphones takes the sonic ability to new heights, as it lets you stream in hi-res aptX Adaptive Bluetooth quality from practically any source you plug it into, be it Android or iOS.

Plus, they don’t leave us feeling starved in other areas. While they might look a little bland for some (especially at this premium level), and they don’t quite reach the heights set by Sony or Bose’s noise-cancelling powers, they are still capable enough for everyday use. The HDB 630s’ plush headband and well-cushioned earpads make long listening sessions a breeze.

Additionally, a claimed 60-hour battery life and solid call quality only sweeten the deal. If only they folded away…

It’s gratifying to see the myriad ways the biggest headphone brands in the game have approached the premium wireless space, with each of these strong contenders bringing their own unique skillset to the table to appeal to specific needs.

For us, sound quality is king, so we’re giving the win here to the headphones that impressed us the most on the audio front. If you want the best-sounding wireless headphones you can get at this level it’s impossible to look past the benchmark-setting Sennheiser HDB 630 – for our money, they’re the cream of the current crop.

MORE:

Now Playing: check out the 6 stunning tracks we've been using to test our hi-fi this month

I love spatial audio, but there's one feature I can't get my head around

Best noise cancelling headphones: rated and reviewed

Sennheiser has updated two of its budget wired headphone models with USB-C connectivity. The HD 400U over-ears follow the HD 400S, while the CX 80U in-ears follow the CX 80S.

The addition of a USB-C connector means they will plug into modern smartphones, tablets and other devices without needing an adapter.

The HD 400S and CX 80S both had 3.5mm headphone jacks – a connection no longer supported by most modern smartphones and tablets.

Both the new HD 400U and CX 80U support up to 24-bit/96kHz lossless audio through the USB-C wired connection. That's the same file resolution as Sennheiser's wireless (though much pricier) five-star HDB 630 headphones, which need a dongle in order to support that format over Bluetooth.

Sennheiser says that the HD 400U build on their predecessor's "bass-driven acoustics" and "backpack-friendly portability" (they can be folded up to stash away in a pocket or bag). They have a closed back for greater isolation and focus, though no active noise cancellation ability. They come with a storage pouch and detachable cable for keeping them safe on your travels.

The CX 80U in-ear wired headphones, meanwhile, have a "balanced-yet-punchy sound" with three sizes of eartip to get the best fit.

Both models have an in-line mic for handsfree calls.

The Sennheiser HD 400U over-ears cost £69.99 / $99.95 (around AU$138) and the CX 80U in-ears cost £34.99 / $39.95 (around AU$69). Both are available to buy now, in black finish only.

MORE:

The best cheap headphones you can buy

Sennheiser HDB 630 vs Sony WH-1000XM6: which over-ears are better?

The best wired headphones around

2025 was a massive year for premium wireless headphones, with many of the big-name manufacturers pulling out all the stops in a bid to eke out a slender advantage in this hugely competitive market.

Such a standard was typified by the arrival of both the Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3 early in the year, before Sennheiser threw its oar in at the last moment with its unveiling of the HDB 630 flagship over-ears.

Fierce competition is clearly pushing brands to new heights of performance and innovation, evidenced by the ever-climbing quality of the premium arena. Both B&W and Sennheiser have staked serious claims to this contested territory, but which should you pick if you want the best premium performance possible?

Sennheiser HDB 630 vs Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3: price

The Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3 cost £399 / €429 / $449 / AU$699 at launch, placing them firmly into what we would term the 'premium' tranche of the wireless headphone market. Discounts have occasionally knocked that UK figure down to £329, but at the time of writing, we've never seen the Px7 S3 fall below the £300 mark.

The Sennheiser HDB 630 will set you back a good deal more cash, especially if you're buying them outside the UK. At £400 / $500 / AU$1000, they're also decidedly premium over-ears, and unlike their sometimes-discounted rivals, we don't expect to see major price cuts just yet – the HDB 630 were only reviewed in December 2025, lest we forget.

**Winner: Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3**

Sennheiser HDB 630 vs Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3: design and build

What our two head-to-head rivals prove, at least from the outside, is that there's more than one way to design a pair of premium wireless headphones. Both cost the same sort of money, yet from an aesthetics perspective, they walk decidedly different paths.

The Sennheisers are about as straight down the line as a pair of headphones can be, adopting the design language of recent Sennheiser Momentum cans via their chunky ovular earcups and complete lack of adornments or thrills. Functional is the word we'd be tempted to use.

The B&W Px7 S3 are a blingier, more eye-catching affair, and if you're into perceived value, this is where you'll find it. Every part of the cans' more complex construction has been lovingly realised, from the premium hinges adjoining the earcups to the textured woven fabric of the headband.

In terms of comfort, it's a closer affair. The Sennheisers aren't flashy, but they're also easy to wear, with a nicely judged clamping grip which, when combined with their nicely cushioned earcups and headband, means they're rarely an oppressive experience.

They offer a less plush, padded fit than the more all-encompassing Sennheisers, but we imagine many wearers will prefer their slimmer earcups and lighter overall profile.

It's the same when switching over to the Px7 S3. The clamping force is again well-judged, while the earpads’ blend of firmness and suppleness means our ears rarely feel as though they're being squashed into oblivion. We did experience some on-ear heat during testing, but nothing too disastrous.

Rather interestingly, the B&W opt for the more traditional physical buttons rather than flashy touch controls for their on-unit operations, but we've no gripes when the systems works as well as it does here.

The backside of the right earcup offers a play/pause button flanked by longer volume controls, whereas the left cup features a sliding Bluetooth/power toggle alongside a configurable ‘Quick Action’ button we currently have reserved for cycling through our test pair’s noise-cancelling modes.

For Sennheiser, it's mainly a touch-control affair, with the only proper button reserved for launching your phone's voice assistant. Happily, the HDB 630 offer solid touch integration, with controls which we find are responsive and work across a generous surface area.

Not a huge amount to choose from here, so this might depend on whether you have a preference for button or touch controls.

**Winner: Draw**

Sennheiser HDB 630 vs Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3: features

These are premium headphones we're dealing with, so naturally, both are equipped with premium-level feature sets as befits their status.

Let's start with the simple stuff. The HDB 630 are ahead of the game when it comes to battery life, clocking in at a maximum of 60 hours of playtime with ANC switched on when compared with the Px7 S3's 30 hours. A 10-minute fast charge will provide a further seven hours of life for the Sennheisers, while you'll get the same amount of playtime from a 15-minute boost to the Px7 S3.

Whichever over-ears you pick, you'll get access to Bluetooth Multipoint, so listening and switching between multiple connected source devices should be a doddle.

App support for the Px7 S3 is handled by the Bowers & Wilkins Music app, an admirably exhaustive platform from which you can adjust your user experience, tinker with the equaliser or checking your headphones’ key vitals, all while granting direct access to music streaming service libraries such as Tidal, Deezer and Qobuz.

With the HDB 630, you'll be handling similar functionalities from the SmartControl+ app, and while there's less all-in-one streaming integration here, excellent ANC, EQ and touch control customisation than make up for it.

Both pairs of headphones offer Auracast support, meaning that they can receive audio transmissions from compatible broadcast sources, although that's only true of the Sennheisers when they have their clever Bluetooth dongle plugged in. Speaking of which...

Right, let's talk about that dinky USB-C dongle bundled in with the Sennheiser headphones, shall we? Our full Sennheiser HDB 630 will give you a full rundown, but basically, the clever little accessory (BTD 700) grants superior quality codec powers to devices which might not have otherwise had them, providing hi-res streaming up to 24-bit/9kHz via aptX Adaptive. That means you can stream in higher quality when the dongle plugged into an iPhone, for example, which doesn't natively support the aptX codecs.

For the more straightforward Px7 S3, Bluetooth codec support comes courtesy of the standard AAC and SBC codecs living alongside higher-quality flavours such as aptX Adaptive and aptX Lossless. Those codecs are higher than Sennheiser's, but they will only work with certain compatible smartphones, so if you have an iPhone, they won't be supported.

If you want to go all out on audio fidelity with the Px7 S3, USB-C and 3.5mm cable connections are provided straight out of the box for listening at rates up to 24-bit/96kHz.

Impressive on both counts, but for that clever dongle and a much more durable battery span, we're giving the win to Sennheiser here.

**Winner: Sennheiser HDB 630**

Sennheiser HDB 630 vs Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3: active noise cancelling and call quality

We'll be blunt: at this level, you can find better noise cancelling, with the Sony WH-1000XM6 and Bose QuietComfort Ultra Headphones (2nd Gen) both leading the charge in this regard.

Sennheiser's effort is far from bad, but it's what we'd term 'good' rather than 'great', and certainly not class leading. Still, as we said in our review, the cans' ANC "takes the sting out of disruptive surrounding noise, reducing the rumble of traffic and bus engine noise", so it'll do the job if your music is playing at a decent volume anyway.

With the B&W Px7 S3, we're a little disappointed. While the chic over-ears are capable of reducing the low-frequency rumbles of, say, road traffic, they're less able to match their rivals when it comes to muting traffic noise or the chatter of voices, while high-frequency noises will intrude on your listening with surprising insistence.

Voice calls are ably handled by both rivals. Calls via the Sennheisers are crisp and clear, albeit with a hint of that slightly processed sound some headphones are capable of producing, while the Px7 S3, thanks to their repositioned microphones and B&W’s ‘ADI Pure Voice’ voice processing technology, make speech sound a touch fuller and more natural without seeming muffled or mechanical. They're not quite as clear as the Sennheisers, but perhaps a little more personable.

Each set, be it the Px7 or the HDB 630, does a fine job of reducing background noise, and as we stand next to a busy road in the pouring rain, the splash of puddles and the pitter patter of the falling raindrops subside nicely into the background.

For their finer ANC talents, the HDB 630 take the win.

**Winner: Sennheiser HDB 630**

Sennheiser HDB 630 vs Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3: sound

When they landed last year (and before the Px8 S3 had been released), Bowers & Wilkins claimed that the Px7 S3 were its most “advanced and capable” wireless headphones ever.

Big words, yet thanks to their redesigned 40mm paper drivers furnished with a new chassis, voice coil, magnet and suspension, it's hard to disagree with what might initially have seemed like marketing hyperbole.

As we stated at the time, the Px7 S3 "are exceptionally refined and detailed headphones", a pair of cans that are capable of dropping you right into the heart of your music to rather thrilling effect.

Play Nick Cave & Warren Ellis’s Song For Bob, and you'll marvel at the bite and grip of those mournful strings, while the varying components of John Williams’ Duel Of The Fates blend authenticity with a thrilling sense of drama when pumped through the B&W over-ears.

These are muscular, forceful headphones, with grip and power in spades. There's more than enough lower-end clout to keep bassheads happy, and while headphones that go big on bass can often sound blobby or out of control, we remain impressed by how well the Px7 S3 are able to meld power and punch with control and bottom-end refinement.

The Px7 S3 are tremendously talented performers, and unequivocally entertaining, but even they aren't quite capable of outgunning the remarkable abilities of their Sennheiser rivals. As our review verdict summarises, the HDB 630 "move the goalposts for wireless sound quality at this level, while going the extra mile to upgrade iPhones and other audio sources to make it easier for people to benefit from it".

Plug in that clever USB-C dongle, get them playing from an appropriately quality source and the HDB 630 will reward you with arguably the most detailed and nuanced performance we've heard at this level. We perform much of our testing using an iPhone 16 and a Samsung Galaxy S21, with the dongle upgrading their connectivity to aptX Adaptive and helping us eke out news levels of clarity and solidity.

The dongle certainly helps, but however you listen, you'll find the HDB 63O to be strikingly smooth and natural sounding headphones that go big on dynamism and articulation across the frequency range.

Instrumental textures are replete with detail and body, while the rhythmic patterns are outlined with outstanding precision, all of which gives tracks a lush, emotional appeal that we find utterly gripping.

The Sennheisers are also capable of painting on a pleasingly expansive canvas, one that sounds much wider and more cinematic than the outgoing Momentum 4 Wireless over-ears can manage. Musical elements are cleverly and precisely placed, making even dense productions seem more easily digestible.

All of that lovely precision and analysis are wedded to a tangible feeling of drive and liveliness, making for, we think, "the most informative and entertaining sound we’ve heard from wireless headphones at this price". What a result!

**Winner: Sennheiser HDB 630**

Sennheiser HDB 630 vs Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3: verdict

There's no question that the Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3 are very, very good wireless headphones. These are five-star operators, and we completely understand their appeal given just how nice they look, how easy they are to use and, of course, how great they sound. That robust, punchy personality is never less than thrilling, all underpinned by outstanding levels of textural insight.

The Sennheiser HDB 630, however, are in a class of one. Put up against any price comparable rival we can think of, the Sennheisers are at the top of the leader board, and it's going to take something remarkable in 2026 to knock them from their perch.

If class-leading sound is your priority and you're happy to spend a decent sum to get it, there's simply no looking past what might be the best wireless headphones Sennheiser has ever made.

**Overall winner: Sennheiser HDB 630**

MORE:

Sony WH-1000XM6 vs Bose QuietComfort Ultra Headphones (2nd Gen): which flagship wireless over-ears are best?

Sennheiser HDB 630 vs Sony WH-1000XM6: which wireless headphones should you buy?

These are the best wireless headphones you can buy

Sennheiser has announced its new RS 275 TV Headphones bundle, which it describes as "a personal audio powerhouse" made to enhance your home audio experience in "undisturbed wireless bliss".

If your wired headphones' cable simply isn't long enough to plug into your TV for personal listening, this this could be a viable wireless alternative.

The new bundle comprises the wireless HDR 275 TV Headphones alongside a companion BTA1 digital transmitter, with the transmitter plugging directly into your television and beaming a wireless signal via Bluetooth to the over-ear headphones.

That transmission uses Auracast technology powered by the LC3 Bluetooth codec, with Sennheiser promising ultra-low latency synchronisation of sound and picture at up to 50 meters of range.

Thanks to Auracast, which allows for an audio source to transmit to any number of nearby devices wirelessly, you can hook up multiple pairs of wireless headphones, or companion devices such as tablets and smartphones, for versatile streaming across a range of platforms and devices.

The BTA1 unit offers both optical and 3.5mm inputs for connecting to sources such as stereo systems, laptops and game consoles (and TVs), while HDMI ARC is also available for TVs and AV receivers.

The headphones themselves house a set of 37mm dynamic drivers, tuned for greater vocal intelligibility and an "engaging bass response".

A single charge provides up to 50 hours of playtime, with charging provided via the the transmitter’s USB-C port. Both the ear cushions and battery are replaceable, so the headphones should last longer than even the most gruelling Marvel marathon.

The new cans have been designed to be lightweight and wearer-friendly, with breathable ear cushions built to keep ears cool over longer sessions. On-unit buttons, meanwhile, offer control of volume, power, and taking incoming calls.

The new bundle is controlled via the Sennheiser Smart Control Plus app for both Android and iOS, offering personalisation of facets such as transparency mode, switching hearing profiles and device-type audio modes, as well as a 'find my headphones' feature.

According to Irene Strueber, Sennheiser's Senior Product Manager: “As screens continue to get thinner, their speakers have to follow, making it harder than ever to enjoy full-range sound without disturbing others. The RS 275 TV Headphones unlock total listening privacy and impressive clarity".

The Sennheiser RS 275 TV Headphones bundle will be available for pre-order on the 3rd of February, priced at £220 / $300 / €250. The BTA1 TV Transmitter will also be available for standalone purchase, costing £115 / $130 / €130.

MORE:

Read our Sennheiser HDB 630 review

I listened to iFi’s Rolls Royce-inspired music streamer – and it promises a luxury ride for your headphones and hi-fi

What is JBL PartyBoost? Is it the same as Connect+ and Auracast?

The final day of CES 2026 is upon us, and as is the case every year, it brought with it a wealth of hi-fi and home cinema treats.

That ranges from Hisense’s new four-colour Mini LED and RGBY Micro LED TV sets, to Audio-Technica's AT-LP7X turntable.

In the realm of Dolby Atmos soundbars, however, we have been left a little deflated at the lack of products from key brands that in past years have delivered new sonic treats at the show.

That's not to say that there have not been a fair number of Atmos soundbars being teased at the event.

Samsung, for example, announced two new models, the HW-Q990H and QS90H. Our senior staff writer Lewis Empson got the chance to have a sneaky listen to the latter at CES, and was impressed by the powerful sound and booming bass coming from the neat all-in-one package. The Q990H is also a particularly big deal, as it's a direct successor to the Award-Samsung Q990F from last year.

LG also released its Dolby Atmos Flex Connect soundbar system, which includes the H7 soundbar, M5 and M7 wireless surround speakers, and W7 subwoofer. It looks to be quite a promising proposition, with the possibility of building a whopping 13.1.7-channel home theatre system through LG's new Sound Suite feature.

There have also been a smattering of other brands releasing Atmos products (take TCL's A65K Design Series, for instance), but we were hoping to see a few more companies taking on the category.

We've spoken plenty about how we are hoping to see a new Dolby Atmos entry from Sonos as a continuation of the success of its entry-level Sonos Beam Gen 2 and more premium Sonos Arc soundbars.

We gave the Beam Gen 2 a five-star rating for its detailed yet immersive sound performance, but this model hit shelves more than four years ago. Since then, we have been eagerly awaiting its successor. Sonos didn't have the Beam Gen 2 replacement we've been waiting for, but that's not a surprise considering the brand tends not to unveil new hardware at the show. The wait continues...

But we were unhappy at Sennheiser, which didn't even tease a new Dolby Atmos model at the show, as it's been quite a while since its last entry back in 2023, when it showed off the Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Mini. The Atmos model received a three-star review from us, with its uninspired sound and lack of projection failing to impress.

But were still hoping to see a new model as its more expensive entries have blown us away when we had them in our test rooms. The Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Max donned the crown for years as the best premium model in our Dolby Atmos soundbar guide (that is, until the KEF XIO knocked it off this post last year). And it would make sense for the firm to at least try to take its crown back in 2026.

We're hoping both it and Sonos are just biding their time and will unveil new models at separate events this year.

My fingers are certainly crossed for even more brands to jump on the category and deliver a five-star stunner, as Hisense did with its surprise hit, the AX5125H, last year.

MORE:

Here are the best Dolby Atmos soundbars at the moment

Check out our review of the Sonos Arc

These are the best budget soundbars

2025 has gone to the farm. And by that I mean it’s dead as a dodo. But, eager to send it off in style, our reviewers spent all of December continuing their hunt for the absolute finest hi-fi and home cinema hardware money can buy.

Yes, while most of you were fighting for Christmas jumper supremacy at the office party, mulling wine and wrapping presents, our reviewers continued to diligently review a steady stream of new hardware, eager to send 2025 out with a bang.

And thankfully, their efforts paid off, with our reviewers finding six incredible products worthy of our hallowed five-star rating.

Here’s what you need to know about them.

Audiolab D7

The Audiolab M-DAC from 2011 is a product many of us have fond memories of, with it being a class-leading digital-to-analogue converter (DAC) and a constant recommendation at the time. So much so that it still remains a firm favourite among certain What Hi-Fi? team members.

Which is why the appearance of the new Audiolab D7 in our listening rooms caused quite the commotion last month. Designed to replicate some of the magic that cemented Audiolab as a leader in the DAC space, but with a more modest price tag, smaller design and sprinkling of quality-of-life improvements, the D7 oozes appeal for its target audience.

And putting it through its paces with various price-appropriate active speakers and headphones, we’re pleased to report it’s an excellent performer. Across every genre we threw at it, streamed and via CD, the DAC delivered an even-handed performance with fluid dynamics and pleasing levels of clarity and insight.

Hence, our five-star rating and verdict: “If you are looking for a well-specified and talented outboard DAC at this level, it would be remiss if you didn’t consider this one seriously.”

Score: Five stars

Read our full Audiolab D7 review

BenQ W5850

The BenQ W5850 is a proper home cinema projector that targets a very competitive segment of the market. Its price puts it in direct competition with two heavy hitters, the five-star Sony VPL-XW5000ES and Epson EH-QB1000.

It’s also an interesting beast, being nearly identical to its sibling, the W5800, outside of its lens. This gives it an atypical short throw distance, making it possible to get a giant home cinema experience in surprisingly small spaces.

Is this enough to let it compete with its established rivals? Based on our testing, the answer is a firm yes. Though it’s beaten by the Sony for black depth, and there are some annoyances getting the most out of SDR content, if you take the time, it’s capable of delivering a mesmerising home cinema experience. As we said in our review:

“The BenQ W5850 is an excellent projector. The performance is very similar to that of the W5800, but the new lens adds flexibility and seems to create an even crisper image. Sony’s Award-winning VPL-XW5000ES remains the benchmark at this level, primarily thanks to its deeper blacks and superior processing, but the W5850’s beautiful warmth and richness make it a delight to watch and live with.”

Score: Five stars

Read our full BenQ W5850 review

Sennheiser HDB 630

There are a lot of wireless headphones to choose from right now. Which is why we were delighted to see Sennheiser add a twist to the formula for its latest pair of wireless cans.

Specifically, not only making sure they’re among the best sounding the company has yet made, but also adding a cool USB C dongle that adds hi-res codec support to any source you connect it to – making it quick and easy to elevate most smartphones' audio performance.

The combination makes the HDB 630 one of the best sets of wireless headphones currently available and an easy five-star recommendation. As we said in our review:

“Sennheiser’s most ambitious wireless headphones don’t only nail sound quality in their own right but also bless iPhones and other audio sources with a significant sound upgrade via a neat bundled accessory. The result? Sony XM6-beating sound performance in a well-built, feature-rich and competitively priced package.”

Score: Five stars

Read our full Sennheiser HDB 630 review

Philips OLED910 (65OLED910)

The OLED910 is the last OLED we tested in 2025. And what a way to end the year. The set is one of Philips’ finest in recent memory, undercutting competitors on price, while delivering a performance our TV and AV editor described as “close to the very best flagship OLEDs”.

Featuring an incredibly bright Primary RGB Tandem OLED panel, the flagship delivers a bombastic, blow-your-socks-off performance that will win over many movie fans. On top of that, though we still recommend investing in a price-appropriate soundbar for the best results, its in-built speakers are remarkably capable.

Hence, our five-star rating and glowing verdict: “The Philips OLED910 is a very impressive TV indeed. While it falls just short of the Sony Bravia 8 II’s picture greatness, it gets closer than most while costing a good deal less – and it sounds better, too.”

Score: Five stars

Read our full Philips OLED910 (65OLED910) review

JBL Bar 300MK2

There has been a bit of a drought when it comes to good-sounding, cheap soundbars. So much so that the Sonos Beam (Gen 2) has sat pretty as the affordable recommendation in our best Dolby Atmos soundbars guide for three-plus years.

And while it has managed to hold that place a little longer, last month it came a hair’s breadth from being toppled thanks to the arrival of the stellar JBL Bar 300MK2.

The affordable soundbar delivers a bombastic, energetic performance that, while not as refined as the Beam (Gen 2), is utterly engrossing, making it an excellent alternative for cash-strapped movie fans looking for a Dolby Atmos soundbar. We said as much in our review, where our testers reported:

“Ultimately, the Beam’s greater precision, detail and dynamics – and its musical ability – make it the better choice overall, but the JBL’s weightier, more bombastic and more room-filling sound will win it many fans.”

Score: Five stars

Read our full JBL Bar 300MK2 review

Sony Bravia 5 (K65XR55)

The Sony Bravia 5 is the entry-level option in the company’s current Mini LED range, sitting below the five-star Bravia 7 and four-star Bravia 9. Despite this, it's far from cheap, with pricing putting it directly between two of our current recommended Mini LED TVs, the cheaper, Award-winning TCL C7K and the moderately pricier, five-star TCL C8K.

The key compromise you need to accept with it compared with its more expensive siblings is fewer dimming zones. Despite this, when we ran it head to head with rivals, we found its potent XR processor, which borrows a lot of the features seen on Sony’s more premium sets, does an admirable job with what it’s got.

So much so that we actually list its backlight control and industry-leading motion handling as two of its main selling points, helping the set deliver an immersive, controlled viewing experience.

As we say in our Bravia 5 review: “Far from finally revealing a chink in Sony’s formidable current TV armour, the third tier of the brand’s latest LCD range is actually yet another star turn. In fact, while it may inevitably not hit quite the same performance heights as its more premium siblings, when it comes to value it’s the Sony set to beat.”

Score: Five stars

Read our full Sony Bravia 5 review

MORE:

We rank the best OLED TVs

Our picks of the best standmount speakers

The best DACs money can buy, picked by our reviewers

You don't always get everything you want for Christmas.

Some desired gifts can fall through the cracks, and while it's nice to have another set of novelty socks and a festive hamper from your estranged aunt who now lives over in Australia (doesn't she know you're a vegetarian?), sometimes you have to take matters into your own hands.

Grannies are great for knitting jumpers, but they don't know a huge amount about wireless headphones or budget amplifiers.

That's why we've compiled this list of the best hi-fi and audio products we're eyeballing in the post-Christmas sales – if you're flush with cash, it might be time to take matters into your own hands and get 2026 started on the right foot.

MORE:

These are the best wireless speakers in town

I tested a host of standmounts this year, and it proves there are endless ways to design a great speaker

Winners and losers of 2025: which companies and products soared this year, and which sunk?

Sennheiser headphones might not have dominated the headlines like Sony and Bose's models, but they have consistently scored very well, while also boasting a battery life of around double some of their rivals. Now Sennheiser's latest pair have another trick up their sleeve...

It's a little accessory that plugs into your audio source (like an iPhone) and ensures that it supports the same high-quality Bluetooth codec as the HDB 630 headphones.

It's undoubtedly a cool feature. But is it enough to lift them above the industry-leading Sony WH-1000XM6 as the best over-ear headphones around right now? Let's see.

Sennheiser HDB 630 vs Sony WH-1000XM6: price

In the UK, both the Sennheisers and Sonys launched at the same price, though their prices differ in other countries. The Sennheiser HDB 630 launched at £400 / $500 / AU$1000, to the Sony WH-1000XM6's RRP of £400 / $450 / AU$699. But that's not the full story.

The Sonys have already been discounted – Black Friday 2025 saw their biggest price slash yet, to £300. While they haven't fallen that low since, at time of writing, they're selling for £349.

Sony products are often discounted in the sales, made more likely by the fact that the XM6 are a few months old already versus the brand-new Sennheisers. So Sony takes this round.

**Winner: Sony WH-1000XM6**

Sennheiser HDB 630 vs Sony WH-1000XM6: design & build

Looks-wise, the HDB 630 resemble recent Sennheiser Momentum models – 'functional' is the order of the day. The chunky oval earcups are free of any adornments, and there's a distinct lack of flourishes. They only come in one finish too, sticking to Henry Ford's maxim that you can have any colour you like, as long as it's black.

But in terms of comfort, it's a big tick. The grip is judged very well, striking the fine balance of being secure but not too tight, and the pleather earpads isolate well. The headband is well cushioned enough to make the headphones comfortable even during longer listening sessions.

You can deactivate Sennheiser's touch-sensitive controls using the app, so you won't accidentally press them. Which is a nice touch.

The Sonys have much more going on in terms of design, with three finishes and hinges that allow them to fold up into a ball (though they have to be stored flat to fit into the carry case). We find that materials used and build quality feels more premium than the Sennheisers, too.

The headband is wide and flat and makes the headphones very comfortable, while the sliders for adjusting size are noiseless and stepless, which certainly adds to the wow factor. Like the Sennheisers, the grip is very well judged and the earcups don't cook your ears like some pairs.

Sony uses touch controls too, and again, these can be deactivated using the app. The XM6 feature a fingerprint-resistant material to stop them being marked by your paws, so they'll stay looking new for longer.

**Winner: Sony WH-1000XM6**

Sennheiser HDB 630 vs Sony WH-1000XM6: features

The most eye-catching feature about the Sennheisers is the BTD 700 Bluetooth transmitter dongle that makes sure both source and headphones are using the same Bluetooth codec. It plugs in via USB-C, so will fit most modern phones – to use it with older iPhones you'll need a USB-C-to-Lightning adapter.

It connects to the headphones automatically, showing a solid white light when connected and purple one when playing music. It's a doddle to use, and the dongle is tiny, though it is still a faff having to plug something into your phone.

Still, for the boost in sound quality, it's worth it. It means every compatible phone will support the aptX Adaptive Bluetooth codec, meaning higher-quality listening up to 24-bit/96kHz supported through the HDB 630 headphones.

But the Sennheisers have plenty going for them besides this. They have the same 60-hour battery life as their Momentum 4 Wireless stablemates – that's double the 30 hours of the Sony WH-1000XM6.

These figures are with ANC enabled, though Sennheiser's figure does drop to a still excellent 45 hours with the dongle in use.

There's a comprehensive app too, which not only shows you the audio quality you're listening to and the signal path from source to headphones, but also lets you toggle on-head detection, handsfree controls, tweak the equaliser and ANC, and more. It also has extensive parametric EQ settings to allow you to fine-tune the frequency curve to your heart's content.

You can listen to the HDB 630 wired too, either using the 3.5mm headphone cable or USB-C, though you'll need some battery power for either. You can listen to the XM6 while they're charging using their USB-C cable, but only wirelessly – you can't listen to them wired via USB-C, but you can when using the 3.5mm cable.

The XM6 have a newly developed 30mm ‘soft edge’ dome driver and Sony’s new HD Noise Cancelling Processor QN3 processor which is a claimed seven times faster than its QN1 predecessor. There's also a ‘look-ahead noise shaper’ that improves the digital-to-analogue process by reducing distortion and improving dynamics.

They borrow Sony’s DSEE Extreme sound enhancement engine from the XM5 model, as well as the low phase noise crystal oscillator (to improve timing) from Sony's premium Walkman range. Like Walkmans, they have gold-infused solder in certain parts of the circuit, and optimised components and circuitry to minimise crosstalk and interference.

The Sonys don't support the various aptX codecs like the Sennheisers, but have Sony's own LDAC instead. And they add a new 360 Reality Audio Upmix for Cinema, which brings a spatial audio feel to any stereo audio content. Sony's Sound Connect app is comprehensive too, with a 10-band equaliser, Gaming EQ and more settings.

Both models feature Bluetooth Multipoint for pairing two wireless devices at once and switching between them seamlessly.

Both pairs are bursting with features, but the Sennheisers take this round thanks to their innovative dongle.

**Winner: Sennheiser HDB 630**

Sennheiser HDB 630 vs Sony WH-1000XM6: noise cancellation

At last, we find a chink in the HDB 630's armour: noise cancellation. It's still very good, just not up there with the class leaders.

Their ANC takes the edge off background sounds, especially low-end frequencies like traffic rumble. And in our experience, these tend to be the most distracting.

"Set ANC level to maximum and play music at a decent volume, and you’ll likely find yourself satisfyingly isolated," we noted in our review. It's when they come up against the Sony XM6 that they come unstuck.

The Sonys are just more effective, full stop. Wearing the Sennheisers, you're more aware of engine noise, whereas the Sonys "provide a more intense feeling of ‘dead air’ between the earcups, and it’s easier to switch off from the noise world while wearing them, particularly when listening to low/mid-volume piano pieces."

The Sony XM6 are some of the best noise-cancellers in their field. With more mics than their predecessors, a design aimed at reducing wind noise, and an NC Optimiser that constantly adapts the ANC to your environment, they're incredibly effective at silencing the outside world.

"Low-end and midrange noise are contained exceptionally well, especially as we try to navigate London's underground system," we wrote in our review.

"We found the Sonys to be wonderfully consistent in dealing with bass and midrange rumblings and just giving you a nice clear background on which you can place your music."

**Winner: Sony WH-1000XM6**

Sennheiser HDB 630 vs Sony WH-1000XM6: sound

So is the dongle a gimmick? Or does it actually help the HDB 630's sound? We're pleased to report it's very much the latter.

We tested them with an iPhone 16 and Samsung Galaxy S21, and found the jump in sound quality with the dongle to be night and day. With aptX Adaptive – enabled by the dongle – music played has noticeably more clarity and solidity, especially when listened to through the Sennheisers.

Indeed, the HDB 630 are "wonderfully smooth and natural sounding headphones, full of shape and dynamism across the frequency range," we wrote in our review. They excel in terms of midrange texture, dynamic expression and refinement, even showing up the Sony XM6 when it comes to Mountains (we met) by Christine And The Queens.

"The sparse piano notes drip with harmonics, while the percussive rhythmic pattern comes through with precision and purpose," we wrote of the HDB 630.

"Through the Sonys, the emotional impact is still there, but the presentation is that bit flatter, the percussion and vocal delivery less shapely and dynamic within a more compressed soundstage."

This isn't a one-off. With track after track, the Sennheisers take you closer to the music, going beyond the texture of the notes to tell you how a musician is playing their instrument. The HDB 630 have a wider soundscape, with greater separation between the various musical elements within it. It all adds up to a greater sense of scale, less congested arrangements and a more rewarding listen.

Not that the XM6 aren't superb in their own right. They're outstanding for detail, dynamism and precision, extracting an awesome level of information from any track you feed them. They have a great sense of rhythmic drive, with plenty of authority and a meaty yet well-defined bass.

Listening to Billie Eilish’s No Time To Die, you hear a great degree of intimacy conveyed by the XM6. "The amount of space around the individual key strokes means you can hear the full dynamic contrast," we wrote in our review.

"Her vocal oozes texture and emotion and you can picture just how close she is to the microphone when recording the track," we went on, while Eminem's Till I Collapse packs a powerful and solid bass hit.

The XM6 make for a fantastic listen. But heard side by side with the Sennheisers, they lose out.

**Winner: Sennheiser HDB 630**

Sennheiser HDB 630 vs Sony WH-1000XM6: verdict

Well well well. Our 2025 Award winners have been trumped in the sound department. The Sennheiser HDB 630 are a superb listen – dynamic, spacious, with an unbelievable level of texture. That they outgun the Sonys in this department is nothing short of a revelation.

Of course there's much more to a pair of headphones than just sound, but that's where our priorities lay. The XM6 are cheaper and certainly more exciting in terms of design, and they do cancel noise more effectively.

There's really not much to choose between them in terms of features, but the Sennheisers' dongle and higher-quality listening edge it for us. For superior sound, they're your best bet, though if it's an all-round excellent pair of wireless headphones you want, the Sonys more than suffice.

MORE:

Sony XM6 vs XM5: how do the Sony flagships compare?

Sony vs Sennheiser headphones: which are better?

The best wireless headphones you can buy

No matter how sophisticated the engineering behind wireless headphones, their wire-free performance is inherently bound by the Bluetooth technologies they, and the smartphone (or other audio source) they are used with, support.

Sennheiser recognises this, and with its latest flagship wireless noise-cancelling over-ears, the HDB 630, has sought to improve things. How? By bundling in a clever little accessory that blesses your phone (or other audio source) with the same high-quality Bluetooth codec the headphones themselves support.

It’s a simple yet ingenious idea that pays dividends. Allow us to explain…

Features

You see, every Bluetooth-toting audio source, such as a smartphone or laptop, supports one (SBC) or more Bluetooth codecs. In the context of wireless headphone listening, these are software formats that compress and encode/decode music so that it can be efficiently transmitted wirelessly from, say, a phone to wireless headphones.

The most efficient, highest-quality codecs – aptX Lossless, aptX Adaptive and LDAC – retain the audio signal best (albeit not perfectly) during this process, allowing more of your music to be heard, but they aren’t universally supported by audio sources and headphones alike.

For example, iPhones, the audio source of choice for many people using Bluetooth headphones, only support SBC and AAC, the most basic, compressed, ‘lossy’ codecs. Android phones typically fare better on this front, although many don’t support the full codec suite. The flagship Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra in our best smartphones buying guide, for example, supports LDAC and ‘only’ standard aptX – not the superior aptX HD, Adaptive or Lossless codecs.

As for laptops and computers, Apple’s MacBooks don’t natively support aptX (like iPhones, they typically prioritise AAC) and only select Windows machines do.

Bearing in mind that both the device and headphones must support the same codec to benefit from its optimal transmission, you can understand that the scenario in which one lets the other down is common.

Finally, we get to Sennheiser’s solution. The HDB 630 bundle in a BTD 700 USB-C dongle that you simply plug into your device’s USB-C to give it aptX Adaptive superpowers.

Pop it into an iPhone 15, for example (older iPhones will need to use the Lightning-to-USB-C adaptor too), and you suddenly have a true aptX Adaptive handshake between it and the HDB 630. For audio transmission integrity, that’s far superior to the AAC one you would get between these devices otherwise.

The dongle is tiny – roughly the size of the top part of your finger – and upon being plugged in connects to the Sennheiser headphones automatically, with a solid white LED light indicating a successful connection, and a purple one displayed during music playback.

On an iPhone, the BTD 700 and HDB 630 both show as ‘Connected’ in the Bluetooth menu; on an Android phone, the dongle simply appears as a ‘USB’ device in the Bluetooth menu below the connected HDB 630.

You can check the quality of the signal path in the Sennheiser Smart Control Plus app’s settings (see the screenshot above or image below). Here, you’ll want to ensure the ‘Audio mode priority’ is set to ‘Hi-Res 24bit/96kHz’.

Sound

The dongle proves a valuable accessory. When connected to an iPhone 16 and old Samsung Galaxy S21, upgrading their respective AAC and aptX connectivity with the headphones to aptX Adaptive, the presentation gains in clarity and solidity.

It’s a good advert for the Bluetooth technology, demonstrating that higher-quality codecs do make a difference with hardware that is revealing enough to highlight them.

Indeed, the HDB 630 are such examples of capable hardware. The headway they make over Sennheiser’s former wireless flagships, the Momentum Wireless 4, somewhat take us aback during our first comparison. The HDB 630 are miles ahead when it comes to detail, dynamic expression and refinement.

These are wonderfully smooth and natural sounding headphones, full of shape and dynamism across the frequency range, and we’re no more than a song into our playlist before we begin to suspect that the Award-winning Sony WH-1000XM6’s days at the top of the leaderboard could be limited.

That song is Christine And The Queen's Mountains (we met), a piano ballad about a yearning for a past relationship that’s never coming back, and the Sennheisers pull you into Héloïse Adelaïde Letissier’s vocal longing with an incredible amount of midrange texture and dynamic attention to her inflections.

The sparse piano notes drip with harmonics, while the percussive rhythmic pattern comes through with precision and purpose. Through the Sonys, the emotional impact is still there, but the presentation is that bit flatter, the percussion and vocal delivery less shapely and dynamic within a more compressed soundstage.

It’s a similar story with Bon Iver’s S P E Y S I D E: the Sonys capture the textures of the acoustic strings and rich vocal and ably track their dynamic variety, yet the Sennheisers' more emphatically pursue their rises and falls, telling you more about how the strings are plucked. The viola gliding through the middle is thrust more into the spotlight, too.

Their bigger canvas and the more precise placement of, and greater separation between, musical elements within it make the dense production of Public Service Broadcasting’s Spitfire more easily digestible, and that commitment to space and scale never comes at the expense of musical cohesion either.

Here, precision and analysis go hand in hand with drive and vigour, making for the most informative and entertaining sound we’ve heard from wireless headphones at this price, with or without the use of the dongle.

Design & comfort

If the sceptic in you has been waiting for a ‘but’, it doesn’t come here. The HDB 630 adopt the design language of recent Sennheiser Momentums, defined by chunky, ovular earcups free of any decoration. They’re probably not far off what a primary school child would draw if given the task to draw headphones.

That may not sound particularly inspiring, and those looking for blingier headwear at this premium price range will undoubtedly be more impressed by the Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3 and Apple AirPods Max. But fans of discreet, minimalist design will more readily appreciate their subtly shiny matte finish and quality construction.

What arguably matters more about any headphones’ physicality is comfort levels, and the Sennheisers nail this criterion. Their grip is secure yet not too tight, the positive seal of their pleather earpads isolates well, and the aptly cushioned headband ensures that the relatively heavy (311g) headphones aren’t burdensome on the top of your head.

You won’t ever forget you’re wearing them, as you might with light, slimline over-ears like the Bose QC Ultra Headphones (2nd Gen), but they don’t feel oppressive either, even during longer wear.

While headphone manufacturers seem to be torn as to whether to deliver key functionality with buttons or gestures, Sennheiser has stuck with a touch-control affair here, the only button on the right earcup launching your phone’s voice assistant.

We wish it turned Transparency mode on/off instead, which is activated by tapping the right earcup twice, but at least the touch controls are responsive and work across a generous surface area.

We like that every touch action is signalled by a sound, and they can be turned off in the app to prevent accidental touch when, say, you’re lying down or wearing a scarf.

That single button and touch-capacitive area aside, the right earcup simply houses a 3.5mm jack and USB-C charging socket, both of which can be used for wired listening with the supplied 1.2m cables, though do note that the headphones require battery life for either method.

You have limited excuse to be caught short, however, with the HDB 630 offering a liberal 60 hours of audio playback with ANC on, reducing to 45 hours when the dongle is in the equation.

The app offers a generous suite of functionality beyond assuring you of the audio quality you’re getting, including activating on-head detection, smart pause and auto-answer call features for hands-off playback control; one of the most comprehensive parametric EQs we’ve seen for such a product; and noise cancellation adjustment.

Noise cancellation

Truth be told, there isn’t a ‘but’ to be found; the HDB 630 are a well-rounded package. That said, they aren’t class leading everywhere. Their active noise cancellation qualifies for ‘good’ rather than ‘great’ in a market where Bose and Sony are dogged in their pursuit of silence, though it should be said that the HDB 630’s physicality goes further than most designs to isolate you from the outside world in the first place.

Their ANC system certainly takes the sting out of disruptive surrounding noise, reducing the rumble of traffic and bus engine noise – those kinds of low-end frequencies are typically the most distracting in your everyday life.

Set ANC level to maximum and play music at a decent volume, and you’ll likely find yourself satisfyingly isolated.

But during a comparison, the Sony XM6 block noise slightly more effectively. You can more clearly detect revving engines through the Sennheisers, and we find that traffic whizzing by us catches our attention more.

The Sonys (and more so, the Bose QC Ultra 2) provide a more intense feeling of ‘dead air’ between the earcups, and it’s easier to switch off from the noise world while wearing them, particularly when listening to low/mid-volume piano pieces.

Price

More features, improved sound and the unique inclusion of an audio-enhancing Bluetooth dongle understandably translate to a pricier pair of headphones than the Momentum Wireless 4, which arrived in 2022 for £300 / $349.95 / AU$549.95.

Sennheiser has been much more ambitious in both designing and pricing its latest flagship wireless over-ears this time round, reflected in the HDB 630’s name and positioning within the lineup – they’re the first wireless pair to be included under the ‘Audiophile’ 600 Series umbrella – and their £400 / $500 / AU$1000 launch price.

That doesn’t put them beyond their closest rivals, mind you. In fact, they’re squarely in the firing line of the Sony WH-1000XM6 (£400 / $450 / AU$699), Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3 (£399 / $449 / AU$699) and Bose QuietComfort Ultra Headphones (2nd Gen) (£450 / $429 / AU$649), all of which are only notably more attractively priced than the Sennheisers in Australia.

Verdict

Sennheiser has reestablished itself within the noise-cancelling headphones market with the HDB 630, moving on from its competitive Momentum model to create something bolder, more ambitious and altogether better.

They move the goalposts for wireless sound quality at this level, while going the extra mile to upgrade iPhones and other audio sources to make it easier for people to benefit from it. And they also score well enough in the design, features and noise-cancelling departments to be considered a highly attractive all-round package.

For sound-conscious folk looking for convenience and audio quality, the Sennheiser HDB 630 are serious best-of-both-world propositions.

Review published: 3rd December 2025

SCORES

• Sound 5
• Build 4
• Features 5

MORE:

Read our review of the Sony WH-1000XM6

Also consider the Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3

Check out our guide to the best wireless headphones we've tested and rated

We like to consider our product reviews helpful not only for readers looking to make their next consumer electronics purchase, but also for the manufacturers of the products themselves; identifying a flaw, for example, gives them something to work on so that they can make an even better product next time around, and that’s a win-win outcome for everyone.

In our five-star review of the original Bose QuietComfort Ultra Headphones, we highlighted a few imperfections in their design. You couldn’t listen to them wired over USB-C, their battery life fell short of that delivered by their closest rival, and their spatial audio was unconvincing. Well, guess what? Bose has addressed all three with its Ultra sequel.

The Bose QuietComfort Ultra Headphones (2nd Gen) are, as a result, among the world’s most comprehensively featured noise-cancelling headphones. Recognising that performance cannot stand still for a moment in this cut-throat market, Bose has also dutifully elevated the Ultra’s already strong audio and ANC quality too. So has it done enough to keep its flagships in the conversation?

Price

The original Ultra Headphones launched in October 2023 for £450 / $429 / AU$649, so it wasn’t surprising that the sequels appeared exactly two years later, priced the same in the UK, albeit slightly higher in the US ($449) and Australia (AU$700).

Those figures put them in the ballpark of their closest noise-cancelling headphone rivals, the Sony WH-1000XM6 (£400 / $450 / AU$699), Sennheiser HDB 630 (£399 / $499 / AU$999) and Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3 (£399 / $449 / AU$699).

While an even pricier tier of wireless headphones has emerged in recent years, the Ultra 2 represent Bose’s peak efforts and sit above the brand’s QuietComfort over-ears (£249 / $199 / AU$330), which forego some of the Ultra’s flagship features (such as spatial audio) and their performance heights.

Design & build

Where Bose could have gotten away with standing still in the evolution from its first-gen to second-gen Ultra Headphones is the design, and indeed the brand has more or less kept its feet planted here.

The QC Ultra 2 look pretty much identical to their predecessors, with their slimline frame and nicely chamfered, logo-brandishing ovular earcups. Their metal yokes are simply now a more striking polished mirror (rather than matte) finish, and the five available finishes now include a bold Midnight Violet (purple) and Desert Gold (black with gold accents).

No, they don’t have the Apple AirPods Max’s metal-heavy luxuriousness or the B&W Px7 S3’s attention to detail, but their sleek minimalism qualifies as ‘business smart’. And while that doesn’t necessarily score highly on the perceived value spectrum for a pair this pricey, their style does offer an alternative to the largely indistinct, blocky look adopted by the Sony XM6 and Sennheiser HDB 630.

Once again, the Ultra fit extremely well, the all-round pleather cushioning on the earpads and headband offering a good seal and level of isolation while easily managing the headphones’ unburdensome 250g weight. Add to that a well-judged grip that survives the head-shake test, and you have one of the most comfortable wireless over-ear pairs for longer periods of wear that we’ve come across.

We wouldn’t be surprised if the words ‘long haul travel’ featured on the Bose’s designers mood board when creating the Ultra Headphones – bolded, underlined and capitalised. The earcups still fold inwards, allowing them to scrunch up in a generous-sized coat pocket or in the compact hard-shell carry case. And despite looking flimsier than some of their rivals, their build quality appears to stand the test of time; our sample of the original Ultra still look relatively new despite having been frequently used by our reviews team for two years.

The controls haven’t changed, either. The right earcup simply sports a power/Bluetooth pairing button; a multifunctional button that can be used to control playback and calls and switch between listening modes; and a nicely responsive capacitive touch strip on the ridge for adjusting volume and accessing shortcuts (assignable in the Bose companion app).

The left earcup, meanwhile, houses 2.5mm and USB-C ports, and this time you can use the latter for wired listening as well as charging, meaning you only need to carry one cable. The USB-C connection supports ‘lossless’ CD-quality audio, too, which isn’t possible over the aptX Adaptive Bluetooth codec supported by the Bose, despite it being one of the most proficient codecs out there. Just be aware that both cabled listening methods require the headphones to have battery life.

Spatial audio

Speaking of which, battery life receives a much needed boost here, from 24 hours to 30 hours with ANC activated, or 45 hours with it off. Those figures hold up in testing and more or less match the Sony XM6, though the juicepack does take a hit when the power-hungry Immersive Audio mode is used, dropping to 23 hours.

Immersive Audio is Bose vernacular for spatial audio technology, which the brand introduced with the original Ultra. We weren’t hugely convinced by the ‘spatial’ effect with all types of music, and in the QC Ultra 2’s ‘Motion’ mode (which tracks the sound to your head movements), being able to sense the processing at play still proves a little distracting. But ‘Still’ is more satisfying, opening up the soundstage and delivering a more dimensional (if a little less focused) presentation that some will undoubtedly enjoy – particularly if they use ANC headphones while watching movies.

Bose has now bundled its ‘Still’ Immersive Audio and most intense noise-cancelling settings into a new ‘Cinema’ mode, designed for – you guessed it – TV and movie watching, and this is where the technology proves most valuable. Dialogue and mid/upper sound effects are pulled into greater focus within the wider soundfield, though dynamics are quashed as a result, limiting its appeal with music.

Noise cancelling

Whether you’re listening to music or movie soundtracks, you can do so in peace. Bose has consistently set the benchmark for noise cancellation efficacy in wireless over-ears, and despite Sony having boldly closed the gap here with its WH-1000XM6, the Ultra Headphones (2nd Gen) still just about prevail for outright sound-blocking intensity in their ‘Quiet’ mode.

Whether you’re riding public transport or walking past roadworks or construction, they provide a blanket of silence so that your music (or podcasts) can bask in the spotlight, eliminating the deepest rumbles and the majority of mid-band hubbub we encounter on our daily travels. On a plane, only the shrill, high-frequency sound of a baby’s cry penetrates that formidable shield.

If you don’t like the QC Ultra 2’s somewhat heavy-handed approach to sound blocking, you can select the ‘Immersion’ mode and dial down the effect more specifically to your liking in the app. Alternatively, consider the Sony rival, which blocks sound pretty much as effectively, albeit in a subtler manner that doesn’t feel as though they’re trying as hard.

As before, the ‘Aware’ mode effectively lets external sounds in so that you can remain aware of your surroundings without having to remove the headphones. Bose has tinkered away to upgrade the proprietary algorithm that impacts how the Ultra 2 respond to sudden loud noises when in this mode, allowing ANC to automatically kick in so that sharp spikes of noise don’t drown out your music. It seems to work; I turn on the hoover and each time I up the intensity settings (and decibels!), the headphones react quickly to soften the impact on playback.

Sound

While we have previously encountered Bose noise-cancellers that haven’t moved sound quality on from one generation to the next, the QC Ultra Headphones (2nd Gen) aren’t one of them. Compared to the originals, the newcomers make small but meaningful gains when it comes to clarity and detail, while sounding that bit more solid and musically tighter and shedding a layer of excess richness. There’s a sliver more space between instruments, too. Considering we peppered our original Ultra review with words like ‘punchy’, ‘entertaining’ and ‘defined’, those improvements make an already entertaining pair of headphones even more so.

Play Charli xcx’s Von dutch, and the Bose rev their engines, launching themselves into the upbeat track with their best foot forward. The synths surge with low-end texture and impetus, the beat pulsates with snap and crispness. It’s the same pleasingly smooth, bass-rich character Bose has long favoured, simply more insightful and precise than ever before. So far, so good.

However, a conversation around whether these sequels are worth upgrading to for owners of the first-gen model should encompass the wider competition. When we tested the original Ultra, their natural rivals were the Sony WH-1000XM5, which sounded different to the Bose – leaner, more natural and capable of slightly greater insight, albeit not as rich or full. Ultimately, for many, personal preference will play a large role in deciding between the two.

The problem for the QC Ultra 2 is that they come up against Sony’s Award-winning WH-1000XM6, which aren’t just different sounding but categorically better sounding, and by a fair margin. Indeed, Sony’s latest generational sonic evolution has convincingly out-leapt Bose’s, the XM6’s delivering not only more natural, even-handed tonality than the Ultra 2 but also greater clarity, texture, drive and dynamic subtlety. Musically, they’re what we can confidently call ‘next level’.

Considering the similarly priced Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3 and Sennheiser HDB 630 are at least of the Sony XM6’s quality, the Bose, while entertaining in their own right, now feel a little left behind in this increasingly competitive, progressive market.

Verdict

Bose has arguably approached the QC Ultra Headphones 2 as it should have, by plugging feature gaps and incrementally improving on the original’s strengths. Reasonable across-the-board refinements were expected and have indeed been delivered, making for a complete pair of headphones that justify ‘2nd Gen’ status.

But the barrier to that fifth star somewhat lies outside of Bose’s camp. Quite simply, the competition has progressed further sonically than Bose has in the past two years, so the pressure for the noise-cancelling kings to make more significant gains next time around is on.

Review published: 26th November 2025

SCORES

• Sound 4
• Build 4
• Features 5

MORE:

Read our review of the Sony WH-1000XM6

Also consider the Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3

Bose QC Ultra Headphones (2nd Gen) vs Bose QC Ultra Headphones (1st Gen): which headphones are better?

Best noise-cancelling headphones tested by our in-house review experts

Sonos has revived the much-beloved Arc Dolby Atmos soundbar for Black Friday, citing it as the "last chance" to buy this Hall of Fame-inductee. We've raved about the Arc ever since it first launched back in 2020, but now's the time that we finally have to conclude that you shouldn't buy it, especially when these alternatives are available for similar prices.

• Check out all of the Black Friday deals at Amazon
• Richer Sounds Black Friday event: huge savings on TVs and projectors
• Sevenoaks Black Friday deals: save up to £2700 on TVs
• Peter Tyson: save hundreds on a new AV receiver

Sonos is currently offering the Arc on its official web store for £719, down from the £899 price it retailed at before the launch of the Arc Ultra (more on that in a moment). It's a fine discount of £120, but there are better options available that come within touching distance of that price.

We'll start with the obvious one...

The Sonos Arc Ultra is a better buy...

The successor to the Sonos Arc is a better soundbar in every way. It takes everything we loved about the original, and improves it with a bigger, bolder and richer sound that includes hugely improved bass thanks to the new Sound Motion driver technology.

We compared the Arc Ultra to its predecessor during our full review, and agreed that those looking for a flagship Sonos 'bar should spring for the latest version as it presents a clear upgrade over the original.

There is, of course, the matter of price to consider. The Arc Ultra is newer and more technically capable, and therefore more expensive, but we've already spotted a Black Friday deal at Amazon that knocks the price down to £799 from £999.

With just an £81 difference between the two five-star Dolby Atmos soundbars, we think the smart move is to opt for the newer model.

The Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Plus is a superb Sonos alternative...

Looking to avoid Sonos altogether? The Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Plus is a great alternative as it offers a room-filling cinematic sound alongside a handful of creature comforts that many will appreciate.

This includes a thorough on-board calibration system that doesn't rely on your smartphone's microphone, a physical remote control as well as an app, and two HDMI passthrough sockets, though they are only rated at the HDMI 2.0 standard.

The Ambeo Soundbar Plus pumps out a rich, punchy and spacious sound, making it a worthy competitor to the Sonos Arc, and at just £750 at Amazon (down from £1299), it's only £30 more expensive than the Sonos Arc; making this an ideal choice for anyone who wants to steer clear of Sonos.

The Samsung HW-Q990F is the full package...

If you're looking for a full surround sound system that features the convenience of a soundbar, then look no further than the Samsung HW-Q990F. It incorporates a dedicated subwoofer and surround sound speakers, as well as multiple HDMI 2.1 passthrough sockets, which gamers will appreciate.

It also happens to sound simply superb, which is why we bestowed it with a coveted Product of the Year Award earlier this month. The wireless subwoofer produces rich, tuneful bass, while the rest of the system provides a spacious, engaging and three-dimensional cinematic sound.

This system hits its stride with Dolby Atmos content, with soaring height effects and sounds passing seamlessly between channels, and it even handles music with finesse.

It's a whole £100 more than the Arc, meaning it's currently at £819 at Amazon; however, that's half the price it launched at, and you get a lot more in the way of features and performance for that extra money. If you have the space and budget, we'd seriously recommend paying the extra for the HW-Q990F.

More of today's best early Black Friday deals

• Amazon: browse all of today's best deals
• B&W speakers: save £200
• Bluetooth speaker: 48% off five-star JBL
• Bose QC Ultra Earbuds: save £100
• Bravia 8 TV: save 34% on 55in TV
• Denon AV receiver: save £500
• ELAC Debut 2: five-star speakers now £199
• John Lewis: £500 off LG and Sony OLED TVs
• Richer Sounds: browse Black Friday deals
• Sevenoaks: £150 off Award-winning speakers
• TVs, movies, home cinema: browse the best deals
• Wine, beer and spirits: save up to 34% on drinks

Black Friday has kicked off a week early, which is good news for deal hunters such as myself, as I now have even more time to locate and recommend the best products at the best prices.

While I often look towards the products that we've tested recently on my search for the most purchase-worthy discounts, I will also consult the products that I use every single day, and for good reason too.

• Black Friday 2025 hi-fi and home cinema deals live: our experts' picks of the top savings on speakers, headphones, TVs, soundbars and more

I have reviewed more TVs, soundbars, and video streamers than I can count at this point, which means my standards are, understandably, high. This means the products that I use on a day-to-day basis are ones that I can truly vouch for, as is the case with the five-star Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Plus.

It's a competitor to the Sonos Arc Ultra, which is an admittedly superb Dolby Atmos soundbar, but I think that the Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Plus has its own benefits, which make it a fantastic alternative for those who are looking to avoid Sonos.

I'll start with the biggest advantage right now: the price. We tested the Ambeo Soundbar Plus at £1299, a substantial price tag no matter how you look at it. However, a Black Friday deal at Amazon knocks this price down to just £749.

That's a huge £549 discount, and it means that the Ambeo Soundbar Plus is now £49 cheaper than the Sonos Arc Ultra, which is currently down to £799 from £999.

While I have to admit that the Sonos Arc Ultra takes the edge when it comes to sound quality, thanks to its Sound Motion drivers for enhanced bass, and superbly spacious handling of Dolby Atmos height effects, the Sennheiser holds its own when it comes to delivering cinematic sound, and the feature set is a step above the Sonos.

We complimented the Ambeo Plus' wide and room-filling sound that envelops us in immersive Dolby Atmos audio, and its surprisingly potent bass is weighty and present without introducing distortion. Pair that with a warm, rich sound that makes movies and music alike shine, and the Sennheiser quickly becomes a very likeable soundbar indeed.

I've spent a considerable amount of time using both 'bars, and when it comes to design, I think that the Sennheiser is the nicer-looking soundbar. While audio quality is paramount, and design is ultimately subjective, the Sennheiser's grey fabric mesh and top-mounted capacitive buttons and light bar make it a bit more visually appealing.

It's in the features department that I find the Sennheiser soundbar to truly outshine the Arc Ultra. Unlike the Sonos, the Amebo Soundbar Plus features two HDMI passthrough ports that support signals up to 4K/60Hz with Dolby Vision. Furthermore, Sennheiser includes a dedicated remote in the box, whereas the Arc Ultra relies on the Sonos app.

Speaking of the app, Sonos has come under fire for its app issues within the last year, and as someone who had to set up a Sonos Beam Gen 2 just a couple of days ago, I can vouch that the Sonos app is still a bit messy. The Sennheiser Control app, on the other hand, is nicely laid out, simple and responsive.

It also allows users to access the automatic calibration system, which is combined wth the on-board microphone to adapt the sound to your listening environment. It's as easy as pressing a button, whereas Sonos' Trueplay system is a lot more complicated.

iPhone users can access an advanced version of the calibration system, which requires walking around the listening space, waving their phone around, whereas the quick version utilises the built-in microphone to take a less thorough measurement. You'll notice I singled out iPhone users; that's because the advanced version isn't compatible with Android devices.

If you're trying to avoid Sonos and want an alternative that delivers a competitive sound and even better features, then the Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Plus is a great choice. And for £750 at Amazon, this is one of Black Friday's best soundbar deals yet.

Black Friday quick links

• Amazon: browse all of today's best deals
• B&W speakers: save £200
• Bluetooth speaker: 48% off five-star JBL
• Bose QC Ultra Earbuds: save £100
• Bravia 8 TV: save 34% on 55in Sony TV
• Denon AV receiver: save £500
• Dolby Atmos soundbar: down to £299
• ELAC Debut 2: five-star speakers now £199
• Headphones: Sennheiser Momentum 4 now £169
• John Lewis: £500 off LG and Sony OLED TVs
• Richer Sounds: browse Black Friday deals
• Sevenoaks: £150 off Award-winning speakers
• TVs, movies, home cinema: browse the best deals

If you want some decent wireless headphones, you’ve never been so spoiled for choice. I won’t go through every single pair available to you right now, mainly because I don’t think there’s sufficient room on the page – suffice to say, from top to bottom, you’re (generally) very well catered for.

You’ve got cheap options at the bottom, such as the Sony WH-C520 (£34 / $50 / AU$79 or the slightly costlier Austrian Audio Hi-X25BT (£129 / $179 / AU$269), then you’ve got premium options in the shape of the Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3 (£379 / AU$699 / $449) and Sony WH-1000XM6 (£379 / $450 / AU$699), or you could go the whole hog and blow a stack of cash on the luxurious Focal Bathys MG (£999 / $1299 / AU$2300). Something for everyone, then.

Well, sort of. The current wireless headphone market is a bit like a convertible with the roof down, or Darth Maul's two-handed lightsabre – a lot going on at the top and the bottom, but not much happening in the middle. If your budget is set at around £100-£250 / $125-$300, you’re not exactly spoiled for choice.

Look at how Sony structures its pricing. You can start at around £35 / $40 / AU$70 with the WH-CH520 and then £79 / $100 / AU$200 for the noise cancelling CH720N, before you jump all the way up to around £400 / $450 / AU$699 for the Sony WH-1000XM6, leaving a big old gap in the middle. Some brands, like Bose, don't even bother making cheap options, while many affordability-focused companies are the inverse: lots of cheap stuff, but very little in the premium market.

I’ve complained about this absence before, mainly with regard to the trials of finding a decent Christmas gift for someone looking to get themselves a pair of wireless cans at Christmas.

Spending £50 seems a bit miserly for a present, whereas £379 will have me living in penury until the next festive season rolls around, by which time I’ll have scraped enough cash together to dish out a handful of paperclips and a half-used bottle of shampoo.

The options that do occupy this strange market void remain, but as I’ve bemoaned before, they're disappointingly mediocre. We've never been fans of the rather bland Sennheiser Accentum Wireless (£160 / $180 / AU$300) or the Cambridge Audio Melomania P100 (£229 / $279 / AU$479), and what's worse, there aren’t many alternatives available around to take over the reins.

By and large, most releases tend to be super-affordable or aimed at the premium end of the scale. This year has seen the launch of the Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3 and Px8 S2 (£629 / $799 / AU$1299), the Focal Bathys Mg, the Loewe Leo (£1299 / €1299), the Sony WH-1000XM6 and the second-gen Bose QuietComfort Ultra Headphones (review coming soon).

If you want wireless earbuds, it’s been a similar story in 2025 – just look at the Bose QuietComfort Ultra Earbuds (2nd Gen) (£299 / $299 / AU$450) or the luxurious Bang & Olufsen Beo Grace (£1000 / €1200 / $1500). Okay, we had the launch of the AirPods 4 with ANC (£179 / $179 / AU$299) in 2024 and latterly the AirPods Pro 3 (£219 / $249 / AU$329) in 2025, but if you’re not an Apple fan, it’s rather slim pickings on the in-ear front.

Why does such a gap exist? My hypothesis remains the same, in that it’s the middle market that tends to get hollowed out whenever times are comparatively tough.

Manufacturers tend to produce super-cheap fare to monopolise the buyers who want to keep costs down, while the high rollers of this world can still be targeted with shinier products, safe in the knowledge that those big-spenders aren’t tethered by financial constraints.

It’s still frustrating to be writing about the same problem almost two years after I first noticed it, but perhaps that’s more of a reflection on the state of the market, and the wider economy, than any wilful negligence on the part of manufacturers.

Let’s be honest, economic factors are the main driving force for any business decision, and it isn’t in most companies’ best interests to be plugging gaps that won’t yield the highest returns.

Still, it would be nice to have a golden middle point whereby buyers can spend a reasonable amount of cash and get the performance to match their budget, especially as not every consumer wants to be forced to pick between a 30-day matured sirloin or a tin of cheap mince.

The solution, it seems, is to eschew newer products in favour of the timeless oldies. Okay, you won't get the same array of cutting-edge features, but the likes of the Sony WH-1000XM4 (£189 /$200) or the Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S2e (£210 / $200) can be picked up for around half of what they originally cost at launch, and you're still getting excellent quality with our stamp of approval. Quite of few of those products are set to be even further discounted in the early Black Friday sales, by the way...

Until brands decide to target the mid-range market, the classic adage might well be true: old really is gold.

MORE:

We have tested the wireless headphones and turntable in the John Lewis Christmas ad – and they're both five-star stunners

Check out the 8 spectacular tracks lighting up our test rooms this month

These are the best wireless headphones you can buy

As the clocks go back and the nights get colder and darker, this is about the time we wish that we had some Class A amplifiers in for review to keep us toasty and warm.

We sadly don't have a valve amplifier in for testing, but we do have Rotel's high-end CD player that's built like a tank, a new Clearaudio turntable and Sennheiser's new hi-res wireless headphones that aim to please audiophiles – all in our test rooms to get the full review treatment by our experienced test team.

Our winners for the What Hi-Fi? Awards 2025 have been announced across 24 categories, but that doesn't mean all the most exciting products have been covered for the year. Far from it – there are plenty of new hi-fi and home cinema products that are waiting for our review team in our test rooms this November, and you can see our top 5 picks for the month below. Along with the three hi-fi products mentioned, we are also looking forward to testing JBL's affordable Bar 300MK2 soundbar and the high-end BenQ W5850 projector.

If you have any questions about the products we are testing, comment below or email us at whathifi@futurenet.com, and we'll do our best to find the answer during our testing process and get back to you.

Clearaudio Compass

It's been a while since we have had a Clearaudio turntable in our test rooms, and we're curious to find out how the new Clearaudio Compass performs at its £1099 / €1290 price point. The belt-drive turntable is the brand's new entry-level model, and features precision-milled components, a new T1 aluminium tonearm fitted with a new N1 moving magnet cartridge, electronic speed change and a 20mm acrylic platter.

Like the previous five-star Clearaudio Concept model we tested over a decade ago, the new Compass is designed to be fairly plug-and-play; it is handmade in Germany and aims to deliver “accessible performance without compromise”. At this price range, it has the multiple Award-winning Rega Planar 6 to face off against. Let's hope it puts up quite the fight.

Rotel Michi Q5

The Michi Q5 is a beast of a high-end CD player. Weighing 23.5kg in total and just about fitting on to our hi-fi racks, as you can see from the picture above, this is a serious digital player for serious audiophiles.

It costs a hefty £5499 / $6999 / €5999, and every element of the product is meticulously designed for ultimate sound quality: dual toroidal transformers, fully balanced circuity and an eight-channel ESS ES9028PRO DAC split equally between the right and left channels for greater detail, wider soundstage and less distortion. The Michi Q5 plays CDs as well as hi-res PCM, DSD and MQA files, and features RCA and balanced XLR outputs, as well as optical, coaxial and type B USB inputs.

The highlight is the top-loading CD mechanism crafted out of aluminium and mounted on a custom floating spring assembly; taking the lid off to play a CD is an event in itself.

Sennheiser HDB 630

Sennheiser's new pair of wireless headphones aims high: it wants to bring high-res Bluetooth streaming and audiophile-level tuning to the masses.

Building upon the five-star Momentum 4 Wireless headphones' design, this step-up model features the kind of audio tuning normally reserved for the brand's HD 600 wired audiophile headphones, promising twice the detail resolution of the Momentum 4. It also comes with a USB-C Bluetooth transmitter that delivers up to 24-bit/96kHz quality using the aptX Adaptive codec when plugged into any mobile device – including an iPhone.

The accompanying app lets you customise the sound to your heart's content, from in-depth parametric EQ settings to crossfeed options, while battery life is quoted at 45 hours with ANC turned on and with hi-res files playing.

Priced at £399.90 / $499.95 / €499.90, can the new HDB 630 beat our current favourite at this price – the Award-winning Sony WH-1000XM6 – and deliver a whole new standard of quality for Bluetooth headphones?

JBL Bar 300MK2

We’re always on the lookout for great affordable soundbars, and we have a new contender from JBL in our test rooms right now.

This entry-level Dolby Atmos soundbar boasts a claimed 450W of power and HDMI passthrough, and it costs £100 less than a Sonos Beam Gen 2.

The previous model got four stars – can the new one go one star further and dethrone the Beam?

BenQ W5850

The Sony VPL-XW5000ES looms large over the £5000ish projector price category (it’s just won its fourth What Hi-Fi? Award in row), but other brands are still keen to take a shot at it.

First was the Epson EH-QB1000 which, despite its five-star performance, couldn’t quite topple the Sony. Now, it’s the turn of the BenQ W5850, which combines most of the hardware of the five-star W5800, and adds a new shorter-throw lens so you can get a bigger image from a shorter distance.

Has the Sony XW5000ES finally met its match? Stay tuned for our full review to find out!

MORE:

Rega and Pro-Ject lead the turntable winners at the What Hi-Fi? Awards 2025, while Technics reclaims a trophy

8 of the best Bruce Springsteen tracks to test your hi-fi system

Bose is making its SoundTouch smart speakers dumb – and won't compensate customers

Sennheiser is no stranger to wireless headphones – its Momentum 4 Wireless over-ears are strong contenders thanks to a pleasing combination of comfort, features and sound quality for the price.

But now the brand is aiming its sights higher, with the launch of the first wireless model in the long-running HD 600 audiophile wired headphones range.

The Sennheiser HDB 630 are positioned as the brand's "first high-res audiophile wireless product" and aims to combine the "unmatched audiophile precision" of the audiophile HD6 range with the portable convenience of the Momentum wireless range.

In a bid to ensure that everyone can enjoy hi-res audio on these new wireless headphones anywhere, Sennheiser includes a BTD 700 USB-C Bluetooth transmitter in the box, which grants hi-res streaming to smartphones and tablets that don't natively support the higher-quality aptX HD codecs.

This tiny dongle device lets you stream music at up to 24-bit/96kHz quality using the aptX Adaptive codec, which offers higher resolution and greater data transfer than the standard Bluetooth codec found on, say, an iPhone.

Sennheiser says: "With only an estimated 16% of smartphone hardware supporting native wireless high-res sound, the included dongle brings this capability to 80% of smartphone models in an instant through their USB Type-C port."

This transmitter also adapts according to your environment – for instance, scaling the resolution down if you're in a congested area to ensure the Bluetooth connection remains stable with minimal dropouts.

The aim for the HDB 630 is not just to deliver a higher-resolution sound quality for audiophiles on the move – we are promised twice the resolution of the five-star Momentum 4 – but also to ensure that connectivity is stable in all situations, including multipoint Bluetooth connections.

The 42mm drivers feature a "refined" acoustic design that balances the headphones' compact form with ample air flow behind the transducer. The headphones have undergone "pure audiophile tuning" to deliver a smoother response in the upper midrange and lower treble areas, with a claimed frequency range of 6Hz to 40kHz.

Listeners can also enjoy the full 24-bit/96kHz resolution in lossless quality by opting for a wired connection, with USB-C and 3.5mm audio cables included in the box.

Adaptive ANC is on board and aims to "block out distractions while preserving clarity and dynamics".

Battery life is claimed to be an impressive 45 hours with full hi-res streaming and ANC turned on. This extends to 60 hours if ANC is turned off and listening with non-hi-res codecs.

Sennheiser also offers detailed parametric EQ and crossfeed functions within the Smart Control Plus app, which lets you fine-tune the HDB 630's sound quality even further to your liking.

The standard five-band equaliser allows for changes within a fixed range; the new Parametric Equalizer offers far greater adjustments that allow for those audiophiles who really enjoy tweaking the sound quality to sculpt their preferred frequency curve. It even includes A/B comparisons to compare and analyse the changes you've made – which is a useful touch. After a future update, users will also be able to share their own tailored EQ presets via QR code with fellow Sennheiser fans.

The crossfeed setting is inspired by the brand's flagship HE 1 headphones, and digitally blends the left and right channels – when dealing with classic mono recordings or "hard-panned mixes", for instance – for a more "speaker-like" presentation that might be easier on the ears.

The HDB 630 are a closed design and takes ergonomic design inspirations from the Moment 4 Wireless, with earcups that are supposedly less prone to fingerprint marks. The adjustable headband is made of a "Japanese Protein Leatherette" material that aims to be comfortable and durable over long listening periods.

Sennheiser's Senior Product Manager, Wee Hong Kuan, says: “We set out to deliver a compelling option for audiophiles who want to keep the same level of quality they’re used to with their wired headphones while enabling them to enjoy it everywhere, and out of the box, the HDB 630 brings a truly unique combination of fidelity and customization.”

The Sennheiser HDB 630 headphones will cost £399.90 / $499.95 / €499.90. Pre-orders are now open, with global shipping starting from 21st October.

That's a step up from the Momentum 4's £300 / $349.95 / AU$549.95 launch price, and the new "audiophile" wireless cans will see competition from five-star premium rivals such as the Sony WH-1000XM6 and Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3.

MORE:

Read our Sennheiser Momentum 4 wireless review

Inside the Sennheiser factory: assembling audiophile headphones and listening to £60k electrostatics

Best Sennheiser headphones 2025: 7 brilliant options tested by our team

If you've been keeping your eye out for a fresh pair of mid-range wireless headphones, you may well have spotted that German brand Beyerdynamic launched its latest addition to the Aventho series last week.

The Aventho 200 follow in the footsteps of their older siblings, the flagship Beyerdynamic Aventho 300, but with a considerably lower price tag. That sounds like an attractive proposition, and one that I couldn't pass up when I visited IFA 2025 last week to get some hands on time with Beyerdynamic's latest cans.

Check out these specs

At a price of £219 (about $295 /AU$450), the Aventho 200 are packing some impressive features. The over-ear headphones have a battery life that clocks in at 63 hours without active noise cancellation (ANC), providing three more hours than the Aventho 300 can muster.

Both offer up to 40 hours of playtime with ANC on, and you can also get up to 16 hours of playtime with a quick 15-minute charging boost.

On the Aventho 200's right ear cup, there's a touch-gesture control pad which lets you use a range of shortcuts, whereby you can turn up the volume or pause your tunes, for example.

You also get a choice of two colour options – white or black – both featuring a stylish silver yoke on either side. In fact, from the outside, the Aventho 200 look very similar to their older siblings, and that's no bad thing – we found the Aventho 300 to be a smart, well-made set of over-ears that were refreshingly easy to get along with.

Under the hood, the Aventho 200 house a set of 45mm dynamic drivers which, according to Beyerdynamic, deliver "powerful sound" with "defined highs and rich bass".

We rated their older sibling highly during our review, which bodes well for the newer model’s performance. They first launched at a price of £359 / $400 / AU$640.

While we find the ANC wasn’t the best we've heard at this level, we found the established headphones provided a balanced, even-handed sound with an impressive midrange and a knack for clarity and organisation.

What's the sound like?

That all sounds promising, but how do the Aventho 200 actually perform?

We're always excited to hear what new treats Beyerdynamic has in store, and it's interesting to see how the brand, famed for its wired headphones quality, is attempting to forge a reputation in the ever-competitive wireless space.

While I had the chance to hear the Aventho 200 first-hand on a very busy trade show floor, we'll need more testing time to really put the new cans through their paces. That said, I did get a flavour of what the new over-ears have to offer at this mid-range level, an area of the market we've often felt has been neglected by the major brands.

Listening to Taylor Swift’s August with ANC off, I found that the Aventho 200 showcase an enjoyable handling of dynamics and good detail. The soft guitar introduced at the beginning of the song sounds appropriately delicate, and seamlessly shifts into the louder chorus as more instruments are added. There's control and poise hinted at here, something we praised the Aventho 300 for during our tests earlier this year.

The dream-like vocals are clear, but I heard a slightly artificial, slightly tinny reproduction, although this may soften as the Beyerdynamics are run in over time. Again, further testing time will confirm or disprove these suspicions.

I didn’t get to compare the performance with the ANC switched on, which could well make a difference to the sound quality, but it's something we will find out when we get a review sample in for testing.

In terms of design, the memory foam headband provides a comfortable listening experience and the headphones themselves felt impressively light in my short time with them.

A tough market

The Aventho 200 are up against some stiff competition in this market, although their attractive price tag does make them stand out from the crowd. There aren't many great wireless headphones at this level, and certainly not many rivals that are fresh to the market.

Beyerdynamic's main competitor comes from the established Sennheiser Momentum 4 Wireless which, although they initially launched at £300 / $350 / AU$550, can now be found for a much lower price. In the UK, for example, some retailers are offering them for just under £188 (around $255 / AU$385).

During testing, the Sennheiser cans impressed with their clean and musical sound, as well as their effective ANC. As we said in our review: "They sound sharp and sprightly, and that added leanness hasn’t come at the expense of substance across the frequencies."

This resulted in a five-star rating, so there's certainly a lot for the Aventho 200 to live up to if they're going to challenge the Momentum 4 Wireless for mid-range supremacy.

Still, their competitive pricing keeps them away from having to compete with more expensive models from brands such as Sony and Bose. The Sony WH-1000XM6 will still set you back £400 / $450 / AU$699 at the time of writing, while the Bose QuietComfort Ultra Headphones (2nd Gen) just landed at £449 / $449.

The Aventho 200 could have the makings of a solid set of wireless headphones with a hefty battery life all at a reasonable outlay, but they'll need to back up their attractive price with an up-to-par sonic performance. Stay tuned for our full review to see how they perform.

MORE:

Read our Beyerdynamic Aventho 300 review

These are the best wireless headphones you can buy

And check out the best over-ear headphones right now

I own a pair of Sennheiser HD650 headphones. Mine are an early pair, bought around 20 years ago. They don’t see much use these days since What Hi-Fi? tests so many headphones, and there is always something new to listen to. Regardless, I still dig out the Sennheisers every once in a while, just because I like the way they sound.

The last time I did that, I noticed that the earpads and cloth-covered headband pads felt soft and had lost their shape a little. I Googled these things, as you do, and was surprised at the sheer quantity of replacement options available. I could buy the official ones from Sennheiser, of course, but there were a huge number of cheaper alternatives from third-party companies.

Now, I know that the HD600 series of headphones has been a huge success for Sennheiser. They have become touchstone products in the headphone world since the original in the series, the HD600, broke cover in 1998. So, it isn’t all that surprising that spares remain available on the aftermarket, particularly as pretty much all versions of these headphones remain in production to this day. Even so, I still felt a lovely sense of satisfaction that the product I had bought decades ago was still being supported.

This got me thinking about how we have become used to replacing various categories of hi-fi and AV products after just a few years of use. Most in-ears, wired or wireless, tend to be seen as disposable. Once a wire breaks or the Bluetooth stability wavers, that's it, they’re replaced.

Many people don’t think twice about changing their smartphone every year or two. Others may wait longer, but even then, annual operating-system upgrades ultimately force any user to move to a newer model just to enjoy a stutter-free user experience. When it comes to phones and computers, it seems that obsolescence is baked in.

But beyond phones, tablets and computers, I see people throwing away older, though perfectly capable TVs rather than repair them, and the reason is either a lack of spare parts or – you’ve guessed it – progressively worse performance due to software issues. Quite often, the lack of smart features is the reason, but there are usually easy workarounds for this in most cases.

Similarly, CD players are dumped because parts for the transport are hard to get, and I suspect early streamers are likely to go the same way because they’ve been left behind by the incessant march of technology, no longer able to play the latest and greatest source material.

Some hi-fi and AV products aren’t so vulnerable, of course. Record players, being mostly mechanical, fare better, as do all-analogue valve and transistor amplifiers. Usually, any of these things can have a life that’s measured in decades, particularly if they are well-engineered to start with and you buy from a brand that values its existing customers.

There are a number of stand-out brands with highly respected service departments. I’m thinking about the likes of Quad, Naim, Cyrus, Burmester and Audio Research here, and they should be applauded.

Most hi-fi equipment isn’t cheap, but if it can be designed in a way that encourages a long life and fuss-free repair, then that initial outlay, no matter how high it is, can be more easily justified.

If the environment, and sustainability in general, is important to you, it is worth only buying from manufacturers that support their older products. My Sennheisers are good to go for another decade, and I’m chuffed about that.

MORE:

These are the best headphones we have tested

Looking for the best wireless headphones? We've got you covered

And these are the best Sony headphones

We're a demanding lot, aren't we? Not just the What Hi-Fi? team (although we do have suitably high standards), but hi-fi and audio customers in general. With so many great products out there on the market, we're never satisfied. We want to see how far the envelope can be pushed, and that means we are always desperate to see what's arriving on the hazy headphones horizon.

In fairness, some of the would-be models speculated below have been overdue for some time, while others may be close to wishful thinking. Either way, there's a reason we're excited to see them arrive – because the wireless headphones they are set to take over from are so brilliant in the first place. If anything, it's a compliment…

From Sennheiser to Sony and covering both wireless earbuds and over-ears, these are the headphones we are desperate to see in the back-end of 2025.

Wireless over-ear headphones

Sennheiser Momentum 5

It's weird that the Sennheiser Momentum 4 don't always get the credit they deserve. We tend to talk a lot about the best of Bose, Apple and Sony, but Sennheiser knows its way around a pair of wireless headphones – and nowhere is that more keenly demonstrated than with the five-star Momentum 4 Wireless over-ears.

Maybe it's because they landed at the end of 2022, or possibly it's because there is such hot competition at this level, but let's not forget how good the Momentum 4 Wireless are.

They are five-star cans, with a clean, neutral sound, a whopping battery life and effective ANC. Oh, and their wired listening mode doesn't require them to be switched on – a really handy feature if you're in a tight spot.

The thing is, the Momentum 5 Wireless could be outstanding cans. Sennheiser's flagship line has thrown up some wonderful headphones, and while we aren't so keen on the mid-range Accentum series, the fifth-gen Momentum could be the perfect way to remind everyone of the brand's considerable on-head heritage.

Apple AirPods Max 2

It's safe to say that nobody has forgotten about the prospect of a properly second-gen pair of AirPods Max. A tweaked USB-C version of the original Max launched last year, but it's been ages since Apple marked its first foray into the world of premium over-ear cans. Our original AirPods Max review? That was first published in December 2020. That's coming up for five years ago.

Naturally, Apple is in no rush. AirPods Max sales are, understandably, pretty colossal, and it's tough to walk down a quiet country lane, let alone a crammed metropolitan high street, without spotting a pair.

The thing is, Apple will have to update the Max at some point. With the likes of the Dali IO-8, the Sony WH-1000XM6 and the Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3 just threatening to steal their thunder, we were hoping for a full-blooded sonic upgrade to arrive either at the end of this year or the start of the next.

Sadly, most sites, including Macrumours, seem to suggest that we won't seen the fully fledged second-gen cans to land until as late as 2027.

Patience is a virtue, and all that...

Bose QuietComfort Ultra Headphones (2nd Gen)

We've had the second-generation Bose QuietComfort Ultra Earbuds (and very good they were, too), so now it has to be the turn of the over-ears to get an upgrade. The original QC Earbuds arrived in late 2023, leaving less than two years between that first-gen model and the sophomore sequel.

The thing is, the over-ear QuietComfort Ultra Headphones also arrived at a similar time in late 2023. So it's not ridiculous to suggest that a new pair should be scheduled to land late this year or, if there's a small delay, early in 2026.

Much as we still like the QC Ultra Headphones, they're just in danger of falling behind the rest of the pack, especially with key rivals pushing the bar ever further for how good a set of premium over-ears can sound. That stunning ANC is still a trump card, but with the likes of the Sony WH-1000XM6 making ground with excellent noise cancelling of their own, it might not be enough anymore.

In truth, we're hoping for an overall upgrade. Better sound, a slightly classier build and improved battery life (24 hours is solid but not class-leading) are needed in order for Bose to keep up with its relentless rivals.

Sonos Ace 2

Ok, this is a bit of a wildcard – for a few reasons. Firstly, most of the entries on this list have been five-star trailblazers, meaning we have been keen to see sequels (or threequels, four-quels and… fifth-quels) thanks to our affection for the current models.

With the Sonos Ace, though, we weren't so keen. It's not that we couldn't see what Sonos was trying to do with its first-ever pair of wireless headphones; but their lack of class-leading clarity, expression and dynamics made them a tough sell.

Also, we are aware that the Ace have only been around for coming up to a year and a half, making a follow-up reasonably unlikely at the end of 2025. Still, we're hopeful of a new pair coming soon (maybe in early-to-mid 2026?) to rectify the issues of the first-gen debutantes.

The thing is, there's a great pair of headphones lurking in there somewhere. The idea of cans that work beautifully within the Sonos ecosystem will be appealing to many, and let's not forget that the US brand does know how to make great sounding products – just look at the Era 100 and Era 300 wireless speakers for proof.

If those smarts can be fully translated to the world of wireless headphones, Sonos could be onto a winner.

Wireless earbuds

Sony WF-1000XM6

The Sony WF-1000XM6 have to be some of the most highly anticipated wireless earbuds of the last few years. In fact, it seems as though we were waiting for a sixth-gen set of flagship Sony buds to arrive as soon as the WF-1000XM5 landed in 2023, not because they left us disappointed, but because we were desperate to see what Sony could manage next.

Plus, great as the XM5 are, they're not perfect. Many of our test team struggle with their somewhat esoteric fit, preferring instead the more amenable, secure joys of the Bose QuietComfort Ultra Earbuds (2nd Gen). That's a fixable problem, and one we expect Sony to rectify when the time comes for a new generation to make its debut.

We're hoping that said debut will come this year. The Sony WH-1000XM6 have already blown us away in 2025, and given Sony's general bi-yearly release schedule, late 2025 or early 2026 would be the most likely times for the WF-1000XM6 to break cover.

We cannot wait...

Apple AirPods Pro 3

Apple has only two current pairs of headphones (in-ear or over) that have earned five-star What Hi-Fi? reviews: the AirPods Max and the AirPods Pro 2.

The Pro 2 laid down a marker for Apple. Thanks to the integration of the company's powerful H2 chip and the optimised repositioning of the acoustic vents and mics, the noise cancelling, voice calls and sound quality raised the bar for a pair of in-ear AirPods.

What we don't want to see, of course, is regression. Apple's flagship buds remain their best-sounding in-ears, blending punch and muscularity with tangible textural insight, but we can't have any laurel resting here. We want them to kick on and take the fight to Sony and the other class-leaders, rather than just competing with themselves.

The Pro 3 could be some of the best buds of the year. Are you up to the challenge, Apple?

Sennheiser Momentum True Wireless 5

A bit like their over-ear siblings, the Sennheiser Momentum True Wireless 4 (it's such a mouthful) have sort of become the 'other guys' of the wireless earbud world. They're a bit like the current Chelsea football team – more than a match for anyone, but not many people are talking about them as if they are title contenders.

We really do like the Sennheiser Momentum True Wireless 4 – you don't score 5's across the board for nothing. While their noise cancelling isn't perfect, their sound is so lively and entertaining that we find them extremely difficult to dislike. They're just so… charming.

Are we wishing for too much in asking for a sequel to land this year? Possibly. The True Wireless 4 made their debut in early 2024, so late 2025 leaves only around a year and a half between iterations. Late 2025 might be a step too far, but keep your eyes peeled in early 2026 when it's more than possible a follow-up pair could hove into view.

MORE:

I spent 10 hours on trains listening to the Sony WH-1000XM6 – and it convinced me to upgrade my beloved XM4 headphones

I have listened to almost every pair of premium wireless headphones this year – these are the ones I’m recommending to most people

Want to push your hi-fi system to the limit? This heavy metal track is the final boss of testing

Amazon Prime Day may now be firmly in the rearview mirror – and we’re already looking ahead to the second one likely to land in October – but that doesn’t mean the deals have to end. Far from it and, as an audio obsessive, I make it my mission to track down the very best deals across speakers and headphones even when there’s no major sale on the horizon. Lo and behold, five of my favourite products are still on discount.

Admittedly, prices aren’t quite as good as Prime Day, but that’s to be expected. If you missed out during the popular sale, the good news is you can still pick up some truly wonderful gear for some great prices.

You can find my recommendations below, but be sure to check out all the latest Amazon deals for anything that might appeal more to you, or that I might have missed.

MORE:

Best Bluetooth speakers: tried and tested for every budget

Best noise-cancelling headphones 2025 – tested by our in-house review experts

These are the best audiophile headphones for true music lovers

The five-star Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Max has been our favourite premium soundbar since we tested it back in 2019, when it earned a What Hi-Fi? Award for its overall excellent performance. Fast forward to 2025, and it has remained on that esteemed list ever since.

However a new player has entered the scene that could well trump the Sennheiser – and anyone familiar with the world of hi-fi should recognise the name.

The KEF XIO directly challenges our long-time favourite with a similar specification sheet in a smaller package. Can the Ambeo Soundbar Max hold its own against this newcomer? Let's find out.

KEF XIO vs Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Max: price

The XIO launched at £1999 / $2500 / AU$3600. It is still early days for the product, but we are hoping to see its price drop during sales events such as Black Friday.

Higher up the price ladder is the Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Max which was first released at £2199 / $2500 / AU$4000.

Since its launch, we have seen that price drop to as low as £1549 in the occasional sale. It is now regularly available for £1999 in the UK, placing it in direct competition with the KEF.

**Winner: draw**

KEF XIO vs Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Max: build

Both soundbars take very different approaches when it comes to their design.

The Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Max is quite the beast, weighing in at 18.5kg. The brand has opted for this beefy build to negate the need for an external subwoofer, instead favouring large drivers capable of covering a far more significant portion of the frequency range.

Because of its size, the Ambeo will inevitably block a few inches of the bottom of your TV screen if placed in front (unless you raise your telly of course), so it is best enjoyed wall-mounted. It's worth considering if this is something you think would work for you, and finding the perfect positioning can be a bit of a tricky task.

Still, once it is set up, the soundbar is quite straightforward to use. It has a screen display on the front of the 'bar, which is handy for knowing at a glance what EQ mode has been selected.

The KEF comes in a sleeker package with relatively compact dimensions. You can wall-mount the soundbar or keep it flat on a table, so it is rather more flexible than the Sennheiser.

The differences continue under the hood. With the XIO, there are six Uni-Q MX drivers, three of which are on the top of the soundbar for upward-firing sound when the 'bar is placed on a stand under the TV, but with the central unit unemployed in that orientation. The rest are facing forward.

When the soundbar is wall mounted, though, it intelligently deciphers which position it has been placed in and redesignates the drivers. So what were the upward-firing drivers now take on the role of the left and right channels, with the previously unused middle unit taking on the vital centre-channel role.

There's no display with the XIO, which can make it difficult to tell what setting has been selected. Overall, though, the KEF's sleeker design and enhanced flexibility when it comes to placement mean it beats the Sennheiser in this category.

**Winner: KEF XIO**

KEF XIO vs Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Max: features

One negative of the KEF XIO when it comes to physical connections is that it does not have an HDMI passthrough, instead including only HDMI eARC and optical.

The Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Max boasts three HDMI 2.0 inputs and one HDMI 2.1 port, which supports eARC, meaning it can handle Dolby Atmos in its lossless True HD format.

While these ports aren't capable of delivering next-gen gaming features such as VRR and ALLM, they can pass through signals from external sources in 4K HDR, including Dolby Vision.

That's a big positive for those looking to wire up all their connections through the soundbar instead of the TV.

Both models have an app to customise your listening experience and have Bluetooth connectivity. The XIO uses the KEF Connect app, where you can calibrate the soundbar to the room, switch to different EQ sound profiles and use the various streaming services.

The Sennheiser Smart Control app also offers "a dizzying number of sound personalisation options", as we say in our review. When we tested it, we did find that the Smart Control app was a bit clunky to navigate.

It also includes a microphone in the box, which allows for a simple automatic room calibration setup – something the KEF does not feature.

All the big hitters in audio format support are included with both 'bars, including Dolby Atmos, DTS:X, and Sony 360 Audio.

The same can be said in terms of music streaming support, although there are a few differences here. Apple AirPlay 2 and Google Cast are available on the Ambeo but not the XIO.

Both soundbars also support Spotify Connect and Tidal Connect. KEF's model does, however, offer more options with Deezer, Qobuz and Amazon Music all on the cards.

The lack of physical connections on the XIO here means that the Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Max must take the crown for features.

*Winner: Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Max**

KEF XIO vs Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Max: sound

Now for the main event. When we tested the Sennheiser model, we were immediately blown away by its floor-shaking bass yet overall balanced sonic performance.

While watching Unbroken, for example, we find that the Ambeo provides a "brilliant, focused build up as the plane approaches, then a huge, room-filling zoom as it flies by."

The quality of dialogue is not sacrificed, either. Voices feel natural and weighty, with the bass frequencies helping to flesh them out.

With the XIO, we get a more transparent listening experience, as each frequency is clear and unconfused. It does not reach the same weight of bass as the Sennheiser, but we find during testing that this is not so much of a problem.

We comment in our review: "The KEF counters with more clarity, greater precision in the way sounds are rendered and notably more finesse in the way low-level dynamics are delivered. It’s the more transparent performer, and it ultimately gives us greater insight into the soundtrack being played."

Moving on to their performance with music, the Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Max manages to portray a coherent and warm sound. When listening to The Two of Us by The Beatles through Tidal, we say it is not the "snappiest speaker we have heard" but does still manage a "rhythmically astute" performance.

The XIO, on the other hand, impresses us just as much with music as it does with films. KEF's entry captures the excitement of the music more than the Sennheiser, with a brilliant musicality.

In fact, we say that it can "easily serve as a standalone music system, which is more than we can say for the vast majority of soundbars that come our way."

Because of the XIO's excellently expressive performance and coherent meld of frequencies, it's a no-brainer for this category.

**Winner: KEF XIO**

KEF XIO vs Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Max: verdict

Even though these soundbars will cost you the same price now, there are quite a few differences in terms of the audio quality they offer.

Where the Sennheiser is a brilliant performer with a bass-heavy but overall balanced sound, the KEF XIO provides such an easy listening-experience as both a home cinema and a standalone music system.

The XIO's lack of physical connections may be a drawback, but it more than makes up for it with its compact design and overall sound quality.

**Overall winner: KEF XIO**

MORE:

Read the full review of the Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Max

And here's our in-depth look at the KEF XIO

These are the best Dolby Atmos soundbars right now

Since 2019, the Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Max has been our favourite premium model when it comes to Dolby Atmos soundbars.

When we first reviewed it, we were blown away by its immersive and bass-heavy performance.

Because of this, it quickly became our top premium recommendation for those with deep pockets in our best Dolby Atmos soundbars buying guide.

Weighing 18.5kg and standing almost 1.3m wide, the Ambeo uses its extra space to fit in larger, more powerful drivers to produce a bigger sound than most competitors.

While that bulky design could be an issue for those with less space, it results in “bass being delivered with weighty gusto and seamless integration” as we discovered in our in-depth Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Max review.

In terms of its Dolby Atmos performance, we love its room-filling sound that draws you into a scene and dubbed it “encompassing and engaging to listen to.”

Its physical connectivity is a big draw, too, as the 5.1.4 soundbar includes three HDMI 2.0 inputs and one HDMI 2.1 port, which supports eARC.

For years, it was simply the best soundbar at this price point of £2199 / $2500 / AU$4000.

That was until we recently tested the new KEF XIO. It has entered the arena and immediately knocked the Sennheiser off the top spot as the best premium Dolby Atmos soundbar.

But how has it managed to trump our old favourite?

First off, the KEF outperforms the Sennheiser in terms of producing an overall balanced sound. We say in our KEF XIO review: “The XIO’s ability to spread sound around the space feels incredibly natural, all while keeping each frequency clear and unmuddled.”

Even though it does not produce the same level of room-filling sound as the Sennheiser when we put them head-to-head, it “counters with more clarity, greater precision in the way sounds are rendered and notably more finesse in the way low-level dynamics are delivered.”

It performs excellently with music too. The XIO carries all the balance and excitement of its Movie EQ mode to the Music setting, meaning it can hold its own as a standalone music system.

There's a lot to like under the hood as well. Five of KEF's own Uni-Q MX drivers are being employed, with two upward-firing on top of the soundbar and three facing forwards.

Also, you have the built-in Velocity Control Technology (VECO) built into each drive unit.

This is a flexible PCB printed with a sensing coil that takes the place of a traditional former (the component that the main coil wraps around) and measures the speed of movement. It allows the soundbar’s ‘brain’ to compensate for any errors detected.

In terms of cost, the KEF model will set you back £1999 / $2500 / AU$3600, which is around what you can get the Sennheiser for at the time of writing. And, our money would go on the XIO.

The KEF does, however, lack the HDMI inputs that we so enjoyed with the Sennheiser, which is a drawback for those wanting to have all their sources running into the soundbar. It has to settle for a single HDMI 2.1 eARC socket.

Overall, though, the KEF XIO provides a more balanced and transparent listening experience than the still mighty Sennheiser. All hail our new premium Dolby Atmos champion!

MORE:

Read our full KEF XIO review

And our full Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Max review

These are the 36 best Dolby Atmos scenes to test your home cinema system

Amazon Prime Day has uncovered some seriously scorching soundbar offers, especially for anyone looking to save a hefty chunk of change on a premium Dolby Atmos-equipped model.

I was pleased to see that the Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Plus, the very soundbar that I have hooked up to my TV as we speak, is down to just £899 on Amazon, which I believe is the lowest price we've seen it at to date.

It's a brilliant Dolby Atmos soundbar, offering a room-filling performance with immersive surround effects, and a rich, detailed sound that is yet to falter with any movie, TV show or song I throw at it.

There is, however, one slight issue. I can't recommend right now, due to a soundbar deal existing that trumps my beloved Sennheiser in practically every sense of the word.

The Sonos Arc – yes, that five-star, Award-winning, Hall of Fame inductee Sonos Arc – is currently on sale for about £400 less than the Ambeo Soundbar Plus, making it a much better buy.

You see, the Arc is a fantastic soundbar in its own right, offering a powerful, detailed, dynamic and authoritative performance that should appease even the most reluctant soundbar snobs.

It doesn't rival a full 5.1 surround sound system – fair enough, I say – but it's very cinematic while also being super convenient.

In all honesty, the Sonos and Sennheiser aren't all that different when it comes to the sound pros, and they don't differ that greatly in the feature department either.

The Ambeo Soundbar Plus does include HDMI passthrough sockets; however, they are HDMI 2.0 connections and therefore don't support any of the latest gaming features.

Saying that, the Arc doesn't even have HDMI passthrough, so I won't turn my nose up at the Ambeo's slightly weak attempt here.

Both support the same streaming options, including Bluetooth, Spotify Connect, Tidal Connect, Apple AirPlay 2 and Google Cast.

Ambeo earns some bonus points for having a dedicated remote, although an app is also available. The Arc, on the other hand, relies entirely on Sonos' controversial S2 app.

Comparing the two Dolby Atmos soundbars is, in my mind, futile at the time of writing. This is entirely due to the price disparity, which puts the Sonos at such a huge advantage.

I've been urging people to buy the Sonos Arc and ask questions later because this saving is so monumental, and now I'm saying the same thing to anyone thinking of scooping up the Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Plus.

MORE:

Find more home cinema deals on Amazon this Prime Day

More great TV deals to be had at Richer Sounds

Sevenoaks Sound & Vision is home to some home cinema bargains right now

After decades at the forefront of the speaker game, KEF has just launched its first soundbar, called XIO.

• Read our KEF XIO review

The British brand says it is the “KEF signature hi-fi system in a soundbar, delivering a transcendent cinematic sound experience”.

The KEF XIO boasts a 5.1.2-channel configuration and houses 12 Class-D amplifiers.

The drivers include six Uni-Q MX drivers, two of which are on the top of the soundbar for upward-firing sound.

On top of that, there are four P185 LF bass drivers that feature a technology named ‘P Flex’, which is an indented surround that allows the cone to retract and detract more. Then there are two conventional full-range drivers.

In terms of connectivity, the XIO has HDMI 2.1 eARC, Optical and Bluetooth.

An RCA output is also available so you can connect a standard wired subwoofer, and KEF has also launched the KW2 RX transmitter (£149 / £160 / AU$280), which allows any subwoofer (though it's neatest with KEF's own models) to be connected wirelessly.

The XIO supports Dolby Atmos and DTS:X, as well as MPEG-H, with specific compatibility with Sony 360 Reality Audio.

It’s available in two finishes: black or silver.

The KEF XIO costs £1999 / $2500 / AU$3600, pitting it firmly against the Award-winning Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Max. While the Sennheiser launched at £2199 / $2500 / AU$4000, we have seen it drop down to £1999 / $1999 although the Australian price has remained mostly unchanged.

Although the XIO has only launched today, we have already had it in our test rooms for three weeks, and our review is now live. In short, it's superb, but you should check out the full KEF XIO review for all of the juicy details.

MORE:

These are the best soundbars we recommend

Check out our review of the Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Max

Here are the best Dolby Atmos soundbars we have tested

KEF was one of the first specialist hi-fi manufacturers to get into home cinema speaker packages back in the early nineties, and it has continued to operate in the market since then.

It may come as a surprise, therefore, that the brand is only now releasing its first soundbar.

Enter the KEF XIO, a 5.1.2 premium soundbar that the company says is designed to excel with music as well as movies.

This is a tough ask considering most soundbars struggle to achieve this duality. KEF is equipped to do this better than most, though, given its expertise in both fields.

Price

The XIO launches at £1999 / $2500 / AU$3600, placing it firmly in the high-end premium soundbar category.

That pits it firmly against the Award-winning Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Max, which was originally priced at £2199 / $2500 / AU$4000 when we first tested it back in 2019. Now, though, we are seeing regular discounts down to £1999 / $1999, although the Australian price has remained mostly unchanged.

The Sennheiser currently holds the crown as the best high-end model in our best soundbars guide, and is our current benchmark at this price.

Build

The XIO comes in a choice of two finishes, black or silver, with cloth grille panels covering the ends, front and back.

Unlike its Sennheiser rival, which has a bulky design that really needs to be wall-mounted, the XIO (which can also be wall-mounted) fits nicely under a TV with its shallow height. It has an overall mature and premium appearance, too, which we think will blend well into most living rooms.

This relatively thin design is quite a feat considering the XIO houses an impressive 12 drive units, each with a dedicated Class D power amplifier. Added together, KEF claims the complement of amplifiers delivers a meaty 820 watts of peak power.

There are six Uni-Q MX drivers, three of which are on the top of the soundbar for upward-firing sound, but with the one in the centre employed only when the soundbar is wall-mounted. That leaves the remaining three facing forward.

The MX isn’t like a traditional Uni-Q design. Rather than having two separate drive units, a tweeter and mid/bass, that fit into a single assembly, this new MX driver has a dual diaphragm arrangement that features a clever mechanical crossover to allow the high-frequency central section to operate separately.

Then there are four ‘P185’ bass drivers. The P185 is a rectangular design that is 51 x 180mm in size. KEF claims that each of these has the same radiating area as a traditional circular 10cm driver unit, but the rectangular shape allows the soundbar to be considerably slimmer than would otherwise be the case.

That’s not all. KEF has arranged the four P185 drivers into two pairs that face in opposite directions, so that any vibrations generated by each driver are cancelled by the opposite reaction of its partner. This layout should result in appreciably less vibration being generated by the soundbar and fed into its support, which bodes well for the XIO’s bass performance.

The P185 is an interesting design for more than its shape. It has a distinctive indented surround that KEF calls ‘P Flex’ to allow the cone greater freedom of movement and control.

Perhaps even more unusual is the Velocity Control Technology (VECO) built into the drive unit. Here, a flexible PCB printed with a sensing coil takes the place of a traditional former (the component that the main coil wraps around) and measures the speed of movement. This allows the soundbar’s ‘brain’ to compensate for any errors detected.

Finally, there are two conventional full-range drivers on either side. Given that they are only 50mm in diameter, maybe ‘full range’ is pushing it, but what they do is push the soundfield wider.

You can wall-mount the soundbar or keep it flat on a table. When it is wall-mounted, the orientation changes so the forward-facing drivers now point upwards. In this guise, what was the central driver is now activated and pointed at the listener. The bulk of our testing was done with the soundbar facing forward sitting on our rack.

On one side of the XIO, you will find a panel with indented touch buttons for power, output and volume. Sometimes these are not as precise in use as we would like. When we press a button, it is not entirely clear whether the unit has registered the command. If we had an on-unit display, this would be less of an issue.

The XIO comes with a lightweight remote that is simple to use with a clear layout. While the remote covers the basic commands, the KEF Connect app has a more comprehensive range of controls, which we suspect most people will lean towards.

Features

In terms of inputs, the XIO has HDMI 2.1 eARC, optical and Bluetooth.

It is also possible to connect an outboard subwoofer either through a standard line-level analogue output or via wireless transmission. Alongside the XIO, KEF has launched the KW2 RX adapter (costing £149 / £160 / AU$280) to allow this wireless sub connection.

At this level, we really expect a soundbar to have dedicated HDMI inputs as well as an HDMI eARC port. The XIO’s main rival, the Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Max, has three HDMI inputs. Largely due to its age, they're not 2.1 spec, so won't support 4K/120Hz from a games console, but they are still useful.

The Samsung HW-Q990F, which is more affordable than the KEF XIO and a full system in a box to boot, has two HDMI 2.1 inputs and full 4K/120Hz passthrough.

With these extra HDMI inputs, you can connect everything to your soundbar rather than going through the TV. KEF's approach in having all of your sources running into your TV is far from uncommon, but is something we expect more from mid-range and budget models.

In terms of 3D sound formats, the XIO supports Dolby Atmos, DTS:X and Sony 360 Reality Audio, and when it comes to music, there’s plenty to choose from, including Amazon Music, Qobuz, Tidal Connect, Deezer and Spotify Connect.

The KEF Connect app is simple to set up and use, with easy-to-navigate sections at the bottom. From there, you can select the XIO’s output, see the exact volume setting, and control all the streaming services.

There is also the useful ability to change the speaker volume sensitivity. You can make one press of the plus button increase the volume by multiple or single steps, for example. There’s the option to set a maximum volume limit as well, which is handy for young and sensitive ears.

In the KEF’s EQ settings, there are different sound profiles to choose from. Default has a great sense of balance and naturalness. Movie, on the other hand, projects the audio to fill the room, giving a more spacious sound field and a greater feeling of movement to sounds. However, there are losses in terms of focus and impact at lower frequencies. This leads us to use Default more often.

As you would expect, there is a Night mode that compresses dynamic peaks and bass impact, which is handy for those times when you don’t want to disturb the other people in the house. Understandably, it also removes much of the tension from the sound, and voices sound less natural than in Default or Movie, so it should only be used when it’s really needed.

Music mode, meanwhile, creates a more cohesive and directed sound that is, as the name suggests, best reserved for stereo music.

Finally, there’s a Direct setting with minimal processing and equalisation. This mode is noticeably quieter and reduces the impact of the surround effects. While we’re normally fans of such ‘pure’ sound modes, on this occasion we find the sonic performance loses too much in the way of entertainment.

The XIO also features ‘Intelligent Placement Technology.’ This allows the soundbar to detect if the orientation changes, and you can calibrate it to further adjust its performance based on the space.

Built-in microphones allow it to measure your room, including being able to detect walls and furniture.

Once it’s set up, it produces balanced results in our test room. Turn the EQ modes off, and the sense of immersion is much reduced.

Sound

We begin our full sound testing with Jurassic World on 4K Blu-ray with DTS:X sound.

As the unwitting children get a first glimpse of the park, the expressiveness of the score is immediately portrayed with a pleasing musicality. The sparkle of the brass feels crisp but not sharp, while the midrange is full-bodied and solid.

We move to later in the film, where things have turned south and our protagonists are being chased by hyper-intelligent raptors. The tension of the pursuit is really heightened by a tight bass with plenty of punch.

As the raptors run after a moving truck, the pounding of their feet on the ground has the right balance of being muffled yet impactful.

Despite the XIO’s slim and relatively compact dimensions, it still manages to produce an impressively wide and immersive soundstage.

When watching Labyrinth on 4K Blu-ray with Dolby Atmos, this becomes apparent. As our protagonist, Sarah, is stuck in the Bog of Eternal Stench and attempts to escape, the sound of the rocks rising surrounds the listener and makes the impact feel palpable as they come to the surface.

The XIO’s ability to spread sound around the space feels incredibly natural, all while keeping each frequency clear and unmuddled.

Take the opening scene of John Wick 2 on 4K Blu-ray with Dolby Atmos, as Keanu Reeves’ rugged character embarks on a hair-raising car chase. The deep revving of engines feels textured with the rhythm of the vehicle throbbing, but it does not overpower the lighter soundtrack.

One car leaps over a bump in the distance and then moves into the forefront, displaying the soundbar’s sense of precision. You can really feel the three-dimensionality of the sequence as the vehicle moves across the screen.

We test the XIO against the Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Max and find that the two have very distinct strengths and weaknesses.

The Sennheiser certainly has a bassier and bigger overall sound, managing to spread the audio around the room more. As objects move across the screen, it is able to project the movement of the sound in a more emphatic way, wrapping us in the sound field a little more convincingly.

But the KEF counters with more clarity, greater precision in the way sounds are rendered and notably more finesse in the way low-level dynamics are delivered. It’s the more transparent performer, and it ultimately gives us greater insight into the soundtrack being played.

The XIO certainly produces less bass than its rival, but those lows are better formed and more controlled. If you do want greater low-end heft, however, then there is always the option of adding a dedicated subwoofer.

When we switch to Music mode to test out some tunes, Tidal Connect and Qobuz Connect work seamlessly.

With Radiohead’s Codex, the mellow bass feels well separated from the midrange but still melds together well. Vocals sound natural, but the slightly echoing effect baked into the track is still picked out.

In fact, the XIO can easily serve as a standalone music system, which is more than we can say for the vast majority of soundbars that come our way.

Overall, this is an effortlessly organised sound that captures the excitement of what you are listening to, whether that’s movies or music.

Verdict

The XIO is supremely easy to listen to, creating an impressively wide sense of space for a soundbar while maintaining balance and expressiveness.

With a comprehensive app and plenty of streaming connectivity, it also works as an excellent sound system for music alone.

KEF says that it wants the soundbar to effectively act as a hi-fi package wrapped up in one product, and it has achieved that. Put simply, it is one of the best soundbars we have heard.

SCORES:

• Sound 5
• Build 5
• Features 4

MORE:

Also consider the Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Max and Samsung HW-Q990F

These are the best Dolby Atmos soundbars you can buy right now

Another week has passed in the world of all things audio and visual, and our deal experts and AV editors have once again lined up their favourite deals so you can save big without any hassle.

This week we've seen excellent savings on all manner of kit, including a flagship Mini LED TV from Hisense and savings on not one but two pairs of five-star wireless headphones from Sennheiser and Sony.

All our deals come with the What Hi-Fi? stamp of approval, meaning we'd be confident in recommending them to anyone looking to buy where the product in question fits their budget. And we'll be back in seven days with another round-up of picks post Amazon Prime Day sales.

So, here are five best hi-fi and home cinema deals we've spotted this week...

A talented high-tech TV with big money off

• Need more information? Read our full Hisense U8N review

Excellent stereo speakers with a hint of soundbar flexibility

• Need more information? Read our full Elac Debut ConneX DCB41 review

JBL's brilliant Bluetooth speakers is an awesome performer at a great price

• Need more information? Read our full JBL Charge 5 review

Sony's brilliant budget wireless earbuds are a no-brainer at this price

• Need more information? Read our full Sony WF-C510 review

Under-the-radar Sennheisers are a snip thanks to this mega saving

• Need more information? Read our full Sennheiser Momentum 4 Wireless review

The Canvas HiFi is a home cinema anomaly. Is it a soundbar? Sort of. Is it a two-channel hi-fi system? Yes, but also no. It’s actually easier to affirm what the Canvas isn’t.

It’s not a Dolby Atmos soundbar, which might surprise you, considering it's designed to attach to your TV to produce cinematic sound.

It’s also not really a soundbar at all if we’re speaking in the traditional sense, as it’s designed for your TV to be mounted directly onto it.

While that might be a dealbreaker for some, especially the mainstream crowd, we find that this oddity in the world of home cinema audio is rather charming.

It also teaches us an important lesson: you don’t need a shedload of processing to create a cinematic sound experience.

Price

We have Canvas HiFi's Canvas 65 model, which is officially priced at a rather ambitious £2899 / $4999 / AU$5999. This is, unquestionably, a premium product, and the price tag should confirm that.

If you’re after a Canvas to fit your 55-inch TV, then you can expect to pay the same price, though owners of a 77-inch TV should expect to cough up £2999. Those lucky enough to have an 83-inch TV, meanwhile, will need to fork out a whopping £3299.

It’s worth noting that the speaker system itself is the same size regardless; however, the grilles are different sizes to match your TV.

That means if you upgrade from a 55-inch TV to a 65- or 77-inch TV, you won't need to replace your whole system. Instead, just grab a new grille and everything will match up smoothly.

If you’re looking for competition in this price range, you’ll need to skip the usual soundbar suspects – such as Sonos, Sony and Samsung – and set your sights a little higher towards the likes of Bang & Olufsen’s £2300 Beosound Stage. We haven’t reviewed it, but its design-centric, premium standing aligns with the Canvas in some ways.

For a more conventional soundbar solution, the Sennheiser Ambeo Max is your best bet. That beast of a bar generally retails for £2199, however, it’s been on the market for a handful of years, so you’ll find it for closer to £1999.

Loose comparisons aside, it’s hard to directly relate the Canvas to anything in the soundbar category. In truth, it feels more closely related to a set of stereo speakers, though that involves pricing up an amplifier, plus having trailing cables and dealing with a lengthy set-up process.

Build

While the design of any soundbar is an important factor, arguably it’s a bigger deal when it comes to the Canvas Hifi, as it serves as a stylish companion to your TV while also upgrading the sound.

We have the Canvas set up in the floorstanding orientation, with a Sony Bravia 8 OLED TV affixed to the top, and can confirm that this duo looks rather suave. It creates a monolithic, freestanding look, with the included black fabric grille creating a seamless all-in-one aesthetic.

There are a couple of things to note, however. Set-up is quite involved, with multiple boxes and an Ikea-style guide that gets the job done, but could be more descriptive.

The guides to get your TV into position without leaving a gap are more like suggestions, but we managed to get the Canvas set up properly after a small amount of trial and error.

Note, you will certainly need at least two people to set the Canvas up, and we can’t comment on the wall-mounting process, though the parts required for that are included in the box.

Also included with the Canvas HiFi is a basic black fabric cover, which can be affixed easily thanks to magnets. Other fascias are available, and we gravitate towards a stunning light oak panel, which features a slatted wooden design.

Be warned, though, that these additional covers are extraordinarily pricey, with that aforementioned wooden option costing a cool £1199. Fabric grilles, on the other hand, will run you £499, though these prices increase in relation to the size of your TV.

There are a couple of other niggles we have with the Canvas’ design.

First and foremost, the cubbyhole for the power and HDMI sockets is a bit too small, meaning plugging the system in can be a bit awkward, especially if you have a rigid HDMI cable.

Furthermore, the free-standing set-up does mean that the TV leans backwards slightly, as the feet on the bottom of the system are designed to angle the sound upwards.

We get that this has been done for the sake of sound performance, but be wary of placing your Canvas HiFi and TV in a place with either lots of ambient light or right under an indoor light, as the angle can result in noticeable reflections on your screen.

Features

Here is where we’d usually list an exhaustive reel of features, including sound formats, calibration settings and the like. However, the Canvas HiFi is a surprising subversion of the premium soundbar market, as it doesn’t have quite so many gimmicks attached.

Let's start with the most important feature: the drivers. They’re hard to miss with the front cover detached, as they dwarf anything seen in the likes of the Sonos Arc Ultra or even the behemoth that is the Sennheiser Ambeo Max.

Within the MDF cabinet, which is supported by Canvas’s patented BridgeBrace technology for extra rigidity, you’ll find three pairs of drivers, all provided by high-end driver manufacturer SB Acoustics.

There is a pair of 16.5cm paper cone mid/bass drivers housed in die-cast aluminium chassis, dual 29mm silk dome tweeters with aluminium front plate waveguides, and, last but not least, a pair of low-loss, high precision passive radiators.

Powering these beefy speaker units are quad Class D amplifiers pumping out 250W of power each; that’s a total of 1000W of amplification. These are paired with Burr-Brown DACs, which support up to 24-Bit/192kHz digital signals.

The Canvas HiFi, therefore, rightfully takes the title of “most hi-fi soundbar to enter our testing room”; the clue is in the title, we suppose.

While the sheer magnitude of the drivers and amplification is undoubtedly rather impressive, the software is where the Canvas is let down slightly.

Frustratingly, there is no remote in the box; not the end of the world, as HDMI CEC handles volume adjustment, but to access the other inputs and calibration settings, you’ll need to use the Canvas app on a smartphone.

Specifically, an iPhone, if we’re being honest, as, while an Android app does exist, it’s borderline unusable. Room correction only works with an iPhone’s built-in microphone, and the wi-fi set-up crashed repeatedly on our Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra.

Switching to an iPhone 16, we had less trouble setting the system up, but we wouldn’t call the app smooth.

Canvas does have an app update launching in the near future, which hopefully will clear some things up. Saying that, the current state of the app, which is required for a lot of the Canvas HiFi’s functions, is in a bit of a sorry state.

It does allow for a handful of basic functions, including a basic room correction feature (more on that in the sound section), as well as a way to turn the Bacch 3D sound processing – the only audio processing option on offer – on and off. You can still calibrate the system with an optional Zen microphone, although it's a substantial accessory, cost-wise.

Thankfully, for playing music, you can bypass the Canvas app and cast directly to the bar with Google Cast, Apple AirPlay 2, Spotify Connect, Tidal Connect and Roon. Canvas also says it can be integrated into a range of multi-room set-ups from companies such as Sonos, Bose, HEOS and more via the optical Toslink connection.

Sound

The Canvas’ proposition, if it wasn’t clear by now, is all about offering a hi-fi-level cinematic sound. So does it deliver on this promise? We certainly think so.

We’ve paired the Canvas HiFi with our Sony Bravia 8 reference TV, our Oppo UDP-203 4K Blu-ray player, as well as a range of reference discs including Dune: Part Two, Civil War and Blade Runner 2049.

Before we get stuck into sound performance, we should discuss our preferred settings, as although there aren’t many to choose from, we do make an immediate discovery.

To our ears, the Canvas sounds best with room correction and Bacch 3D processing switched off; this sort of makes sense when we remember that it's a stereo product.

One setting we do switch on, however, is the HDMI volume boost feature. Without it, the Canvas sounds quiet, and needs to be turned up to quite a high volume in order to reach its full potential.

When turned up too high, it can sound strained, so this feature helps to level things out by introducing a 10dB volume boost, allowing the Canvas to deliver punchy, cinematic audio without losing nuance or focus.

It’s designed to compensate for lower volume outputs from built-in streaming apps. However, we find it improves the experience across the board.

Leaving the Canvas HiFi in its natural state, we’re immediately floored by how crisp and natural it sounds. Detail levels are exceptional, with the clattering of helicopter blades in Civil War sounding textured and precise.

Voices are another highlight, as the conversation between Officer K and Joi in the bleak sci-fi apartment in Blade Runner 2049 sounds wonderfully authentic and emotive, and they’re underpinned with a richness that makes them sound genuinely lifelike.

Where the Canvas HiFi truly excels, however, is with low-end punch.

Bass is presented with a level of weight that you could liken to an external subwoofer; it’s deep, rich and nicely controlled. This is evidenced in the bass-heavy Harkonnen arena fight in Dune: Part Two, which is presented with plenty of low-frequency heft, meaning the scene is conveyed with ample drama.

We appreciate how direct and clear the Canvas sounds, as it doesn’t try to add anything with processing. Dolby Atmos is great when implemented correctly, but the simplicity and focus on pure audio quality are where the Canvas shines.

It’s also skilled with music, as evidenced with a handful of tracks that we play through the Canvas, including Churchyard by Aurora and Bloom, Baby Bloom by Wolf Alice. Timing is handled very well, and the naturalness of voices and instruments does an excellent job of replicating the music with texture and detail.

There is, however, one sticking point that just holds the Canvas HiFi back from true greatness. Its handling of dynamics is, unfortunately, not quite good enough. Scenes and tracks with big moments of impact or dynamic shifts lack the crescendos that we look for in products such as this.

The Canvas has no trouble building up a moment of suspense or a verse that is about to enter a bombastic chorus, but it never quite hits the peak, resulting in a slightly weak pay-off.

It’s a shame, as the clarity, detail levels and the sheer weight of the sound make for an otherwise thoroughly engaging sound.

We also find that the included black fabric grille can rattle in scenes with heavy bass. This might be due to the lightweight acoustic cloth used in conjunction with the lightweight design and magnetic connection. It introduces what sounds like distortion, but removing the standard grille negates this issue.

Trying the heavier wooden fascia fixes this issue, though spending £1299 to fix an issue isn’t exactly an ideal scenario.

Verdict

The Canvas is a prime example of niche, audiophile gear straying away from the exclusive world of hi-fi and into the realm of home cinema.

We’ll admit, we had some prejudices when we found that this pricey sound system didn’t support some of the most commonplace cinematic audio features, but those notions were quickly dispelled.

Its clear, detailed and weighty sound is supremely cinematic, and even though it doesn’t quite deliver the goods where dynamics are concerned, we find that there’s lots to like here.

Sometimes, simplicity is a pro in itself, so if you want a straightforward and effective stereo upgrade for your TV, all in a stylish package, then this quirky speaker system is certainly worth a look.

SCORES

• Sound 4
• Build 4
• Features 3

MORE:

Read our review of the Sennheiser Ambeo Max

Also consider the Sonos Arc Ultra

Read our Sony Theatre Bar 9 review

Best soundbars: options for every need, recommended by our experts

These are cabled open over-ear headphones, a type which has long been considered restricted to certain uses, being relatively unsuitable for others. Their cabled nature counts against using them as a moveable feast: besides, if you’re out and about then such open headphones will let surrounding noise in, potentially swamping your music, while also letting your tunes escape into the wild, where they may annoy fellow travellers on the commute or garner irritated glances in an office environment.

Even if you’re at home, you can’t use open headphones in a shared space, for the same reasons. So traditionally we have come to think of open cabled headphones like these as being for true solo listening, at home, alone. Real hi-fi headphones.

But this has recently changed. Open headphones have become a popular choice with gamers, who are of course often at home alone (although connected to the world) in darkened bedrooms as they mash away at their controller buttons. Yet we gather, from those who know a little more about such things, that gamers are now favouring open headphones even when they congregate in teams and groups for gaming sessions, perhaps gathering useful real-world information overlaid upon their gaming soundtracks.

And in addition, the world at large is changing. We have noted of late that previous consideration of fellow commuters seems to be on the wane, judging from the many people who now play phone videos on the bus and in airports without using any headphones at all. So perhaps today’s self-obsessed world has become better suited to the more widespread application of open headphone designs.

Design & build

We, however, will continue to judge such headphones primarily in the context of being home alone, and listening to music, or movies, or podcasts or audio books. And although Sennheiser does mark this model as a “microphone-ready design”, we will not be attempting to connect a microphone to the HD 550 and thereby Twitch our way to fame. Shocking traditionalism, perhaps, from longstanding hi-fi reviewers, but through many decades we have always been very at home with Sennheiser, a brand which has handled our tunes for as long as we have been listening.

We had a case of déja vù unpacking Sennheiser’s new HD 550; haven’t we done these? They looked near-identical to a pair of open Sennheisers we already had to hand, the HD 560S, which we reviewed a few years ago. The new HD 550s have an indent instead of a bulge for the logo on the outer grille, they have a light grey highlight on the inside of the ear cup, and they turn the Sennheiser name sideways on the headband (which also has less thick padding). But otherwise the two headphones appear identical.

Of course this doesn’t speak to the materials and drivers within. It does highlight Sennheiser’s lack of differentiation between designs in recent years; even the latest wireless noise-cancelling Momentums are similarly near-featureless headsets, as are Sennheiser’s Accentum wireless headphones, not much different from the HD 550 either, aside from having flat closed headshells rather than open, and a different yoke mechanism.

We remember Sennheiser designs of old which were downright quirky, but we gather that market research has led the licensee of the consumer Sennheiser brand, Swiss medical company Sonova, towards this simplification of design. The former more engineered Sennheiser look was popular with only a small percentage of the market, and the goal is to reach a wider market, so out went the bling and in came the greys and blacks (with occasional cream or copper parts inserted to relieve the monotony).

Another obvious comparison product was almost simultaneous in release, as well as very similar-looking – the HD 505, differentiated as an Amazon exclusive model by having copper-coloured highlights (pictured below, on the right). Given that the literature in the box for our HD 550 review model was common to the HD 505, with both models listed at the top (visible on our lead image above), we have our suspicions that they are not much otherwise differentiated. And yet the HD 505 is selling cheaper at £230 / US$280 / A$450, and is being discounted substantially further on Amazon as we write (you'll find the latest local Amazon price in WHF UK's HD 505 review here).

Meanwhile that similar-looking HD 560S headphone sells at $319.95; we kept this alongside as one of our reference comparators during this review.

Sennheiser's regular discounting can also create rivals among its higher models: in Australia as we write (June 2025), the new HD 550 is at exactly the same price as the higher-level HD 650, currently discounted to the HD 550 price from, er, $300 higher.

Such discounts change regularly, so apologies if the mentioned ones have ended by the time you read this, but it shows that it's always worth scouting at your local dealer (or checking Sennheiser Hearing's site) for higher models on discount before investing in a new model at full price.

Still, while the HD 550's exterior design lacks any new element of visual interest, and doesn't achieve the physical presence and grandeur that still exists in Sennheiser’s higher models like the HD 660S2 (up at $949.95), they are certainly solid enough, and gain by having most elements well tried-and-tested on other models. Common design across multiple models may be boring, but there is at least an argument that keeping things simple and common plays to reliability, and to potential economies that will allow better sonic components for this level of headphone.

Listening sessions

That does seem the plan for the HD 550, because during listening there were moments when we might have been wearing far more expensive models.

They use a custom 38mm 150-ohm transducer made at Sonova’s production facility in Tullamore, Ireland, with a quoted frequency range of 6Hz to 39.5kHz, and lower than 0.2% total harmonic distortion (@1kHz). The drivers are positioned to angle back towards the ears, through acoustically-transparent and largely visually-transparent dust covers.

The HD 550s certainly leverage the two biggest advantages of cabled use over Bluetooth: the potential for greater detail in the signal, and for greater available power to drive the headphones. For Bluetooth headphones, signals have to be digitised, and then squeezed through the invisible Bluetooth pipe. A cabled signal is analogue all the way, and depending on your source it may have near-infinite detail! And the HD 550s come loaded with the ability to deliver that detail. Listen to how they handle the delicacy of the drum fills on Fiona Apple’s recent cover of Neil Young’s Heart of Gold, the textures and space around the little snare paradiddles, and the breathy edge to Apple’s vocals.

Or the scintillating guitar picking that opens Suzanne Vega’s Witch, panning out and swirling around an already-bright central vocal, plenty of width and air from the HD 550s before the drum entry takes the song to rockier territory.

A second advantage of cables over wireless is straightforward power – Bluetooth headphones are very often annoyingly volume limited, whereas these cabled headphones are powered by whatever quality of headphone amplifier you can give their 150-ohm impedance. The HD 550s certainly seemed to love good power, and they sounded their best given more than modest quantities, subject to the usual warnings on safe use and taking care of your ears. The point is that you can enjoy minimal distortion up to relatively higher levels. Aphrodite’s Child’s Break, say, could be played loud enough without distortion to give real impact, while through the HD 550s the same band’s early single Five O’Clock sounded wildly synthtastic up loud on its choruses, organ-rich in its laidback verses, showing Vangelis’ dynamic rock chops as he fills between Demis Roussos’ soaring vocals.

Keeping things emotive, Arvo Pärt’s Cantus in Memory of Benjamin Britten piled on the pathos and under the HD 550s’ abilities could easily maintain its great bass swell while still separating the higher strings and handling the recurrent tolling bell – a challenge for any single driver to handle, yet the HD 550s held everything together.

And there was certainly no problem sinking into the music under these dynamic open cans, and they benefit from being able to give some simple dynamic punch as well: the heartbeat on the intro to the new mixes of Floyd ‘Live At Pompeii’ has an even tighter and possibly deeper kick to it than the infamous ‘Dark Side’ intro sequence on which it is based, and the HD 550s really did push down to genuinely deep bass for this impressive impact.

We had some other models under review at the same time, including the rather cheaper new Audio-Technica ATH-R30x, another wired open headphone which perhaps surprisingly offered more sparkle. But ultimately the Sennheisers were the safer listen, never slipping into sibilance, and without any longer-term impact of fatigue during extended higher-level listening.

Of those similar Sennheiser models, we did have the open HD 560S to hand, which made an interesting comparison, combining elements of the HD 550s with the more sparkly merits of the Audio-Technicas. The HD 560S sound is perhaps a little less controlled, but was substantially more open-sounding and with a far better and more natural delivery of both bass and high-end; on track after track our preference was for the cheaper HD 560S model.

A two-piano 2023 recording ‘Rachmaninoff For Two’ piece made the comparison clear: through the HD 550 it was one big piano sound with stuff going on, through the HD 560S it was clearly two pianos delivering much improved and separated dynamics. The HD 550’s largest benefit was improved comfort, mainly from their significantly lighter weight.

On the other hand, the HD 550 sound was similarly advanced in openness and dynamics over the same piece when played on a pair of Momentums via Bluetooth, showing the advantages so easily gained by using a cable into open-backed headphones.

Verdict

Ultimately we’d label the HD 550s balance as almost entirely neutral. They deliver sufficient bass but don’t pump up it up like a closed street headphone, nor mush it up either, simply delivering things cleanly.

The midrange isn’t drippingly gorgeous or heart-meltingly forward, but it’s well-balanced against clean higher frequencies that never shriek, avoid any specific feeling of rolling off or the enclosed feel of closed headphones, though they might sparkle just a little more up top.

It’s the spaciousness and lack of pumpiness in which the open design stands out from closed models, and while we’d recommend a side-by-side audition with a pair of Sennheiser’s HD 560S, if you can find them, the HD 550s’ neutral balance maintains the reassurance of Sennheiser’s continuing ability to provide predictably enjoyable sound at whatever level you choose to engage with the brand.

• See all our Australian reviews from Sound+Image and Australian Hi-Fi magazines

• Showcase! - world-class Australian home theatres & smart homes

Sennheiser's has announced it is expanding its mid-range Accentum line with the Accentum Open, a "non-occlusive" pair of wireless earbuds which fit on the ear, rather than digging deep into your lugholes.

The new open-design earbuds are the latest entry into a trend that started to gather steam in 2024 thanks to the appearance of the Bose Ultra Open Earbuds and the Sony LinkBuds Open. Panasonic is also getting on board with its recently announced RB-F10.

The Accentum Open seem to follow say trend as other recent open-design earbuds, with each earpiece clocking in at around 4.4g. Sennheiser promises that the buds' combination of lightness plus their non-intrusive design makes the Accentum Open "liberating to use".

At the heart of Accentum Open is an 11mm dynamic transducer, in a design that's situated just outside the ear canal, leading to less wearer fatigue and providing greater awareness of the environment by allowing outside sounds to enter the ear more freely.

​The new earbuds house dual beamforming microphones for "dependable hands-free call quality", filtering out background noise for clearer, more intelligible conversations.

The Accentum Open also support Bluetooth Multipoint connectivity for seamlessly switching between multiple devices such as laptops and smartphones.

The earbuds offer up to 6.5 hours of playback on a single charge, and a total of 28 hours when the charging case is in play. Thanks to their fast-charging abilities, 10 minutes of juice from a USB cable will grant you up to 1.5 hours of listening time.

According to Friederike Menking, Sennheiser's Project Manager:

"Accentum Open was designed to complement your busy life, not complicate it. Whether you are listening to music, catching up on a podcast at your desk or checking in with your friends on your way to the train, the ease of use is second only to the sound".

The new Sennheiser Accentum Open are available in either a black or cream finish, priced at £70 / €90 / $130. Considering the prices of their open rivals, including the Apple AirPods 4 with ANC (£179 / $179) and the Sony LinkBuds Open (£179 / $200), that's an attractively low amount for the Sennheiser buds.

From the over-ear Accentum Wireless to the Accentum Plus Wireless, we haven't exactly adored Sennheiser's mid-range line thus far, so maybe their competitive RRP will help the Open to a better result for the established brand.

MORE:

These are the best wireless earbuds you can buy

What are open earbuds and are they right for you?

8 tracks we've been using to test in the What Hi-Fi? listening rooms this month

Today marks Day 2 of the High End Munich show!

It's the last time Europe's biggest hi-fi trade show takes place in Munich (the show moves to Vienna next year), and it's going out with a splash. There are over 500 exhibitors and 1000 brands showcasing the latest and greatest audio products throughout the week. The show started on Thursday, 15th May and ends on Sunday 18th.

The What Hi-Fi? team are on the ground at the MOC Event Center Messe München to bring you all the latest hi-fi news and launches, while raising a stein (or two!) to the venue's last hurrah.

We've already seen multiple launches from some of the biggest hi-fi brands out there, including high-end amplifiers from Mark Levinson, Audiolab's new DACs, a high-end streamer from dCS, a new phono stage from Chord Electronics, and a special Charlie Brown turntable from Pro-Ject. Scroll down for all the key news and highlights.

We'll be bringing you exclusive product news, hands-on images, first impressions and more insights from the event, so keep an eye on the website, our Instagram and Facebook channels for exclusive photos and videos from the show floor.

High End Munich 2025: latest news

Latest news and what to expect

Audiolab
Audiolab has started things off with a bang, announcing two new standalone DACs – the D7 (£499) and pricier D9 (£1099) – that are descendants of the much-loved, well-regarded Audiolab M-DAC. The D7 (pictured above) and D9 are packed with new technologies and features.
Read the full Audiolab D7 and D9 story

Audiovector
The Danish speaker company will be demoing its new flagship R10 Arreté floorstanders, which cost a cool £127,5000 / $165,000 / €147,500 per pair. We've already had a first look and listen to these new floorstanders, and you'll get a chance to hear them yourselves at the show.
I listened to Audiovector's flagship floorstanders, and they're an incredibly fun way to spend a small fortune

Auralic
Auralic will be unveiling its new Aquila X3 streaming media processor at Munich, which promises "a cutting-edge feature set and true modular design, offering users unmatched flexibility and upgradability." The X3 will be on demo to showcase Auralic's LightningCast technology that is said to be "revolutionising high-resolution streaming".

Audio-Technica
There's a new flagship turntable in town. Audio-Technica has launched the AT-LPA2 (pictured above), with chassis and platter made of clear acrylic to achieve that striking transparent look. It comes fitted with the AT-OC9XEN dual moving coil cartridge, has a separate power supply unit, and is yours for £1699 / €1999.
Read the Audio-Technica LPA2 story

Advance Paris
The French brand will be launching a number of new products at the show, details of which are under wraps for now. But if you like the look of the beefy A12 Classic integrated with VU meters, keep an eye out for its new releases.

Astell & Kern
A&K has a brand new flagship portable music player – the A&ultima SP4000 – which is packed with more ways of playing high-resolution music than you would think was possible from a portable device. We don't have official pricing yet, but the previous five-star SP3000 flagship cost £3799 / $3699 / AU$5499, so expect a similarly lofty price.

Burmester
Not content with one product launch at High End Munich, Burmester has refreshed its entire Reference line of products. This sees the arrival of the 257 turntable, 249 preamplifier and 259 stereo power amplifier, which are all brand new designs and share nothing from their predecessors.
Read the Burmester story

Chord Electronics
Chord teased a new flagship product for its Ultima Reference range, and we now know it's the company's flagship Ultima Phonostage (pictured above). We don't have a price at this stage, but it was on display at Munich High End together with some initial specifications.
Read the Chord Ultima Phonostage story

Cyrus Audio
Cyrus has dropped some huge news at High End 2025 with the launch of its first-ever full-width products. The new 80 Series features casework which, according to Cyrus, is simply an extension of that used for its 40 Series. Besides giving its rengineers more room to work in, the new chassis also allows the company to accommodate its external power supply (the 40PSU) in 80 Series products.
Read the Cyrus Audio story

Dali
Dali has brought the bass to High End 2025 with the V-15F, its most powerful subwoofer yet. Weighing over 50kg, it's a bit of a beast with a huge 16-inch driver and no fewer than four continuous flare reflex ports. A serious speaker for stereo and AV use.
Read the Dali V-15F story

dCS
The new Lina DAC X music streamer launched earlier this month and we hope to have a peek of the new £13,500 / $15,500 player at the show. We were impressed with the Lina DAC (five stars), so have high hopes for this evolved step up.
Read the dCS Lina DAC X story

Electrocompaniet
Electrocompaniet will be launching a new product called the EC 5.0, a fully analogue preamplifier, at the show on Friday 16th May.

Elipson
The French brand will be showing off three very different speakers at High End Munich. First up are the eye-catching, globular Planet L Performance speakers, which will be on demo. Also on show are a new version of the Prestige Facet II bookshelf speakers and an updated Legacy range of speakers.

Eversolo
The Eversolo Play streaming amplifier is a new product from the brand that we're keen to see first-hand. It combines extensive streaming features with a Class D amplifier in its compact box, yours for €699. There's also a version with a CD player built-in for €799 – that's a potent combination of talents for a modern do-it-all system!
Read the full Eversolo Play story

Fyne Audio
A new addition to its F700SP line-up will be unveiled at Munich. The F704SP gets the 'Special Production" treatment, with IsoFlare driver technology and innovations drawn from the brand's flagship F1 Series. Price? £20,000 / $26,000 / €24,000 per pair.
Read the Fyne F704SP story

Genelec
Finnish audio brand Genelec will have its mammoth five-way 8381A speakers on demo at the show in a piano black finish. Alongside that are smaller Genelec The One three-way bookshelf speakers that come in a variety of colourful finishes.

Gryphon Audio
2025 marks the 30th year of Gryphon's Antileon Series power amplifier and at High End Munich 2025 the company has launched its fifth-generation version: Antileon Revelation. As with all Gryphon power amps, both stereo and mono versions are available, delivering 160 and 180 watts per channel (RMS) of Class A power, respectively.

Read the Gryphon Audio story

IsoAcoustics
Known for its isolation products, IsoAcoustics will be showcasing two new product ranges: the GAIA Neo and GAIA Titan Neo acoustic isolation feet. Designed to be more user-friendly and flexible than before, thanks to height adjustment and simplified installation.

iFi Audio
iFi has launched the UP Travel Bluetooth DAC – a compact transmitter and receiver that offers hi-res Bluetooth from in-car audio and in-flight entertainment systems to your devices, removing the need for cables and adapters. A 3.5mm connector, 10-hour battery and support for aptX Adaptive and LDAC codecs.

JBL
JBL's flagship, high-end Summit series of loudspeakers has gained three new models, all named after mountains. Joining the giant Everest and K2 models are the smaller-but-still-quite-large Makalu and Pumori floorstanders and Ama standmounter. They start at £14,998 / $19,995 per pair. Ambitious. Read the JBL Summit speakers story

Klipsch
The American speaker brand will have one of its latest flagship horn speakers – the La Scala AL6 – on demo throughout the show, alongside its Klipsch Ojas collaboration speakers. Over at the Motorworld hotel next door, Klipsch's Flexus 300 (the first ever soundbar with Dirac Live) and Reference Premiere speakers will be on show.
Read the Klipschorn AK7 & La Scala AL6 story

Luxman
Celebrating a monumental 100 years, high-end Japanese brand Luxman has launched the P-100 Centennial headphone amplifier and E-07 phono preamp, both of which we expect will be on show.
Read the Luxman Centennial story

Mark Levinson
Mark Levinson has unveiled a whole new range of high-end amplifiers. Its 600 series comprises the No. 626 preamplifier, No. 632 two-channel power amplifier and No. 631 monoblock tower. With prices starting at £24,000 / €28,000 / $25,000 for the No. 626 this is a trio made for serious hi-fi systems.
Read the Mark Levinson 600 series story

Meze Audio
Meze Audio will be showcasing its open-back POET headphones at the show, which launched earlier this year at £1850 / $2000 / €2000. Also making their debut at the show are the new open-back 105 Silva – official price and launch later in the year.
Read the Meze 105 Silva story

Musical Fidelity
We first saw Musical Fidelity's new midrange B1 series of hi-fi separates at the Bristol Hi-Fi Show earlier this year. The B1 xi integrated amplifier and B1c CD player are both on display at Munich, too.
Read the Musical Fidelity B1 range story

NAD
NAD has taken the wraps off two new amps for its Master Series range: the M33 V2 BluOS Streaming Amplifier (£4999 / $5999) and M23 V2 Stereo Power Amplifier (£3499 / $3999).
Read the NAD story

Nagaoka
The Japanese cartridge brand is celebrating its 85th anniversary with a brand new flagship cartridge. The Nagaoka MP-700 promises "exceptional detail retrieval from vinyl grooves" and is yours for £1149 / $1399.
Read the Nagaoka MP-700 story

Onkyo
We're excited to see Onkyo's Icon series at the show, which marks the brand's return to hi-fi after many years of absence. The Icon includes a streaming integrated amplifier, a network preamplifier and a power amplifier, and they certainly look smart from the pictures we've seen so far.

PMC
PMC has confirmed that it will be demoing its new Prophecy range of speakers, which includes one pair of standmounters, three pairs of floorstanders and a centre speaker, with prices ranging from £2275 / €2775 to £8975 / €10,945.

Pro-Ject
Pro-Ject has unveiled a Peanuts-themed record player – to coincide with comic strip's 75th anniversary – and Charlie Brown's round head on the platter just looks adorable. Previous years saw the launch of the ultra-cool Metallica turntable, the beautiful Pink Floyd one, and the lovely Yellow Submarine deck.
Read the Pro-Ject Peanuts record player story

Qobuz
Finally, the long-awaited Qobuz Connect feature has launched at High End 2025. In line with Tidal Connect and Spotify Connect, Qobuz's version will hopefully bring a more seamless streaming experience to your hi-fi system and a simpler way of controlling your Qobuz music library across devices.
Read the Qobuz Connect story

Sennheiser
Head to the Sennheiser booth and try out its "immersive mirror box", which offers a short "multi-sensory light and sound experience, followed by visual snippets with behind-the-scenes insights." We're excited to find out what this experience entails.

T+A
A new streaming integrated amplifier called Symphonia will be on demo, paired with the Talis S 330 floorstanding speakers. Visitors will also get their first look at a new E Series receiver concept running the latest T+A OS user interface – both are currently in development.

TAD
The high-end Japanese brand will be showcasing its ultra high-end TAD-ME1TX standmount speakers, which boast "meticulous engineering and superior materials", with the price tag starting at a wallet-busting £17,500 / $18,200 / €17,300 per pair.

Technics
While we don't have any indication that Technics will be unveiling something brand new at the show, the legendary Japanese brand is celebrating its 60th anniversary this year, so expect to see their latest launches – SL-1300G turntable and EAH-AZ100 wireless earbuds (both five stars) – on display.

Wharfedale
We've seen a new range of speakers from Wharfedale at High End 2025. Evo 5 replaces the well-received Evo 4 line and boasts five different models with updated cabinets, drivers and crossovers and new damping technology. Prices start at £549 / €699 / AU$1249.
Read the Wharfedale Evo 5 story

WiiM
WiiM had a big High End Munich last year, launching the WiiM Ultra (five stars) and WiiM Amp Pro (currently being tested). Munich 2025 will be similarly significant thanks to the launch two new product types: the HomePod-looking WiiM Sound smart speaker and the WiiM Sub Pro subwoofer. We're also excited to see the new WiiM Amp Ultra streaming amplifier (pictured above), which combines the Ultra's touchscreen display unit with 100W of amplification, along with plenty of streaming features and connectivity.
Read the WiiM Sound story
Read the WiiM Amp Ultra story

You can see the full list of brands exhibiting this year.

MORE:

Revisit the highlights from last year's High End Munich 2024

8 tracks we've been using to test in the What Hi-Fi? listening rooms this month

The rise of small, complete hi-fi systems that are more accessible for newcomers is a great direction for the industry

The best music streamers across all budgets

Hot on the heels of the recently-reviewed HD 505 over-ears, Sennheiser has unveiled its latest pair of wired headphones aimed at audiophiles and gamers alike. The new HD 550 seek to balance "revealing performance with effortlessly smooth tuning", blending a wide, spacious sound with a lightweight construction to help listeners delve into their music for hours at a time.

​Central to the HD 550 is a custom 38mm transducer which seeks a fast, dynamic performance with a focus on sonic clarity and reduced distortion. The new cans' open-back design features a new acoustic mesh which seeks to protect the transducers, while those same transducers' angled arrangement grants a more expansive soundstage for your music.

The HD 550 boast a more relaxed clamping force compared with their 500-series stablemates in a bid to boost comfort over long listening sessions or epic gaming marathons. Weighing in at 237g, the same weight as the HD 505 cans, the HD 550 feature a textured headband and ventilated metal mesh earcups to offer increased listener comfort that also doesn't compromise overall durability.

The HD 550 also have one eye on the environment. The new headphones are built with a modular design, allowing for easy swapping of cables and earpads should they become worn out or damaged. Sennheiser's latest over-ears come equipped with a 1.8m cable terminating in a stereo 3.5mm jack plug with a 6.35mm adapter, making them compatible with a broad range of source devices.

According to Klaus Hanselmann, Sennheiser's Audiophile Product Manager, "Audiophiles looking for featherlight headphones with honest voicing and deep bass extension are in for a treat. While the HD 550’s airy detail is obvious, customers will fall in love with its delightfully polite touch – perfect for listening for hours on end."

The Sennheiser HD 550 will ship in the first week of April, priced at £250 / $300, a small advance on the £230 / $250 test price of their HD 505 cousins.

MORE:

Read our recent Sennheiser HD 505 review

Get the best sound with the best wired headphones we've tested

I heard my favourite Radiohead album on the B&W speakers used to record it – and now I love it even more

Welcome to the latest entry into our weekly Rewind column, where our team of hi-fi and home cinema experts detail the top stories you need to know about to break in the past seven days.

Highlights include our TV and AV editor, Tom Parsons, getting a sneak peek at Sony’s next-generation TV tech in Japan, our verdict on Gryphon’s high-end amp and a few other surprise announcements even we didn’t see coming.

Here’s what you need to know.

DVD fans should check their collection for rot

Last week Warner Brothers reacted to ongoing reports of “laser rot” impacting DVDs released between 2006-2008.

Thankfully, rather than brush the problem under the rug, it acknowledged the issue, which renders some discs unplayable, and promised to “work with consumers” to replace the impacted DVDs.

Read the full story: 'Laser rot' has rendered millions of Warner Bros DVDs unplayable – but you may be able to have them replaced

We tested Gryphon’s diabolically capable amp

Our testers had the pleasure of reviewing the Gryphon Audio Diablo 333 amp last week. Retailing for £24,500 / $24,900 / AU$39,995 the amp sits at the high-end of the market.

During testing we found plenty to like about the Diablo, which delivered jaw-dropping authority with unexpected finesse during our checks.

Hence our reviewers’ conclusion:

“In recent months we’ve been fortunate enough to test some world-class integrated amplifiers. We are pleased to say that the Gryphon’s Diablo 333 should be counted among them.”

Read our full Gryphon Audio Diablo 333 amp review

Our TV and AV editor went to Japan

Our intrepid TV and AV editor, Tom Parsons braved international travel to visit Sony in Japan and get an opening look at its cutting edge new RGB LED tech.

While it may at first glance sound very similar to the RGB panel tech TCL, Hisense and Samsung showed off at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in January, he came away very impressed with Sony’s hardware.

So much so that he penned an opinion piece detailing how it could overtake OLED in the top end of the market.

Read the full story: I’ve seen Sony’s next-gen RGB LED TV in action – and I think it could be even better than OLED

A reminder of why it’s worth visiting your local hi-fi shop

Hands in the air, we’re just as guilty of succumbing to the urge to just order your hi-fi online. But, if you want the best experience possible, or aren’t sure how your prospective purchases actually sound, there are still plenty of reasons you should visit your local hi-fi shop.

Last week we penned a love letter to hi-fi shops detailing the five biggest reasons to pay them a visit.

Read the full story: 5 great reasons to go to your local hi-fi shop instead of shopping online

We tested Sennheiser's step-up open-back headphones

Our reviewers finished testing the Sennheiser HD 505 headphones last week. While they may not massively deviate from the audio-powerhouse’s typical format, we still found plenty to like about the wired, open-back cans.

Paired with a MacBook Pro and either of our reference Audioquest DragonFly Cobalt and Cambridge Audio DacMagic 200M DACs, they delivered a solid performance.

Whether it was bopping pop, clinical classical or thumping screamo, the cans delivered a smooth, refined, spacious sound. We just wish they offered a smidgeon more punch and rhythmic precision.

Read our full Sennheiser HD 505 review

MORE:

These are the best wired headphones we’ve reviewed

Our picks of the best Mini LED TVs

We rate the best stereo amps money can buy

Sennheiser is no stranger to the world of over-ear wired headphones, with the near-80-year-old company ensconcing music fans’ ears with cans both budget and high-end, closed-back and open-back.

The new Sennheiser HD 505 are another addition to its line of open-back headphones, aiming to offer a step-up listening experience for music fans that have graduated beyond the budget models.

Price

The HD 505 sit at the top of the HD 500 line, which has traditionally been Sennheiser’s most affordable ‘audiophile’ wired headphones range and already sports a few cheaper open-back models. Think of the HD 500 as a stepping stone to the more famed HD 600 range used by studio professionals and head-fi fans.

The HD 505 cost £230 / $250 / AU$450, and around this price you have a strong handful of five-star rivals, such as the Beyerdynamic DT 900 Pro X, the Austrian Audio Hi-X65 and the Award-winning Grado SR325x.

Build & comfort

The HD 505 design doesn’t stray too far from the recognisable Sennheiser format of a sturdy, minimal build and large, ovular earcups with a metal mesh grille. We note that the HD 505 follows a similar silhouette to the HD 620S (the newest member of the step-up HD 600 family) rather than its cheaper siblings in the HD 500 range, with the headband and the hinge where it meets the earcups looking slimmer and more elegant.

While the main finish of these headphones is black, the HD 505 have copper accents around the hinge and the edge of the earcups that add a splash of colour. Thankfully this copper accent isn’t shiny or garish at all; it’s a muted metallic finish that adds interest to these headphones.

The headband has a good amount of synthetic leather cushioning, while the earcup cushions are a soft velour. We were worried that the plastic housings around the earcup felt a little too light and ‘plasticky’, but this contributes to the headphones’ lightweight design – something that makes a huge difference when listening for long hours at a time. The HD 505 weigh 237g; Sennheiser’s rivals (even the more comfortable ones) typically clock in above 300g at this level.

Thanks to the overall lighter weight, we found the HD 505 to be very comfortable to wear during our testing, with the headband offering good support and cushioning. Our ears never got overly warm either, thanks to the roomy earcups.

There is ample headband adjustment, but how comfortably the headphones fit depends on each individual’s head shape – some on our review team found the headband and cups pressing down on certain contact areas of the head when first slipping them on, while others found a super-comfortable fit straight away. However, both camps reported that overall the headphones were pretty relaxed in wearing and didn’t feel any undue clamping pressure over long listening periods. Watching a full season of Slow Horses on Apple TV+ proved no trouble at all with the HD 505 on at all times.

If we had one complaint it’s that the velour earpads are a little too soft, meaning they give way a bit too easily. In comparison, the earpads on the Austrian Audio Hi-X65 offer a firmer and greater degree of cushioning, meaning there’s more padding before your ears start to feel the structure of the earcups, the latter of which can happen with the HD 505. The Hi-X65 feel a touch more robust and have slightly better weight distribution too, but they are a weightier and more functional pair than the Sennheisers. The Beyerdynamics feel noticeably heavier to wear as well.

The HD 505 overall feel durable and reliable, and Sennheiser makes spare parts and replacement ear pads to ensure the HD 505 last for as long as possible. The headphones come with a 1.8m cable – long enough for easy use with laptops and hi-fi equipment – ending in a 3.5mm connector with a 6.3mm screw-on adapter so it can be used with a wide variety of audio devices.

There is no in-line mic or controls with this cable, but you can purchase one separately, as well as longer cable lengths or even balanced options, for those who want it.

Sound

Being an open-back design, be prepared for the HD 505 to leak sound when listening at anything beyond whisper-quiet volumes – the main drawback of these very airy, spacious-sounding headphones. That means these cans are mainly suited to at-home listening, where you won’t disturb your colleagues with your questionable music or you won’t feel conscious about cranking up the volume.

The 120-ohm transducers inside the earcups have been optimised for delivering a “clear, analytic sound”, covering a frequency range spanning 12Hz to 38.5kHz. Sennheiser’s engineers have fine-tuned the drivers to ensure a “smooth lower treble response”, crucially without any of that treble-related fatigue that might otherwise lead to a taxing listen.

The drivers are also angled forward in the earcups to aid the headphones’ expansive soundstage, aiming to mimic the experience of listening to nearfield speakers in front of you.

We find that we can listen to the HD 505 comfortably loud without the music ever sounding hard or harsh. The top end is wonderfully smooth, with no undue sibilance or brightness – overall this is as easy-going a listen as you could hope for. Without the ‘boxed-in’ quality you get with conventional closed-back designs, songs have ample room to breathe and the scale of sound is pleasingly big.

The HD 505’s sound is balanced by a very clear and detailed midrange, while the lower frequencies are well controlled and have a good deal of agility and snap. You’ll get punchier, meatier bass performance from the likes of Grado SR325x and the Austrian Audio, but the Sennheisers remain an enjoyable listen with a wide range of genres. There’s decent wallop and a taut edge to the drum kicks in Fleetwood Mac’s The Chain, while they are dynamically adept at communicating the ebb and flow of music as well.

Voices in particular are delicately and subtly delivered, with Lorde’s vocals on Royals coming through with utmost focus and clarity, with an impressive amount of refinement at this level. The HD 505’s talent with voices is great for watching TV and films, too. Instruments flourish in a soundstage that is pleasingly airy and spacious, although a bit more texture and grit wouldn’t go amiss when playing Kendrick Lamar’s Humble and a frantic Shostakovich composition.

The Sennheisers have a decent handle on timing and agility, keeping pace with Lamar’s ferocious momentum. While we love the more upfront, rhythmic intensity of a pair of Grados, we can imagine the Sennheiser’s more laidback nature having plenty of appeal for some people.

We play music, podcasts and YouTube videos through our MacBook Pro, swapping between Audioquest DragonFly Cobalt and Cambridge Audio DacMagic 200M DACs, and the Sennheiser headphones are accommodating with most sources and equipment we use them with. Unlike the Austrian Audio cans, the HD 505 aren’t particularly fussy with partnering kit or recording quality, so they can be plugged into any existing set-up, no matter how budget or basic your system is.

Verdict

Sennheiser has once again done what it does best: deliver a well-made, comfortable pair of headphones that convincingly show off the benefits of an open-back design. There is strong competition from rivals with different sonic flavours in this price range, but the HD 505’s lightweight design, coupled with their crowd-pleasing smoothness, ample detail levels and unfussy nature, will have plenty of fans.

First reviewed: March 2025

SCORES

• Sound 4
• Build 4
• Comfort 4

MORE:

Read our review of the Austrian Audio Hi-X65

Also consider the Grado SR325x

Read our Beyerdynamic DT 900 Pro X review

Best wired headphones: the top 7 pairs tested by our review experts

Is there a brand more synonymous with headphones than Sennheiser? Sure, there are plenty of brands such as Bose, Sony, Grado, Stax and more that have many corners of the headphone market sewn up. But none is more prevalent and renowned throughout the world – and across decades – than Sennheiser’s range of wired headphones. 

From its HD 414 on-ears with the distinctive yellow earpads from 1968 to the hugely accomplished HD 600 range (which is featured in What Hi-Fi?’s best headphones of the 21st century list and in our best hi-fi products of the 1990s), the German brand has staked its claim as a pioneer and pinnacle of headphone performance. 

What you might not know is that Ireland plays a huge part in its well-regarded audiophile headphones ranges. Since 1991, Sennheiser’s factory in Tullamore, Ireland (about an hour’s drive from Dublin) has been the main facility for manufacturing the high-quality transducers found in the brand’s audiophile headphones, including those in the famed HD 600 range for the past two decades. It was only recently, in 2022, that the assembly of these headphones was also ported into this same Tullamore factory. Sennheiser says this “improves transducer matching”, and being able to assemble the headphones and get them ready for the final packaging in the same place guarantees that quality control standards are met throughout for the customer.

The Tullamore plant is also the place where they assemble Sennheiser’s flagship HE 1 (nicknamed “Orpheus” at its 2015 launch) electrostatic headphones, which cost between £55,000 to £60,000 these days. You might have seen this astonishingly priced product on many a “most expensive headphones ever” list, such as our own.

Tullamore, then, is where the heart of Sennheiser’s audiophile headphones lies. The factory has evolved over time and has been spruced up even more recently to include a new hi-fi listening room where visitors can sit comfortably and listen to these HE 1 headphones or any of Sennheiser’s other wired headphones that they make just a few feet away.

Automated transducer manufacturing

What’s striking about the Tullamore factory is the combination of automated processes in place and the very manual, very human expertise needed for making Sennheiser’s wired headphones. Rows of very clever, very precise machines are dedicated to making the transducers, ranging from extremely tiny ones used in the in-ear IE 600 and IE 900 models, to the larger drivers used in the HD820, HD800S, HD600, HD650 over-ear cans. 

There are about a dozen machines doing roughly 70 different processes at any one time. There’s a machine that winds the very fine coil wire (some 0.03mm thin, similar to fine human hair) a specific amount of times for the best performance; there’s one that applies the special pink glue that holds the transducer casing together. A machine that uses a ‘plasma nozzle’ to bind the electrical wires to the transducer to create the signal path sits alongside one that flashes a light that detects any minute errors in the process so far. In between each step, there are machines that check and test that every element is being perfectly made (with human experts on standby, too, of course).

Pat Fulton, the Sennheiser Tullamore plant manager and our guide, says that each machine has been made specifically to Sennheiser’s needs, and so are one of a kind. There is a steady whizz and whirr on the factory floor; the automated machines are abuzz, but they are also neat and orderly. There is a clear flow in the machinery process that’s fascinating to see, especially seeing the transducers being shipped along conveyor belts between the machines.

I’m told that the system is flexible enough to allow for changes to be made. Whether that’s a different transducer or headphone model that needs priority in the manufacturing process or any maintenance or changes to the machinery itself – even if one machine stops, it doesn’t necessarily slow the production flow. Fulton says there’s always another model or another element of the process that can be tagged in so that production doesn’t ground to a halt. 

There isn't a set amount of products having to be made, either; it all depends on the various different models and their cycle times in terms of assembly, production and demand. "There isn't a general rule of thumb," says Fulton, as the set up is "scalable for whatever we need to do" and "it gives us the flexibility to change around our production if we want to, which helps us to adapt to different requirements."

The human touch

Of course, not everything can be automated. As much as Sennheiser is proud of its very clever, very precise automated machines that make the transducers, there are some things that simply need the human touch. 

“Audiophile assembly is not easy”, says Fulton. “It takes a lot of time and requires extreme precision and attention to detail as well as a lot of human interaction and passion.”

Various elements of headphones – the soldering, inserting the innovative glass reflector in the HD 820 closed-backs, the final assembly and checks – are done by a team of experts who have been trained in the art of this precise craft. 

Fulton says that over his 30 years at the Tullamore plant, he has noticed that “Sennheiser as a brand has always pushed the boundaries to keep going and keep developing. And, you know, that's very good from a customer perspective. But for someone who works here, it also creates a constant energy and a challenge, which is great, and it's a constant learning."

A lot of the people who came to work at the Tullamore plant have also become more skilled and grown into more technical roles. “We constantly encourage that, because that's the secret of renewing everything and keeping your skill sets fresh and valid.” It also creates a level of passion, care and pride in making the headphones "that translates into the products and, you know, it only can be good.

“We’ve automated a certain level of transducer production, but once you get into the 800 realm and some of the HD 600 series as well, a lot of that is also manually made. There are a lot of good reasons for that – there is a skill and a craft in doing it. There’s quite a lot of skill and dedication and that attention to detail that’s required, that the products deserve themselves. 

“We feel having that human interaction is very important. Like there are always elements that you will look to automate and to make more efficient… but there are certain things which just lend themselves better to that personal touch, really.”

Assembling a pair of headphones

Sennheiser isn’t about to let some journalist run loose with a soldering iron to its £2000 headphones (and rightly so), so the team has sensibly ushered me into the final assembly area for some hands-on experience. 

A big part of the non-automated section of the plant involves the assembly of the headphones themselves – it’s an element ported over from the Germany HQ and into the Tullamore factory. It means the headphones assembled here can carry the “Made In Ireland” badge on the headband, too.

I’m shown to a section where the HD 820/800S and the HD 650/660S2 headphones are assembled. On the day, it was the HD 600 model they had on the line. After watching the experts at work to see how it’s done, I got stuck in. Everything is laid out in an orderly fashion and it doesn’t take long to realise repetition breeds perfection; it isn’t as easy as it first looks, either. First, you have to snap in the outer frame to the two earcups, add in a layer of foam and attach the mesh grille, clip in the cushioned ear pads correctly (which takes more tries than I’d care to admit) and check for any marks or imperfections on the headphone itself or on the grille. Next, the headband needs clipping on and this takes proper grunt to ensure they align up perfectly with the slots in each earcup and are connected securely. Attaching the cables is far easier (the one marked red is for the right ear cup) and after one final test in a machine, I get to pack up the final assembled headphones into their cardboard box (this is, for me, the easiest bit to assemble), all ready for their new owner. 

It may sound simple, but there are moments in each step that can trip you up. Ensuring the cables go in the right order and that the headband is oriented correctly are two key elements. How do you know? The ‘r’ in the Sennheiser logo on the headband points to the right earcup and cable – so there’s never any error or confusion on which way it should go. “Do you ever miss a step?” No, say the four women working in shifts in the assembly section; the headphones just feel wrong if it’s not done right, they say. You end up hearing or feeling for the way the parts all line up or snap together, they say, more than just looking at how the headphones are made. It’s a very tactile process, and one that does make you appreciate the work going into making these premium headphones.

Listening to the flagship HE 1 headphone system

There is one space on the factory floor, sectioned off behind a large glass wall, that is dedicated to making just one headphone model: the HE 1.

It takes roughly two weeks to make just one HE 1 headphone system from start to finish. Some of the materials – such as the Italian marble housing for the valves and controls – need to be flown in, and any hiccups in this supply flow can delay the assembling process. That’s even before we take into account the amount of care, precision and testing that needs to be done to make such a technically advanced and incredibly expensive pair of headphones. Naturally, they are made to order.

In the separate listening room, you can listen to the HE 1 for yourself. The headphones are hooked up to two sources: the Rega Planar 3 turntable for spinning vinyl and Rotel’s Tribute CD11 player for playing CDs. You can peruse a selection of vinyl records and CDs (the same duplicated in both formats so you can listen to differences) featuring classic test album staples from Massive Attack, Pink Floyd, Daft Punk, Dr Dre and Miles Davis.

How does it sound? Quite unlike anything else. The open-back, electrostatic design affords it the kind of open, clean and refined performance like no other. Distortion levels are at an all-time low; I didn’t even realise just how loud I was listening to the Wish You Were Here album until I took the rather large headphones off. They are comfortable to wear too, despite the engulfing earpads. 

The incredibly airy, spacious presentation offers more than ample space for instruments and voices to breathe; there’s depth and dynamics, with a level of sublime clarity and detailed, layered texture that lets you get fully immersed in the performance. You certainly don’t need any spatial audio gimmick here.

That airy, spacious presentation means so much room for instruments and musical elements to flow. Depth and dynamics, clarity and detailed texture that lets you sink into the music... I did end up preferring the vinyl version, but that could be down to the differences between the two source products used rather than the format.

The presentation of the HE 1 is what makes it really special, though, and makes it worthy of its high asking price. Calling it ‘high-end’ just doesn’t feel enough. As we detailed in our original hands-on experience when the HE 1 Orpheus was first unveiled in 2015, there’s a majestic elegance to the way the control dials and glowing valves emerge out from the marble casing, and the enticing way the smoked glass lid opens to reveal the headphones within. It’s mesmerising. 

Check out the gallery below for more images.

Of course, it helps that the headphones sound so good as well. If you can afford a pair for yourself, colour us green with envy. You can also opt to listen to the more real-world priced (but still fairly premium) headphones, such as the HD 820, HD 650 or IE 900 – in this system instead of the HE 1.

There’s a pleasing harmony to being able to hold and hear these headphones – ones made just a few feet away – in a system and listen to what they are capable of. We are lucky enough to get a glimpse into how hi-fi products are made in these factory visits, but it’s quite something else to be able to have such a tactile experience and listen to the final product so close to where they are actually made.

MORE:

Read our original, full first impression of the Sennheiser Orpheus HE 1 headphones

And our more recent Sennheiser HD 660S2 review

The ultimate music tracks to test your hi-fi system

HUNTKLVJG

It's been 93 years since Albert Einstein opened IFA (or the 'Great German Radio and Phonographic Exhibition', as it was then known) for what was the European trade show's sixth outing. Quick maths will tell you that the event is now in its 99th year, and it's come a long way since 242 attendees ogled technology for twelve whole days during the inaugural show.

This year's IFA is now live, until Tuesday 5th Sept, and many of the biggest names in consumer electronics – LG, Samsung, Hisense, TCL and Sennheiser, to name just a handful – have descended on the Messe Berlin exhibition centre to show off their latest and greatest wares. Brands who are not officially attached to IFA are also using the period to get in on the act of launching new products, too.

What Hi-Fi?'s roving reporters are on the show floor and you can see all the news and show highlights below...

IFA 2023 news and highlights

Audio Technica
Audio Technica announced on August 18th via "Twitter" (we know about the name change) that the brand would be attending IFA 2023. It mostly focused on the unveiling of a pair of new microphones, but there was a nice showcase of the limited edition "Ice Blue" version of the ATH-M50xLB over-ears, as well as a fun, audiovisual booth which showcased a lady walking around Japan banging drums and thrusting a microphone into the faces of unsuspecting natives.  

Anker 
We're not entirely sure what Anker has in store for us at IFA 2023, but what we do know is that they will be making an appearance at the ShowStoppers official press event on Thursday, August 31st. That likely means that the Chinese electronics manufacturer will be present as an exhibitor, though given the broad gamut of products it produces, what will actually be shown off is anyone's guess.

Fauna
We've included Fauna on this list purely because of the relatively unknown brand's rather novel foray into the world of sunglass-based audio (check out the IFA website for a sneak peek of what we mean). Suffice it to say, we'll be looking to try on a pair to see if the shades' sound matches their style.

Honor
Honor launched its latest foldable, the Magic V2, for the China market last month, but it looks as though it will be going global very soon. The world's thinnest and lightest foldable phone looks set to take centre stage during the company's IFA 2023 keynote 'Unfold Tomorrow' on 1st September, so hopefully we'll get pricing and availability details then. What's more, it could treat us to a sneak peek of a second, as-yet-unannounced foldable phone...

Jabra
If you like headphones and earbuds, you probably won't be short of distractions at this year's IFA. Danish electronics brand Jabra made an appearance both at the ShowStopper event and as an exhibitor, and they've announced two new wireless earbuds with Dolby Atmos support: a premium Elite 10 pair to challenge the Sony and Bose flagships, and a sporty pair of Elite 8 Active buds with military-grade toughness.

Jlab
Jlab is an American audio brand that specialises in colourful, low-cost electronics for fitness, gaming and the youth-oriented market. Jlab was present at the event this year, giving us the chance to get a look at the company's newly-announced JBuds Mini - as you'll see from the pics, they're small enough to fit on a keyring. Cute.

JBL
JBL is historically prolific around IFA time, and this year will be no different. While JBL weren't technically at IFA itself, they used this busy, buzzy period to launch some very exciting new models: the Dolby Atmos-enabled PartyBox, a rather retro-tastic wi-fi speaker (also with Dolby Atmos) and its first-ever pair of air conduction earbuds.

Lenco
Lenco didn't exactly advertise its presence at IFA, so we were surprised to be faced with not one, not two, but three new Bluetooth turntables launching: the eco-friendly LBT-335 bamboo turntable, the LBT-345 Bluetooth turntable and the LS-470 turntable-and-speaker combo system. We don't have pricing details just yet, but are curious to find out how this new trio will sound when they officially go on sale later this year. 

Majority Audio
Majority showcased a rather nice range of wares at IFA 2023., including a host of budget soundbars, streaming systems, headphones and radios. Crucially, the brand's new internet radio, the Oakington, was making an appearance, giving us the chance to have a feel, a look and a (brief) listen to the upcoming model.  

Motorola
Motorola, under the label "Motorola Sound" will be at IFA this year, and is officially unveiling some brand-new products in the world of audio and AV. 

Samsung
Samsung held a press conference on 31st August (and had a whole building daubed with the company's branding and logo). To go with that fanfare, the South Korean brand unveiled its flagship 98-inch Neo-QLED 8K TV with a Dolby Atmos system, as well as its first-ever 89-inch Micro LED TV. There was also hands-on opportunity with Samsung's new The Freestyle 2nd Gen projector. 

Sennheiser
Sennheiser launched its a more compact and affordable version of its iconic Ambeo soundbar, the fittingly named Ambeo Mini (read our review now). They also unveiled two new colourways for its excellent Momentum 4 headphones (Denim and Black Copper), as well as a further wearable surprise that, sadly, we can't reveal just yet...

Shokz
Funky name, funky brand. Shokz specialises mainly in sports-related audio wearables and has confirmed its attendance for the Berlin 2023. According to the because Shokz will have a presence at the show to demonstrate their latest product innovations. Maybe something bone-conduction related..?

Shure
American audio brand Shure is also part of the IFA ShowStoppers event, showcasing the brand new Aonic 50 Gen 2 wireless over-ear headphones with spatial audio and hybrid ANC. The brand's wired in-ears, such as the Award-winning Aonic 3, have been big hits with us in the last few years, so this new model could definitely make a big splash.

Toshiba
Toshiba's appearance at IFA has been a case of teasing the crowd rather than giving them what they actually want. When we were kindly invited to snoop around the company's official stand, and while nothing was officially announced or released, there were teases of multiple TV concepts that had us wishing they were more than just prototypes. Maybe one day...

Urbanista
Urbanista specialises in trendy designs and, more recently, innovative products utilising light as their predominant source of power. Following its Los Angeles over-ear headphones and Phoenix earbuds, the light-powered Malibu portable Bluetooth speaker is the latest Urbanista product to utilise innovative Powerfoyle light-reactive technology courtesy of Exeger. We got a hands-on feel at this year's event, and thankfully that feared blackout across Berlin didn't materialise.

Yamaha
Japanese brand Yamaha is, a little like fellow compatriots Sony, jacks of all trades and masters of quite a few, excelling as makers of fine pianos, electric guitars, headphones, amplifiers, soundbars and much more. Yamaha has announced not one but two products at IFA 2023: the entry-level R-N600A network receiver and MusicCast 200 desktop audio system, an exciting double-whammy that delivers a whole bunch of streaming conveniences in two distinct hi-fi packages. 

Xgimi
A new projector dubbed the "Horizon Ultra" has been Xgimi's big reveal, even if that surprise was rather ruined thanks to a picture of said projector and a countdown to its full unveiling taking pride of place on the Xgimi website. The Ultra promises to be "The World’s First 4K Long-Throw Home Projector with Dolby Vision" (a coveted title), so we'll keep you updated as we look to hunt one down. 

Xperi (DTS and TiVo)
Xperi, the American multinational software company that develops platforms and solutions for consumer electronics, boasted two showcases at its well-furnished IFA stand. Not only were we treated to a taster of DTS Play-Fi's wireless immersive audio expansion with 12-channel home theatre support, we also glimpsed TiVo's multi-level viewing platform, complete with smart voice control, from the company's neat little demo rooms.

When is IFA 2023?

• What is IFA 2023? Internationale FunkAusstellung Berlin is one of the biggest (and oldest) global annual trade shows for consumer electronics and home appliances.
• IFA 2023 dates: Friday 1st to Tuesday 5th September
• IFA 2023 location: Messe Berlin, Germany

What to expect at IFA 2023

This year's IFA continues the world's return to 'normalcy' following the disruption of the global COVID pandemic. Present at 2023's event are 26 full main halls of exhibitors across a 130,000sq m space (the unrelentingly functional Messe Exhibition Centre in Berlin), welcoming roughly 2059 brands from 48 countries to mingle alongside a rather whopping 180,000 visitors from 144 nations. 

Much of the familiar exhibits and events from last year's showcase return, although there are novel tweaks that make 2023's effort a distinct experience, including not only more brands and showcases but three Tesla cars, a Starlink satellite demo and the Berlin Tech Week festival, a city-wide project that sees IFA break from the confines of the Messe and onto the 'streets' of the German capital.   

For the first time ever, IFA now has a 'Sustainability Village' with an on-site 'Mend and Repair Shop' where users can take (most) electronic goods to be, as the name suggests, spruced up a little. 

IFA Next is back this year as a rather pleasing way for startups to showcase their ideas within the Messe's hallowed halls, something that proved a big success last time around. There's even a House of Robots for those of us obsessed, or indeed unconvinced, by the notion that James Cameron's apocalyptic, Terminator-esque view of the future is very much on the way, albeit with more automated vacuum cleaners and fewer killer automatons made of weapons-grade titanium alloy.

Sennheiser Consumer and German hearing aid manufacturer GEERS is commencing a Custom Comfort Tips pilot project in which it will offer customers in Germany an opportunity to have personalised ear tips made for the headphone company’s wired IE Series earbuds.

The pilot has been created to offer users of the Sennheiser IE 200, IE 300, IE 600 or IE 900 earphones customised ear tips that will sit perfectly in their ear canal – something that the company says significantly influences the sound perceived by the wearer. The technology behind it uses a scanner or silicone mass to measure each ear and produce left and right tips that are “exceptionally comfortable” and, most importantly, optimum sound reproduction for the user.

If you are a journalist or a creator attending High End Munich later this month, you can also take part in the initiative by having your ears scanned at the Sennheiser booth on the Thursday or Friday of the show.

Customised fits have been an area of focus in the headphones market of late, with many companion apps of wireless models delivering optimum fit tests. And of course, custom-moulded tips from specialist companies have been on the market for years.

But while this is a pilot programme with limited reach for now, its success could potentially see Sennheiser offering customised tips as part of (or an add-on for) future IE orders. And if it did, that would undoubtedly enhance their appeal for many. We recently found the most affordable model, the IE 200, very likeable earbuds for the money, as we had previously the range-topping IE 900. 

MORE:

Sennheiser launches the latest generation of its HD 600 audiophile headphones

Here are the best wireless earbuds you can buy

Or check out the best wired headphones on the market

If you are looking for the best noise-cancelling headphones whether your heart is set on in-ear or over-ear headphones, we are guessing a pair or two from Bose features somewhere on your shortlist. Probably somewhere near the top.

And why wouldn't they? The company's noise-cancelling technology is celebrated worldwide and it has forged a reputation for serious quality built on decades of experience manufacturing consumer electronics. We are now in a position where Bose headphones are some of the most compelling wireless options you'll find – despite the likes of Sony, Sennheiser, Bowers & Wilkins and Apple knocking at their door.

The current core products in Bose's over-ear headphone lineup are the QuietComfort Ultra Headphones, the QuietComfort Headphones and the QuietComfort SE. As far as earbuds are concerned you have the QuietComfort Ultra Earbuds and the Ultra Open Earbuds.

These models are all fine-tuned by Bose engineers, and all but a couple have been reviewed by our test team, with the majority getting five-star ratings. But, there are huge differences across the range and there's far more to it than price differences and whether they go over or into your ears.

We traditionally see some of the best and lowest prices around sales events like Prime Day, Black Friday and Cyber Monday but that's not to say there won't be any price fluctuation outside of these times.

Of course, your particular needs and priorities will determine which pair you should buy, so to work out which Bose headphone model is best for you, let us run you through each pair, including features, perks and where possible, all-important sound quality...

Should you buy the Bose QuietComfort Ultra Headphones?

Verdict

The QuietComfort Ultra Headphones are Bose’s flagship noise-cancelling headphones. And they’re not cheap. We reviewed them at £450 / $429 / AU$649 which means you’ll be paying a decent premium over rival models such as the Sony WH-1000XM5, Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S2e and Sennheiser Momentum 4 Wireless.

The Ultra replace the old Noise Cancelling Headphones 700 and revert back to a more traditional design. They might not feel as premium as their predecessors, but they are more portable with hinges that allow them to fold properly. The same can’t be said for the rivals mentioned above, which only fold flat.

The Bose are comfortable and combine buttons with a touch-sensitive strip for controlling playback, volume and sound modes. Battery life is 24 hours which is good, but you couldn’t call them class-leading. Sony’s XM5 offer 30 hours and Sennheiser’s Momentum 4 Wireless go for 60 hours!

Where the Bose excel is noise cancelling and sound quality. During testing, we found the ANC to be superb and having compared them to all the key rivals at the money, including the new Sonos Ace, we think they’re best-in-class. They do a great job of blocking out a wide range of frequencies and you can customise the intensity of the noise cancelling for different environments through the companion app.

They sound like a flagship pair of wireless headphones should, with an excellent sense of musicality and enthusiasm but there’s a real sense of refinement there too.

Bose’s take on spatial audio, Immersive Audio, is quite hit-and-miss and cuts battery life to 18 hours. It’s a feature that we could honestly live without. But, if you’ve got the budget and want arguably the best noise-cancelling currently available, then these Bose have your back.

• Bose QuietComfort Ultra Headphones vs Sony WH-1000XM5

Should you buy the Bose QuietComfort Headphones?

Verdict

We haven’t tested the Bose QuietComfort Headphones before but they sit just below the Ultra model in Bose’s hierarchy of wireless over-ear headphones. They’re a more affordable model and this is reflected in the design, and the features on offer. They still boast noise-cancelling and 24hr battery life, but use an older version of Bluetooth (5.1 versus 5.3 in the Ultras), don’t have Immersive Audio and don’t have the ActiveSense automatic ANC adjustment feature which you do get on their more expensive siblings.

Their position in Bose's range is reflected in the price with the Bose QuietComfort Headphones coming in cheaper at £350 / $349 / AU$550. It’s still a relatively premium price and puts them in the same ballpark as the Sony WH-1000XM5 and Sennheiser Momentum Wireless 4.

Buttons and switches are onboard for controlling playback and noise-cancelling, but their design has no touch-sensitive element. They are available in more colours than the flagship model, including eye-catching Cypress Green and Moonstone Blue.

They’re an interesting pair because Bose also has one other pair of noise-cancelling headphones that sit just below them, the QuietComfort SE. These headphones launched at the end of September 2022 and were seen as an upgrade to the then QuietComfort 45 model.

The SE cost £240 / $330 / AU$450 but this is one pair we haven't tested. We wouldn't be surprised to see the SE the next to be discontinued, leaving the non-SE model as Bose's entry-level noise-cancelling model.

For those interested in a potential bargain, the QuietComfort 45 were officially on sale from 2021 to 2023. You can no longer buy them through Bose but shop around online and there's a chance you might find a pair or two still on sale. Because of their age, they could likely be bought at quite a hefty discount – but at full price, better options now exist at the money from Sennheiser and Sony.

• Bose QuietComfort Headphones vs QuietComfort Ultra Headphones

Should you buy the Bose QuietComfort Ultra Earbuds?

Verdict

Bose has two pairs of Ultra headphones currently on the market. Its traditional wireless earbud model is called the QuietComfort Ultra Earbuds. Like their over-ear siblings, they deliver excellent noise-cancelling and sound quality in a premium package.

We originally tested them at £300 / $299 / AU$450 which makes them a little more expensive than their closest rivals such as the Sony WF-1000XM5 and the Sennheiser Momentum True Wireless 4. The Sonys are a little older so their price regularly comes down, while the Bose should be discounted more regularly the longer they’re on sale.

The design and fit of the Bose QuietComfort Ultra 2 is virtually identical to their predecessors, which also feature on this page, the QuietComfort Earbuds II. During testing we found the soft silicone tips comfy over long periods while the ear fins help keep the buds firmly in place.

Noise-cancelling on this model is excellent but it’s the sound quality where Bose has pushed the envelope compared to its previous models. They produce a refined and mature sound which is familiar, but there’s even more drive and punch on display. The Ultra sound wonderfully dynamic when the music demands.

The features on offer are also very similar with Immersive Audio the main new addition if you want to experience your favourite music in spatial audio. We weren’t huge fans during testing and, like the QC Ultra Headphones, using the mode has a big impact on battery life, slashing it from 6hrs to 4hrs.

• Bose QuietComfort Ultra Earbuds vs Sony WF-1000XM5
• Bose QuietComfort Ultra Earbuds vs Apple AirPods Pro 2

Should you buy the Bose QuietComfort Earbuds (2024)

Verdict

If you want to experience what Bose's flagship QuietComfort Ultra Earbuds have to offer, but don't want to pay the flagship price, then you'll want to check out the entry-level QuietComfort Earbuds (2024).

We have seen two previous iterations of these earbuds over the years, but the latest version brings a new look and new features to the party. Battery life is better than the Ultras at 8.5hrs and the charging case is wireless. However, there is no aptX support, just SBC and AAC.

The oval design might be different but build quality and comfort levels are still good, even if the earpieces might be a little chunky fpor some. You're still getting quality plastics for the earpieces and soft, supple eartips and 'stability bands' to help keep them in place.

While it's true that the flagship Ultra model has better and more advanced noise-cancelling and does sound more detailed and dynamic, the QuietComfort Earbuds (2024) still exhibit a huge chunk of what we like from their premium siblings and deliver a great all-round performance at a more affordable price.

• Bose QuietComfort Earbuds (2024) vs QuietComfort Ultra Earbuds: which is best?
• Bose QuietComfort Earbuds (2024) vs Apple AirPods 4 with ANC: how do they compare?

Should you buy the Bose Ultra Open Earbuds?

Verdict

If you want a pair of wireless earbuds that shirk the traditional design that we’ve all come to know and love, then Bose has this smart little number up its sleeve. Part of a new breed of ‘open’ earbuds, the USP of the Ultra Open Earbuds is that they’re designed not to drill into your ear canal. Instead, they clip around the ear with their tip nestling just at the entrance. There’s no need to mess around with silicone tip sizes here.

This will make them an attractive proposition for anyone who finds normal wireless earbuds uncomfortable and anyone who wants a pair of earbuds that do the sonic business but also allow the outside world in; handy if you’re out running, for example.

During testing we were surprised by just how capable the Bose are. They manage to create an impressive amount of bass weight considering there’s no traditional seal as such, but bass notes also come with detail and definition. They’re a balanced and enjoyable listen no matter what your musical taste. You get physical controls, Bluetooth 5.3, aptX Adaptive support and an IPX4 rating. Battery life is a competitive enough 7.5 hours.

They are quite expensive by wireless earbuds standards and at £299 / $299 / AU$449 cost just as much as their siblings, the Bose QuietComfort Ultra II which have built-in noise-cancelling. We would probably take those over the open earbuds, but we think in certain use cases they’ll work a treat.

MORE:

What are open earbuds? How do the headphones work and are they worth it?

The best Bose deals live right now

And our pick of the best wireless headphones and best wireless earbuds

How to choose the right pair of headphones

The wireless noise-cancelling Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S2 headphones on review here update the heart of the headphone offering from the renowned UK-based loudspeaker company. B&W has been making loudspeakers since the 1960s, but it is remarkably new still to headphones. 

Its first Bluetooth model, an on-ear design, was released only seven years ago, and the original PX7 over-ears came in 2019, above their little PX5 siblings as a luxurious over-ear wireless noise-canceller prepared to take on the executive travel market dominated by the likes of Bose, Sennheiser and Sony. 

Of course there hasn’t been a whole lot of executive travel since then... And with Sony and soon Sennheiser updating their key models in this field, it’s clearly time for a reboot. Enter the Px7 S2, a tweaked-up redesign of that 2019 model with all-new drive units angled in their earcups, improved active noise cancellation, upgraded microphones and new materials promising superior comfort, all in a slimmer profile than its predecessor, making it easy to store and carry.

It’s also the first time that Bowers & Wilkins has integrated the operation of a pair of headphones into its main Music app, rather than a separate Headphone app. 

Meanwhile the company has also made the interesting decision to tell everyone it’ll have an even greater pair of headphones launching later this year (probably late September, we're advised) – the new PX8, promising “a brand-new cone technology” but a price at £499 / $549 / AU$899.95, so up in territory occupied by very few wireless headphones reside (we’re looking at you, Apple!).

These Px7 S2 headphones, though, are more affordable, if still at the high end of town for wireless noise-cancellers –  £379 / $399 / AU$599.95, and available now from the Bowers & Wilkins website and select dealers. So, what’s new for the s2?

Build & finish

The first thing we noticed with the new Px7 is that Bowers & Wilkins has done away with the carbon-fibre arms used in the previous PX7 and PX5, replacing them with a solid engineering plastic composite. 

There was a lot of marketing fluff written around how the “woven carbon fibre arms of the PX7 mimic the strength and agility of the fastest vehicles in the world, channelling pure sound to you…” Strong they may have been, but unfortunately it proved difficult to achieve anything other than a patchy mottled matte grey finish on the material, rather less luxurious than may have been hoped.

The new Px7 S2 looks lovelier, and is notably uniform, in that Bowers & WIlkins is able to colour every element of the exterior, so that the black model is all-black (bar some chrome highlighting), while the blue model is entirely blue from its cups to its struts to its cushions, and the grey is similarly all-grey. 

Our sample was in the black, looking sophisticated and understated, shall we say, clearly posh but no bling required given that the large ‘Bowers & Wilkins’ branding on each headcup will advertise your impeccable taste quite sufficiently. 

The headshells and headband retain the tightly woven fabric which has a stain and moisture-repellant coating (cleanable, says B&W, by a gentle wipe or dab from a soft, damp microfibre cloth) and there are improved memory foam earpads, while those new yokes are now formed to swivel in either direction when you drop the headphones to your neck or fit them into the provided hard carrycase. There’s no second hinge-fold to go foetal, however, so the case remains somewhat larger than the equivalent for, say, Sony’s noise-cancellers.

The new Px7s sit for long periods just as comfortably as the previous model – the weight is almost unchanged from the previous model at 307g (down from 310g) but there has been a useful shaving of size, the headphones now some 3cm smaller in each dimension.

This is possible partly thanks to a new slightly smaller drive unit in the new PX7 compared with old, down from an oversized 43.7mm diameter to a more conventional 40mm, here described as a bio-cellulose driver (standard plant cellulose, we think, rather than the far more expensive type grown rather alarmingly by bacteria in vast vats). 

A resin is also used on the cone to enhance stiffness; a speaker-style large roll surround is fitted as well, to assist linearity and reduce harmonic distortion, while its 20mm voice coil (up from 15mm in the original PX7) is wrapped around a Kapton (a Dupont polymer) former rather than paper; together with the thin mesh used to minimise coloration, Bowers & Wilkins says this driver system has better resolution and reduced distortion over the previous model, with a smoother high frequency curve. 

The new angling of the drivers in the headshells further aim to keep a consistent distance to the listener’s ear from every point of the driver.

The 'Music' app

Rather than the previous 'Headphone' app used by Bowers & Wilkins, the new models will connect direct to the company’s 'Music 'app which now lies at the heart of their wireless and multiroom products, from the latest Zeppelin to the wireless Formation series. We should note that we were using a beta version of the Music app to assess the Px7 S2’s facilities in the period just before its official launch, and – as always with apps – it’s possible things may vary in the final release, or later. 

For example the Music app offers music playlists (linked to Tidal) as well as other music services, but if we try to play those to the Px7 S2 headphones a message pops up that “In-app streaming is not currently available on this product”. But we’re told a future update will allow streaming direct from the Music app. 

The app certainly connected easily and quickly to the new headphones, offering various sound settings that then ‘bake in’ to the headphones so that they will keep those settings even if used with a different device, which is particularly important if you have, say, a particular EQ preference. 

This was confirmed to us by the company’s Andy Kerr in the UK, who also admitted, however, that EQ is a bit of a problem for Bowers & Wilkins, because, well, to abandon modesty, it simply thinks it knows best. It has carefully tuned these headphones and would prefer that you don’t mess with them, ideally. But in this age where everyone gets to define their own personal truth, they couldn’t leave the EQ section showing just a message to F-off and listen, so they’ve deigned to include simple (and relatively mild) bass and treble sliders. 

There’s also ‘environment control’, which gives access to the three main modes of operation – noise cancellation on, pass-through (see below), or NC off. On the previous PX7s, the noise cancellation could be set to three different levels; that option appears now to have been dropped. 

Note you don’t have to use the app to select these modes, as a ‘quick action’ button on the left headshell shuttles through them, using usefully differentiated beeps to let you know which is which (if you can’t already tell by listening).

You can, however, use the app to reallocate this ‘quick action’ button to instead summon your voice assistant of choice (i.e. Siri if you’re using an iPhone, Google or, if prioritised, Alexa on an Android devices). 

You can usefully prioritise your Bluetooth connections, so that your headphones will connect on start-up to your phone, not the TV you were watching on headphones last night.

You can choose whether the headphones go into auto-standby after 15 minutes (useful, since you otherwise have to remember to physically turn them off), and whether you want the ‘wear sensors’ active so that tunes stop when you lift an earcup. 

This last option has three sensitivity settings, and we thought none of them was working, but in fact it just takes about a second for playback to stop. One glitch, probably a function of our using the app in beta, was that once we’d switched the ‘quick action’ button to activate the voice assistant, we couldn’t get it to switch back to shuttling between modes. 

Finally you can use the app to rename or entirely reset the headphones (we did this to retrieve the lost ‘quick action’ shuttle mode).

• Best Bowers & Wilkins speakers: budget, premium, bookshelf, floorstanders

Sound quality

The Px7 S2 can actually play three ways – wirelessly, or using the supplied analogue cable, or down its USB-C charging cable from a connected computer. Once fully charged the headphones have a claimed 30 hours of battery life, with a 15-minute quick recharge impressively able to provide up to seven hours of additional listening time.

The Bluetooth 5.0 implementation here includes the basic SBC codec, the AAC codec that will provide better quality for Apple users, and then the aptX, aptX HD and aptX Adaptive codecs which can provide Android devices a higher-quality connection, though still lossy. 

The aptX Adaptive can achieve low latency handy for watching video content (this will depend on your phone’s implementation), but more importantly aptX Adaptive can scale its bit-rate dynamically between 279kbps and 420kbps to suit the wireless environment, so that in heavy RF environments it will automatically drop quality to avoid connection issues. 

Even the top bit-rate is still, however, only around a third that required for CD quality, and a fifth of the advertised 24-bit wireless transmission. Even allowing for some 40% saving from lossless data compression, this is not lossless high-res wireless, rather a data-compressed lossy signal in which information has been thrown away. There is, as yet, no such thing as lossless high-res Bluetooth. 

That’s the tech truth of it, but this won’t stand in the way of a wonderfully enjoyable listening experience from the Px7 S2, and a stable one as well – in all our wanderings with these headphones we never once suffered a drop-out from the phone in our pocket, and at home we could leave the room, even the house, before the range was exceeded. 

As for the sound, it is solid, powerful and very well balanced, and remarkably consistent whether or not noise cancelling is engaged. Many headphones change their sound significantly when the useful but destructive process of ANC is added to playback, but here there’s just a slight thickening of upper mids, enough that we’d still recommend listening without ANC for maximum clarity, but with little penalty for adding it when external noise needs to be excluded. Indeed a little extra bass will assist the balance in such scenarios.

At home, however, turn ANC off for just a tad better clarity of midrange and soundstaging. The bass drone under the opening of Alex The Astronaut’s Growing Up, for example, was a little over-swollen with ANC engaged, underpinning things less intrusively without it and allowing the track to undertake its growing arc of complexity unimpeded. This track, played at the maximum level available from the Bluetooth connection, also showed what a crystal clear job the Px7 S2s can do on a vocal even while multiple layers are rising in strength below. 

• The best headphones you can buy right now

Even when there’s a big modern synth bass kicking away, as on Doja Cat’s Vegas from the Baz Luhrmann ‘Elvis’ soundtrack, these are headphones which can slam a recording home; they also punched out Dobby’s Walk Away featuring the Merindas, delivering both the bass drops and the wide reverb treatments on the vocals and harmonies. A bass sweep showed the headphones creating output even from frequencies below 20Hz, so you certainly won’t be missing any action down at the bottom. 

Another notable strength is playing at top available Bluetooth level without any sign of distress. Crank a classic like Walk On The Wild Side and you can push Herbie Flowers’ double-tracked bass to the max over the twin panned guitar jangles before the snare shuffle starts and Lou Reed enters stage centre to begin the story-telling. 

It was no surprise to find a Bowers & Wilkins product at home with natural acoustic arrangements; Bill Berry & His Ellington All-Stars ‘For Duke’ is a fabulous recording, and the panned saxophones flanking the piano and drums on the opening Take the A Train were delightfully breathy and alive.      

Listening to speech also showed how well toned these headphones are; human voices on podcasts sounded exactly as recorded (we used our own recordings to check this) with no excessive mid-bass bloom on male vocals and just enough crispness to ensure clarity, though these are not headphones which sound especially open or spacious. Sometimes we thought them a little short on edge; playing the O2 live version of Leonard Cohen’s Tower of Song the new Px7s did a good job of holding his tricky broadband vocal all together in a single piece, but his voice still lacked a little definition, so that he emerged marginally mumbly as he thrilled the London crowd. 

Similarly there was a little lack of space surrounding classical recordings, so that our favoured von Karajan recording of Holst’s Jupiter had all its pieces and dynamics in place, but something of a lid on the auditorium acoustic. You’re unlikely to notice this on the road, of course (where ANC may also thicken the upper bass and lower mids somewhat). And if it were to bother you in quiet conditions at home, we’d suggest trying the cable or the USB-C listening option. 

Each clarifies the sound, the USB-C digital option most of all, revealing the lower-mid confusion underlying Jupiter as being a rather rumbly room acoustic, and allowing more sense of the higher auditorium reflections around a far more complete and clean orchestral sound. Using USB-C with ANC off, the strings could really soar and the dynamics were unleashed: witness the impact of the tympani midway through Uranus later in The Planets, and the massive chord near its close. 

This USB-C connection, in fact, transforms the home listening experience through the Px7 S2 significantly enough to suggest a careful consideration for critical listeners of fixed-cable quality against Bluetooth convenience in the home.

One time we chose that convenience was while testing a turntable (above) which offered Bluetooth wireless output, so that we were able to enjoy the strange and unusual pleasure of strolling the home listening wirelessly to vinyl records. This is an addictive experience, and works nicely in a two-person home where you can use noise-cancellation to mask the preferred TV chatter of your partner while listening instead to the Px7s’ delivery of some vinyl. 

From our Temptations’ ‘Sky’s the Limit’ LP they opened up the glorious mix of Just My Imagination, where silky-smooth harmonies and Jerry Long’s strings arrangements dance around a groove from the Funk Brothers so solidly delivered by these heapdhones that we could not resist a little dance. (We are glad to describe this to you in print, without the distracting reality of the missus pointing and laughing at us.)

Noise-cancelling here is good, moderately intense but not quite to the point of creating imbalance in the ears or eyeballs, so we didn’t crave the different levels that were made available in the original PX7. The ANC was highly effective in banishing the rumble of a bus commute, and we have every confidence of it cancelling plane drone too, though we didn’t get in one to try. The noise cancellation has the use of four microphones, and there are two more for making calls, which in our trials came through rather quieter than the curtailed music, but very clear to hear on both ends of the conversation.

The ‘Passthrough’ ambient mode is effective as soon as you’re in an environment with noise, allowing you to hear airport announcements, have a little more traffic awareness, or eavesdrop on nearby conversations. We wouldn’t use it for general awareness in quiet spaces; it doesn’t sound like an open pair of headphones that are naturally letting in sound, a trick we’ve heard only from Apple’s AirPod Maxes, with which you can sit outside and listen to the wind in the trees as well as your music.

There’s a little Passthrough bonus for hip-hop fans: if you run your thumb around the back of the raised branded sections on either headshell you’ll hear a noise as you cross the microphone position. By moving your thumb back and forth there, you can make record-scratching sounds to add to your music. So we could rename this ‘Passthrough/Scratch mode’.

Just occasionally the Px7 S2s could seem overwhelmed. The Bluetooth presentation of the musical backing to the intense American Trilogy section in Baz Luhrmann’s ‘Elvis’ became squashed beneath the vocal and background cheers – which admittedly caused some but less distress to on reference Sonys and Apples, yet it played fine through a full-sized hi-fi system, and when the Px7 S2s played this sequence via USB-C without ANC; in that configuration the Px7 S2 outdid both those other brands.

The generally-impressive abilities with modern bass also had its limits: the monstrous three bass notes on Tyler, The Creator’s EARFQUAKE dominated the drivers such that they couldn’t simultaneously hold the vocal and other tracks fully clear above it. But then this is true of most rival headphones, and many loudspeakers too. 

Verdict

Bowers & Wilkins has successfully improved on the already-strong legacy of the original PX7 in nearly every way. The Px7 S2 headphones look and feel great, they are rock-steady wireless performers with effective noise-cancelling when out on the road, while at home their ability to play via their charging USB cable reveals their very best performance – open, dynamic and clear. 

The company is baiting potential purchasers with news of the AU$899.95 Px8 headphones to come, so you may want to wait to see what wonders those bring. But we very much doubt anyone rushing to enjoy the Px7 S2 will suffer any buyer’s remorse. You’ll be too busy enjoying the music delivered by these fine headphones.    

• Best over-ear headphones 2022