Mavin's true wireless Air-X headphones have a 100ft range

CES 2019 always throws up a few surprises, and one this year is that the most technically capable true wireless headphones yet are being made not by Apple, Samsung or Sennheiser, but by a little-known brand called Mavin.

What makes its Air-X in-ears so special? Largely, it's their wireless range of 100ft. By comparison, the range of standard Bluetooth, which most wireless headphones use for transmission, has a range of about 33ft.

Mavin has achieved this new record by integrating Qualcomm's new QCC3026 (catchy name, right?) chip, which brings further benefits when combined with a phone that uses the Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 or 845 chip, such as the Samsung Galaxy S9 or LG G7 ThinQ. Those benefits include TrueWireless Stereo Plus, which sends audio directly from the phone to each of the two buds, rather one having to send audio on to the other. This is said to have a positive impact on sound quality and battery life.

Speaking of battery life, the Mavin Air-X buds will last for 10 hours from a single charge, but the included charging case adds another 40 hours of use. For reference, Apple's AirPods last around 5 hours per charge, with roughly another 20 added by the case.

All of which makes the Mavins seem rather appealing. Of course, they'll also need to sound great, so we'll be hunting down a pair for review just as soon as possible.

The Air-X headphones are already available in the US for $179, and we've asked the company if and when they'll be available in the UK.

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Tom Parsons has been writing about TV, AV and hi-fi products (not to mention plenty of other 'gadgets' and even cars) for over 15 years. He began his career as What Hi-Fi?'s Staff Writer and is now the TV and AV Editor. In between, he worked as Reviews Editor and then Deputy Editor at Stuff, and over the years has had his work featured in publications such as T3, The Telegraph and Louder. He's also appeared on BBC News, BBC World Service, BBC Radio 4 and Sky Swipe. In his spare time Tom is a runner and gamer.