All right guys…so for a while I’ve been using some Beats and other noise canceling headphones that really I hadn’t been all that impressed with, but they worked for the job at the time I had. So lately I’ve been reading about these new WH-1000X M3’s from Sony. All the reviews seem really great on them, so I thought I’d give him a shot. It’s really between these and the Bose Quiet Comfort 35’s and I really liked the look of these better with the matte black finish. Typically I’m not that big of a fan of post products, but their are noise canceling technology is fantastic and if you’ve ever been on a plane, you realize that about 90% of the plane is actually using those headphones. So let’s get into these and see how they did.
Sony Noise Canceling
First let’s get into the good stuff. One, the noise canceling on these headphones is fantastic. I’ve been using them for about a month now. I’ve been on several different flights using them, walking around cities, all kinds of just ambient sound kind of walk around scenarios that you would use noise canceling headphones and they do an awesome job.
There are actually several different settings. I do find though that I only use the noise canceling setting because if you use the ambient sounds setting in really high when situations, the microphones on the outside will often pick that up and it’ll sound like your music is distorting when it actually isn’t. So for me, I’ve used it either on or off and not using the ambient halfway noise canceling setting.
Touch Gestures on the Sony Headphones
One of the really cool things about these headphones is on the right cup you could actually use gestures to change tracks, increased volume. You can even put your entire hand over the cup and it’ll mute the sound so that you can have conversations with the headphones still on. This was really helpful when they’re bringing the snack cart down the aisle of the airplane.
Matte Black Finish
The other thing I really liked about the Sony HW-1000X M3’s is the subdued look. You get this matte black finish with a small Sony logo. Some of the other ones are really doing their logo a lot more prominent, especially at the Bose and Beats headphones where you get this huge logo on the cup. These do have a little bit more professional look to them and the soft touch to them is nice. I did find for even longer flights are longer walks down the street. These are very comfortable where over time so headphones can give you kind of your fatigue or head fatigue and I didn’t really get that with these. The ear cups are really nice and soft and it isn’t too much pressure on your head, but it is enough to keep a nice suction around the ear.
Sony WH-1000X M3 Battery Life
So one of my favorite things about these headphones is actually the battery life. They say it’s up to 30 hours. There’s no real way to test that. What I can tell you is when I used to worry about either replacing batteries or recharging and other headphones, I really don’t worry about it all much that much. With these, I find that it’s a lot through longer recharge stretches. Also on the longer flights and trips, they have a quick charge feature that if you just plug them in for 15 minutes, you get a couple hours of listening time. That is huge so you don’t have to sit there and wait for forever for these things to charge up. You can just kind of do those quick cycles as needed.
Android and iOS Sony Headphone App
So another cool feature of these headphones is they actually come with a very easy to use Sony App that you can adjust all your ambient surround sound, everything else. I do find there are several settings on this that I will never use where you could put the forward facing sound and really tune the ambient. What I really do is just use noise canceling on noise canceling off, which you can also do for buttons on the headphones and adjust the EQ. A lot of the other stuff I find just to kind of be useless for my needs, I really just needed to function like I want the headphones.
What’s Included / Sony WH-1000X M3 Headphones
You do get a case in several different connections. They use a type C to actually charge the headphones, which is great they keep to that standard. The cable is crazy short though. So I do find that I do want a different cord to actually plug in the headphones and charge them because especially when you’re on airplanes, you don’t want them sitting there hanging by the cord.
They do come with another like old school airplane jack, which I haven’t seen one of those in years that got taken out of the case almost immediately. And they do come with a mini to mini jacks that you could plug it in directly to airplane TVs and other functions where you wouldn’t be able to use the Bluetooth audio.
Narrow Heads and the Sony Headphones
All right. So like with everything there’s the good and the bad, right? On these headphones there isn’t a whole lot of adjust ability for people with narrow heads. I’m six foot two. My head isn’t exactly tiny, but at the same time I guess it’s kind of slender because when I put these on the tightest setting that you could put on the headphones. So while I would have a lot of adjustment to go larger, it doesn’t really make a whole lot of sense for me. So if you have a narrow head or a smaller head, just keep that in mind and try them on before you buy them to make sure that you can actually fit with these on your head.
Bass Response with the Sony’s
Another thing to be careful of, which is true for most headphones, these are not super bass heavy. The sound quality is excellent on it, but if you get crazy with the bass boost and the bass slider, you will get distortion, especially on electronic music and rap if you’re getting into larger volume levels.
Useless App Settings
As I mentioned before, the APP has a lot of gimmicky stuff that you’ll probably never use, but it does have a lot of useful functions and makes it really easy to use the headphones and get the settings the way you want them, and the ambient sound setting, which they kind of put in between, they’re noise canceling and fully off does right into situations in windy conditions where it does sound like your music starting to get just to get distorted.
So I really just never used that function anyway after that and go for it. Full off. Full on.
Workouts and the WH-1000X M3 Headphones
The thing is is these headphones are really not for workouts. It’s a more of a premium ear cup. It doesn’t do well with sweat. So I’m actually a recovering from a surgery or right now, so my workouts are pretty light, so I have actually been using these on my walks outside and doing my stretches and stuff indoors. But it’s typically because I’m not sweating all that much and outside it actually helps with keeping my ears warm. I wouldn’t recommend these for running or heavy workouts. It’s a premium ear cup that’s not really meant for that function. It would be kind of cool to see like an interchangeable thing, but typically for workouts you’re not going to want to tip a full over the ear headphones anyway.
Sony WH-1000X M3 Voice Calling
So the other thing is you can use these for voice calls. They have this thing called HD calling. You can’t answer your phone and it’s supposed to really bring like as high fidelity sound to your phone calls. What I did find is these are okay for phone calls. What ends up happening is that they put on the ambient sound so you can hear things around you while you’re on the phone call. I think some of that has to do with picking up your voice so that you can actually be heard by the person that you’re talking to. But I do find it’s a little bit awkward to talk to people on these headphones, so it’s a nice ability to do, but I’d much rather use my Apple Airpods or something else. It tends to be clear and I don’t get this real hollow sound when I’m talking like I do with these headphones.
$349 Pricing / Sony WH-1000X M3 Headphones
And the last thing is price. These are on the molar, more expensive range of noise canceling headphones in this range. They are a little bit more than the competition. However, I do find the sound quality’s better and I liked the design and fit of them a lot better than the competition. So for that little bit of premium, you do get what you pay for and I think that’s real reason why all the reviews are so good on these headphones. Even though the price is a little bit of a premium is because you do actually get something for that price premium versus just a Sony name.
Who should buy the Sony WH-1000X M3 Headphones?
All right guys. So who are these perfect for? I really see it great for home listening and walking around the house. If you’re someone who commutes a lot saying take trains, airplanes walking around cities, they’re perfect for that as well as good because they’re really comfortable for longer term and the noise canceling is incredible. So I find that I don’t have to turn the volume up as much because the noise canceling is so good.
So yeah, the way this ended up was the reviews are right. These are some of the best noise canceling headphones you can buy in the current state of the market. They’re not going to kill the bank but they’re also not the cheapest. But I do believe, at least style wise, for me they’re the best. And I found the sound quality was one of the best out of the market and the features like the gestures on the right cup and some other small things really kind of set these headphones apart from the competition. So yeah, I would definitely recommend buying them. I use them all the time and I was really happy with the purchase.
Buy the Sony WH-1000X M3 – https://amzn.to/2X5pmiN