Beoplay EX - Wireless Bluetooth Earphones with Microphone and Active Noise Cancelling, Waterproof, 20 Hours of Playtime

I don't often write reviews for products, only those which I really think deserve praise and are perhaps under-appreciated in the user market. Quick TLDR: Summary: These are GREAT earbuds, with beautiful sound, outstanding connectivity (no problems for me connecting or staying connected), an app with EQ tuning, excellent battery life, high water-resistance, handsome quality physical details in the buds themselves, as well as the case. I think they're well worth the price. I purchased the Bang & Olufsen EX earphones around 2-3 months ago, and they're everything I hoped they would be, which is: a quality upgrade to the prior B&O earphone lines in terms of features and functionality. I expected that the sound quality would at the very least be on par with the previous models which I own: e8 generation one, e8 generation 2, and e8 generation 3, all of which have beautiful sound (which you really wouldn't expect from such SMALL earphones!). Well, the sound quality is real. I've attached some photos of my older gen e8's, all of which are still very functional and used as backups. They all still sound great. The H9 Gen3 also pictured are over-ear headphones with 25 hour battery life and now cost less than half what they did when I bought them, quite a deal. I'll first focus on the sound: it is rich, with defined highs, mids, and lows, but an overall 'neutral' sound. For those who prefer more bass or more treble...the accompanying B&O app (available for both Android & Apple devices) allows you to set EQ sound profiles (which you can name). I don't think they need much adjustment, though I do slightly alter mine to have a sharper sound in the highs and slightly less bass. That's because I love really clear vocals, guitar strings, horns, violins, etc, and I find much music is overproduced with bass tones overwhelming these higher tones. Sound is the primary reason I rate these Bang & Olufsen EX as a 5 star product. Functionality is the secondary reason I'm rating them as a 5 star product: -Bluetooth 5.2 (the latest and most connective) creates an excellent connection to my phone, computer, ipad, and watch, allowing me to stream music uninterrupted for around 4.75 hours with ANC activated. -Battery Life: around 4.5 - 4.75 with ANC activated. I've never used them with ANC off, so I can't say whether they reach the projected 6 hours with no ANC. I imagine they get close to that. -Recharging: Very fast, I think around 2.5 hours for a full charge. But a 15 minute charge will give you an hour of play, which is great if you're in a rush. The battery/charging case holds around 2 additional full charges. Technical production, physical quality: These are beautifully made, with tempered glass touch pads across the small covers. The units fit well in my ears, and you can use either memory-foam or silicone tips. I always use memory foam, as you get a better fit, better passive noise-isolation from your external environment, and better, fuller sound due to the increased isolation. And, as long as you keep your ears clean, memory foam buds last quite a long time before you need to replace them, in my experience. Even if I did need to replace them more frequently, I would still prefer them. They're also better for working out, as the buds are even more stable. Increased water-resistance! These are rated IP57, so they have up to 1 meter of water resistance. What this really means is they won't be damaged by sweat, rain, or tap water. This is an improvement over their previous e8 models which were only IP54 (less resistant to water, though I've been caught in the rain many times, and done plenty of workouts, likewise without problems). Stability of fit. I can dance, run, lift weights, whatever, and these earbuds don't budge in my ears. Love that! About ANC: These latest models have added something the e8 models didn't have: ANC. These days, ANC is pretty much a required and expected feature in any premium earphones (and even expected in more run of the mill brands). So, I was happy to see that B&O had 'finally' added ANC to their earbuds. I will say that I think the ANC is passable and could use improvement. But I think this is partially due to the form factor and incomplete closure to the external environment due to the small size. My Apple Beats Fit Pro have ANC of about the same quality, and those are supposedly equal to the AirPods Pro, which lead the market in this feature for this form factor. I will also say that my Apple Beats Fit Pro's sound far (far) inferior to my B&O EX's. Battery life is very similar between the two as well (though I think the EXs outlast the Beats Fit Pros).

Beoplay EX first impression: While washing my face in the shower, I hear a distant bullet stray wide. I’ve listened to this song a hundred times but this is the first time I’ve been able to hear this detail. My face is under a stream of hot water and I’m experiencing music in a way that isn’t possible with other earbuds in a quiet room. Wow. The extra detail that I was able to hear elevated the song for me in a way that I think the artist intended for me to hear. If these can make all my music this enjoyable then I don’t have a problem with the price. It’s a different experience. Update: The sound is on another level but I have become aware that it is not just the EXs that make this happen. You need a good source, a good speaker, and a way to get the source to the speaker. Bang & Olufsen offers all three with this package. With the EX they provided a 30-day trial to Deezer. This allows me to stream high-fidelity music giving me a clean source to start with. The EXs speakers/drivers (whatever, I’m not a speaker guy) are like nothing I’ve ever heard. But most people miss the part about how the music gets from the device to the speaker. Bluetooth can inhibit the flow but with Qualcoms’ aptX enabled the floodgates are opened and your music is allowed to reach the EXs uninterrupted (again, I’m not a speaker guy and these analogies are just my non-technical bs). It works. It works in a way that has brought my music to life. Old music is new. Can you put a price on that? Cons: ANC isn’t great. Why do they want me to hear more wind noise when enabled? Pros: Sound. Build. Controls. Fit. Waterproof. Microphone. Warranty. Final thoughts: I ended up with these earphones after my partner loaned me her pair of first gen AirPods. I fell in love. They were magical the first time I used them and I've needed a pair of earbuds ever since. I was really excited about the Pixel Bud Pros and pre-ordered them. IMO the design doesn't work for two reasons, fit and microphone. The microphone basically didn't work so I sent them back and got myself a pair of AirPod Pros. I was convinced that I was in earphone heaven again, but as I walked out of the store and tried to turn up the volume I realized they lacked swipe controls. I was deflated. Something had to be available that fit my desires. Enter the EXs. Are they perfect? No. Are they incredible? Yes. I use them all the time. About HiFi/Hi-res music…Try it! Enable it in Apple Music, try Tidal, try Deezer, or any other HiFi streaming service. Try it on different speakers and in different places (try your car). You will notice a difference that I wasn't aware of until now. I am keeping Deezer because of their EU approach to privacy. I don't feel like I'm being watched when I use their service. My Teams meetings are more sufferable as I am confident that my coworkers will be able to hear me when I speak and I am always able to clearly hear them. Most importantly, I am excited to listen to my music. I keep thinking of songs and artists who build great soundscapes for me to surf. The EXs have given me a new appreciation for some artists while I have come to judge others as amateurs. Being able to distinguish the subtleties of every song is a gift that I am happy I gave myself and that I should be able to continue to enjoy for years to come.

Do not buy these, unless you want to pay $400 for garbage. The ONLY thing nice about these earbuds is the sound quality, which is top-notch. But good luck ever getting them to work. The other reviewers are not lying about the connectivity issues. I've had these almost a year and probably have only used them a few hours, mostly when I first got them. The software will NOT update without doing a factory reset (which I'm trying to do now, again... and which reminded me to write this review). Good luck making that happen. It will take at least an hour of your time. Ridiculous. They will fall out of your ears with the slightest turn of the head, and I've tried all the earpieces, even third party. IF you could get them to work, they'd only be good while sitting in a chair and not moving much... How I wish I had just returned them that first month... The few hours I have used them, the sound quality was outstanding, despite the lack of a deep bass, which is probably why I kept trying, and trying, and trying to get them to work and passed the 30-day return date. Save yourself a ton of headache and give these a pass. I ended up getting the Sennheiser Momentum 3 for $250 and though the sound isn't quite up to B&O, it's close, and they actually have a very good bass, unlike the B&O's. Also, they will actually stay put, unlike the B&O trash product. I use the Sennies all the time, including the gym and while running. Wish I'd just got them from the get-go. Good job, B&O, you got my money for nothing. I'll never buy B&O again, and I'll make sure everyone I know never buys your product, either. It won't get me my money back, but at least I'll have some satisfaction in knowing you won't rip some other people off like you did me.

I've had mine for three years now and I feel that's enough time to get a good idea of how I feel about them. They sound amazing and they get plenty loud with a few levels left until max volume. I like listening to music with these more than with my headphones from a similar price range. They look great and feel great as well. I took two stars off because the connectivity is terrible and the battery life on the left earbud terrible. The connectivity is fine if you're sitting in one place but if I'm walking with the case and my phone in my pocket, the connection is intermittent and if I'm walking through the airport then there's just no hope at all to listen to anything. It's been like this since day one. The battery life on the left earbud has been crap for a little over a year now and it's been getting steadily worse. It doesn't even last an hour at 70% volume before I get the low battery sound and my right earbud still has an 80% charge. Sadly, it didn't bother me enough to contact customer support until just after my 3 year warranty expired. Whoops. I had the Beoplay E8s before these and those had bad connection problems as well. With all that said, I won't be buying anything else from this brand (like a replacement earbud). I'd rather spend my money on another brand.

I gave these a shot when I was looking for a new go to set of noise canceling earbuds. I read a lot of great things about the sound quality and I am an audiophile, so I had to give them a chance. I look for a few things in an earbud. how they sound, ease of use, and how well the cancel out noice and also how well you can hear when they are in transparent mode. I am comparing these to the AirPods2 Pro, and Sony WFX1000M4 1. how well they sounded - I downloaded the app and was actually happy to see that they had their own radio stations and also sports stations you could tune into for free.. but what I was most interested in was the controls for setting up the audio profiles. I found this to be very weird. I didn't like the preset choices, and I really didn't feel like when I tried to change the EQ settings it made much of a difference. I am not saying they didn't sound great, but I have read reviews that these were so far above other headphones and I just was not hearing that much of a difference. This price is much higher than the competition. I am looking for reasons to pay for this. Audio is unquestionably high end. I feel the Sony has better base, and also better EQ and App features. 2. ease of use. I felt like the Beoplay EX were awkward and difficult to use the touch features. some things like volume control make sense, but I had a hard time switching from ANC to transparent mode. I felt dumb when someone would start talking and I could slightly hear them, and I would be hand signing the international signal for huh? wait hold what am I doing, then I would just have to take it out of my ear and apologize, because I couldn't tell if I even changed it to transparent mode. the ANC is just OK. I fly a lot on airplanes, and I could easily hear the entire announcements of the flight crew each time they said anything, and I could hear noises around me. The Sony XM4 are the best for that, and the AirPods 2 pro are a close second. that's a very important feature to me. the Beoplay EX failed me, and this was driving me insane. I couldn't get used to these touch functions. 3 fit and comfort. - These earbuds are very comfortable and fit very well in my ears. I can tell they are universally made to fit anyones ear with plenty of comfort and you can choose your own size to the ear buds. I recommend the foam cushion buds for the best sound and ANC. Final Thoughts--- THE GOOD - these are definitely high quality design, and the case itself looks amazing. they hold a charge for a long time. The sound is good and they are comfortable. THE BAD - the ANC leaves a lot to be desired at this price level, and turning it off was confusing and difficult, and the transparent mode didn't work all that great, I still felt like I had ear plugs in and had to take them out to listen to someone. The EQ is not for everyone's taste. I understand they are trying to make it easy and simplified, but it just didn't work for me. I want more control. I listen to so many different styles of music and audio that I want to be able to have more customization. LAST THOUGHT- would I recommend? Its sounds like some people really love these, so I dont want to say my review should be the end all for everyone. this was my first time trying this brand. Maybe if you have experience with Bang & Olufsen before, it is easier to transition into them and like them. I would definitely be interested in future models that fix the features I felt didn't work for me, because I really did want to like them. Don't buy these if you need ANC, the XM4 are the best for that. Sound, the Sony XM4 also have almost as good of sound, and were on sale for almost $80 cheaper. I ended up with a new pair of Sony WF1000XM4's because they are hard to beat and they are a step above the AirPods pro2. I still have my the AirPods for backup. I fly on long international flights and it's good to have that backup when one pair goes dead and needs some time to charge.

I had originally purchased the anthracite color because it was on sale for $300 and I had read excellent reviews of the product online. I had never purchased anything from B&O because it was usually out of my price range but based off of the reviews and competitor pricing, I figured I would give it a shot. Verdict? Completely loved it. I do have one criticism. Even though I rated it five stars because the sound quality is so outstanding compared to any other earbuds on the market, wearing these long-term can cause your ears to hurt a little bit because the fit is a bit wonky. The small buds are too small and you forfeit some noise cancellation, while the medium is a bit too large for my ears so it puts pressure on the inside which can cause some earbud fatigue after extended use. As I said before, however, I still gave it five stars because other competitors suffer from similar problems but lack the depth of quality sound that these earbuds offer. In fact, as my title indicates, I lost my original anthracite pair on a plane traveling to the East Coast. I ended up not wanting to purchase another replacement because the cost had gone up a hundred bucks to the original retail price of 400 bucks so I tried Alternatives by Audio Technica and by Bose (including the new Ultra). I ended up returning the Bose, and I'm keeping the Audio Technica as a backup pair (the Bass Is weak on these so they are good for voice). I will say that the Bose noise canceling is No. 1 by a huge margin. But this pair of earbuds it's just too good in bass, depth of sound, and overall quality. I saw that the gold coloe was on sale for about $315 and snapped them up. No regrets. If you see them go on sale, especially near $300, buy them. Then, sign up for Deezer (or have your Spotify Adjusted for HIFI sound) and enjoy the immersion. Also, look up 8D sound - these are fun with 8D playlists for a bit of a change up. Hope this helps!

Coming from the Sony XM4's I splurged for what should be a significant upgrade at 1.5x the cost. The XM4's are not perfect but they are great and their ANC is another world scary. I put the B&O EX's through their paces for a week before deciding to send them back and return to my trusty XM4 buds. First the good, yes the sound quality on the EX's is great, exceptional even. Details you've been missing suddenly pop, string plucks, reverb of the room, the warmth of the bass... it's subtle but it's all there. These are meant to compete with the AirPod Pros so similar q-tip/ pencil styling is provided for already accustomed iPhone users. Android users who prefer more subtle and elegant round buds may still find the EX acceptable in its styling. Premium materials abound from glass in the touch sensors to comply foam tips included to an excellent case that feels sturdy and solid. I really like the easy "boop boop" noise they make when connecting to your device vs announcing "bluetooth connected" every time. ANC is good, nowhere near as good as the XM4's but better than most. There are 3 modes here that you can cycle through, from full transparent to active ANC. This is really where the positives stop and the problems begin. The B&O app is fine, nothing special and you are annoyingly required to create an account before you can do anything. Location tracking is REQUIRED or the app will not connect to your buds, this is egregious as there isn't a single location related feature here, just greedy data grabbing by B&O. Customization is extremely minimalistic and provides only the basics for ANC and listening mode, which is their non-traditional EQ. Here they give you a round dial that you can slide a button around to find your personal sweet spot be that "warm" or "energetic"; A bit of a disappointing dumb down though you will be able to find what you like. I experienced strange random disconnects while listening to music with the phone in my pocket, similar to when you've walked out of bluetooth range. I've never experienced this on any other earbud and here it happened repeatedly. Call quality is decent but the initial connection can be really buggy. For example, call comes in, you answer and put on phone speaker, you then decide you want to switch to your new $400 EX buds so pop one in. Instead of the call transferring seamlessly and instantly, like on the XM4's (or literally any other bud), you get a few seconds of limbo where the buds appear to connect yet you can't hear anything, switch back to speaker, apologize to your caller, then magically they connect and your call continues on the EX's. I really hate this and it happens over and over again. These 2 things alone are deal breakers and enough reason to return. Multipoint, while a cool feature, is nothing but pain here. If you connect, say, to both your phone and laptop or PC via bluetooth, the EX's will connect to both and then play the audio of whichever device is broadcasting at any particular moment. The problem then is that if the other device issues a notification you will get sound drop silence on the EX's interrupting the primary audio and you won't hear the notification either. Just a moment of dead air until the primary stream picks up again. The only way around this is to disable bluetooth on either device or manually disconnect from bluetooth which defeats the purpose entirely! Another problem is the touch sensors via the glass circles. You have to press precisely and exactly in these little circles or nothing happens. I hate touch sensors generally, on the XM4's as well, and much prefer a haptic button like on the Jabra buds. Double presses go missed most often where I try to skip a track yet it pauses instead. So you wind up in play/ pause, no, play/pause, no, skip... arg, finally! Something else worth noting is that I found the EX's to provide no greater comfort than any other earbud I've owned. After a long session your ears will ache and this isn't due to the tips either, it's the round plastic bits shrouding the drivers that press against your ear cartilage. So the EX's fail at most pretty basic operational features which is unacceptable at the highest price in this segment. These should be near perfect, but they are not. I found using my XM4's more enjoyable, more predictable and while also not perfect, they just work better at the basics like calls and seamless audio. Pros: -Excellent musical sound quality -Premium materials and construction -High quality wireless charge case with good battery life Cons: -High cost that should provide perfection, yet falls WAY short -The app has 2 options: ANC and listening mode, very limited customization -Account creation and location access required before you can even connect to your earbuds -Random music drops/ disconnects with phone in pocket -Problematic BT connection during calls -Multipoint works but is basically a gimmick that provides more problems than benefits -Touch sensors are finnicky and require very careful & exact touches -Long sessions are as uncomfortable as any other earbud, no improvement here

Isn’t it the point to listen to music that is a cut above the rest? I am remiss regarding this review. I bought them last September. I registered them and downloaded the firmware. Played with the EQ and quickly found my sweet spot. Literally took my breath away. I began listening to music I’ve listened to for years and was amazed at the depth I’ve never heard before. It was like hearing it for the first time. I prefer rock and roll but listen to all genres. B&O sound is different from others. The separation is fantastic. This kind of separation is not for everyone. For example: if I’m listening to a tune with several guitar tracks I hear each one. Ok. I’m like 200 years old and thought I knew how music should sound. I was wrong. I now hear elements of it I didn’t know were there. I’ve used many different buds and don’t feel a need to compare. To be clear, I bought them strictly for music. So many tracks have left me with a feeling of being in the studio and listening to the playback. The sound is crisp, clear and clean. I honestly don’t like taking them off. If you must know,the case is well made. The fit for me out of the box was perfect. I have only had one issue with connectivity like when I’m near another blue tooth speaker. Charging is righteous. The only thing I would like better is stronger ANC. Are there others as good or better? Of course. I would buy these again. Yeah I went on a limb to buy them but glad I did. The beautiful thing is if they are not for you, return them. The only thing relevant to me is the sound. I don’t care about calls which are good. It is all about the sound of the music. Fabulous. Sit back ,close your eyes and ask yourself,is this how the artist wants you to hear it? What I hear always leaves me with a smile that doesn’t go away. Now, if you will excuse me, the studio is calling me.