The best wireless headphones according to Wirecutter. What's going on? I'm Rich Damiro. This is Rich on Tech and with me today is Lauren Dragon. She is an editor at a senior staff writer senior staff writer at Wirecutter. And this is a great website Wirecutter. If you're not familiar with it, it's kind of like the reviews website to end all reviews websites. They basically test out a lot of products and come up with not just one perfect product,
but kind of good products for what your needs are. Yes, So, Lauren, tell me about you test headphones for a living, for a living full time.
Despite what my mother might tell you, it's a real job.
So just all day, every day, all day every day.
So that's all I do is essentially I get in a whole bunch of headphones, I try them out, I get a panel to listen to them. We do things like sweat testing and run testing and durability testing, and from there we kind of try to find the best thing that fit people's needs and make their lives easier.
And what gives you this right to review headphones? You have a pretty good history with audio.
Yeah, I have a pretty big audio background. I have a bachelor's degree in music performance and audio production, and then I went into radio for a few years, and then I went into voiceover for a while. So I've been in and out of professional recording booths and studios and seeing what professionals are using. And then I started writing Oh Gosh about like ten plus years ago for Sound and Vision and other audio review sites and web
and magazines. And then from there Wirecutter came out about five years ago.
Okay, now I give my explanation a Wirecutter, you want to add yours.
Essentially, we find the stuff that fits best into your life to help you do things easier and make your life better. So you know, it may not be a one size fits all kind of thing. We try to think about different use cases and different people's needs. So whereas other things other sites might just say this is the best thing in a vacuum, Well, it might not work if you have a small apartment, may not work. If you were a single mom, it may not work.
So we think about the different ways that you might use something, and we try to find something to fit your needs as opposed to just what the best thing is.
Okay, so we're going to do one, two, three, We're going to do four types of headphones here, okay for various use case scenarios. So your first pick is least expensive, this is your workhorse. What's your pick, so the job remove.
They've been our pick actually for a couple of years now, and they're super durable. They sound way better than you think. They're really comfortable, so you can wear them a really long time and they won't bother your ears. A lot of times you'll notice with cheap headphones book cut corners by putting in crappy foam or weird plasticky parts, and you'll kind of cut into you and so you maybe wear them for an hour and then you start finding yourself wanting to take them off and give your.
Ears a break.
You won't have that problem with these. So that's why I love them is they're really easy to use buttons. They're very comfortable, and a lot of stuff out there isn't and they sound great.
And they're also flexible. When you first showed them to me, you kind of flex them around, So I like that aspect. Before we move on to our kids pick, which I really think they look very cool. I know you can't see them on the podcast. But they look really nice. They look like a premium, like one thousand dollars pair of headphones. But tell them I have a certain thing where I have to have headphones that kind of cup over my ears because I don't like them when they
sit on my ear. Is that like a preference or is it.
Totally a preference? So we have on ear versus over ear, and we actually have different picks for people like that. So and you're not alone. People that wear glasses tend to like on ear because they don't interfere with the arms on their glasses. People like you maybe like over ear because it doesn't feel as like compressed on their actual outer ear area.
So we do have pick.
Sort of things the job remove are on ear, and generally because of the size of the drivers and that's like the little cone thing inside of a speaker, except smaller in headphones, those things tend to be more expensive the bigger you get. So if you have bigger over your headphones, that tend to cost more money. So you'll find that like on ears, tend to usually cost a little less than the over ear counterpart.
Interesting. Okay, so let's get into the kids pick that you have, and these, like I said, these look like a very expensive pair of headphones. What's your pick?
So the PUROBT twenty two hundred and what I love about these is they may not look like kids headphones. And we thought when we tested it with a bunch of kids, so we got some you know, three year olds, four year olds, ten year olds, and we wanted to see what they liked. And I thought they'd go for
the fun cartoon colors, and that they really didn't. They wanted something that looked like grown ups headphones, and a lot of stuff out there is very breakable, kind of disposable, and these will last your kids.
So my two year old.
Fit in them when I was doing stuff. They'll fit them all the way up until they basically hit tween age, and they'll last you well because they have metal parts, they have nice solid memory foam, they have easy use buttons, but most importantly, they have volume limiting, so kids may not be able to pay attention to the fact that they're turning their music up too loud, and that can damage their hearing really quickly. In fact, some of the headphones we test it got to jackhammer levels and.
That's not Okay, so what is this limit?
It to eighty five dB. So that's the World Health Organization's limit. That's what they say is recommended. You know, it's a part of a noise diet. There's a whole other thing we could go into about how your ears deal with loud sounds. Not about one loud impact. It's about the larger picture.
That you take in through a day.
But eighty five dB over eight hours is considered generally speaking safe. So your kids can put these on, they can try to crank them up as loud as they want, but they can't go into what's considered unsafe volumes.
Okay. And they're Bluetooth. They've got an unoff switch, they've got a volume switch. They also have a plug if you want to go wired.
Yep.
And they have a micro USB charger on there. But again, you were stepping on them earlier and they still look great.
So literally took them and I are combat boots for the ones that the kids like the best, and I just stomped around on them, because that's what happens. You drop them in the car, kids step on them, they do. So that's what's great about these things is that they are built to last you. So yes, it may seem like you're spending a little more money, but you figure you could get three or four twenty dollars pairs over the span of a couple of years or by one and it will last you.
And these Puros are one hundred dollars. Yeah, round hundred, So one hundred dollars for these and again kind of seems expensive. But this is the thing when people don't realize, Like you said, if you spend twenty dollars on the Amazon basics or whatever they are, you know, you buy three pairs of those because they break all the time. You might as well buy one nice pair, and you're investing in safety and safety. I like that idea too, because I think a lot of parents don't think about that.
Yeah that you know, for my kids, I'm always adjusting like their headphones. I'm like, let me listen to that before, and of course an hour later I listen again and it's like cranked up yep. So I do agree, set it and forget it a little bit. I'll be purchasing those through your affiliate link, of course. Okay, So, Jabra, this is your best alternative to the AirPods. Yes, tell me about these.
So you've got Actually they have two different versions of these, so there's the Elite sixty five T and then the Elite Active sixty five T. The Elite Active, the main difference is they're a little more sweat resistant, and they also have a little bit of fitness tracking, which isn't that important honestly.
They use an app most of the time.
Right and honestly most people that are really serious about that and they use a watch or something else. But for me, the Elites are also sweat resistant, water resistant, dust resistant, And what I love about these is well, the AirPods are great for using on a Mac and if you have a lot of Apple products and you're transferring from one to another, they transition beautifully because they have that W one chip, which is their version of Bluetooth.
Basically it's pretty seamless. But aside from that, they don't do a whole lot else really well. The Jabra they're Elite, the sixty five T and the Act of sixty five T sound better, stay in, better, fit better, have more controls, and are more durable because they have the water and sweat resistance. So essentially, unless you're a hardcore Maac fan, these are really going to do a lot more for you. And they also have four microphones in them, so they
do really great video chats, voice calls. I people a lot of times to be like, wait, do you have something in because they can't even see them, and they sound fantastic. And they also help to reduce background noise, so if you're working in an office or if you're working at the gym, they transition really well between both. And they have about the same battery life and they cost about the same which is around one hundred and fifty okay.
And it looks like they come in sort of a charging case similar to what the same.
Thing so you get it's the same thing as AirPods where it's like you get about four to five hour use in your ears and then you put them in and they'll charge fully two more times each, you know when you put them in.
So okay, you know, So if you're not, you know, in love with the Apple stuff or you don't necessarily need that, go with the job where you get more features for about the same price. All right, now, finally on the table here we've got the noise canceling pick. And it's interesting because I bought my first pair of Bows. I think it was like when I first started at KTLA eight years ago. I was going to Japan and I was like, do I spend three hundred and fifty
dollars on a pair of headphones. I was like, you know what, I've seen all the advertising, I'm going to do it, and I've loved them ever since. They've lasted since then, by the way, so that's been eight years. But your pick, I am verified here you have a pair of Bows as your top sort of noise canceling headphones. So tell me about these. What are these called?
So the QC thirty five Mark two, which is a really long name. But what makes them different is that, first of all, Bos has their noise canceling you just the best. They've cornered the market on that. They're just really fantastic at getting down especially the low to mid range frequencies, which means like airplane noise, of cars, outside traffic sounds, air conditioner sounds. They'll drop that down really
really well. And then you know, one of the things that Bose also has is with these they have the built in if you're someone who use a serie, they connect to Siri. If you use an Android, they connect also to Google and they connect to Alexa. So there's one button that will trigger all of those who whatever system you use, you can also get those.
It's certified for all those sort of flexible yeah, and not just in one kind of silo there. I also know this, there's NFC on here, which I know Apple people don't really care about that. But if you have an Android, it's really nice because you literally just tap your phone to this to pair it up.
Super easy pairing. Yeah, and that's I know. That's actually a really great feature. That is, you know, I think a lot of people overlook if you aren't naturally an Android person. So that's why I think I like about these a lot, is that no matter what type of system you use, if you switch around between them, maybe you use more one thing at work and one thing at home, they'll adapt really well.
To Okay, but you're paying the price. How much are these? There are three fifty three fifty Now they used to do that twelve payment plan. I don't know if I don't see that advertised anymore anymore. I just bought mine out right, but I always saw that in the in the ads. But I don't think they do that, all right, Lauren Dragon from Wirecutter, thank you so much. How can people get in touch with you and the website?
Okay, so wirecutter dot com. We are also we're owned by the New York Times, so you can also go through the New York Times. And if you want me specifically, if you have specific headphones about questions about headphones, you can always find me. I'm on Twitter, I'm on Facebook, but just at Lauren Dragon.
Okay, then an and there's many more picks. We just did four, but you, like you said, this is a full time job for you. So if you have questions about headphones or you want to pick the perfect headphones for your situation, you even Lauren even has a pick for weightlifters.
Yes, specifically for weightlifters.
That's crazy that ge that gets really really specific here. So thanks so much for joining me today. I appreciate it. If you guys liked the podcast, screenshot it and share it on your Instagram stories and be sure to tag me and I'll share it to my followers as well. I'm Rich Damiro For links and pictures and all that good stuff on these headphones, just go to my website. It's rich on tech TV. Thanks for listening. I'll talk to you real soon.
Mhmm