Why I like them

While expensive, Sony's flagship WF-1000XM6 earbuds not only feature great sound and excellent noise canceling, but their voice-calling performance is also top-notch. Aside from an external makeover, the XM6s are upgraded on the inside with new drivers, a three times more powerful QN3e chip with improved analog conversion technology, eight microphones -- up from six -- and an improved bone-conduction sensor that helps with voice-calling performance. The "HD Noise Canceling" QN3e processor is paired with Sony's Integrated Processor V2, which now supports 32-bit processing, up from 24-bit. Read my Sony WF-1000M6 review.

Reasons to buy

The WF-1000XM6 are pretty hard to beat from a performance standpoint across all the key areas.

Reasons to skip/keep looking

Not everybody will get a tight seal from the included eartips. (I swapped in some tips from another set of earbuds I was testing to get a tight seal.) If you get a good seal and fit, these are special earbuds. But if you don't, you could find them underwhelming for the price. Ideally, with earbuds this expensive, Sony would have included a wider assortment of tips.

Why I like them

Panasonic's new flagship earbuds, the Technics EAH-AZ100, feature a more compact design than the earlier EAH-AZ80 buds (the AZ100s are 10% smaller and 16% lighter) along with improved sound quality, noise canceling and voice-calling performance. One of the key upgrades here is Panasonic's newly developed proprietary Magnetic Fluid Driver that Panasonic says creates "clean, high-resolution, low-vibration and low-distortion sounds for the most authentic, balanced audio that's true to the original source." This type of driver is found in Technics' high-end EAH-TZ700 wired in-ear monitors ($1,200), and it's been miniaturized for use in the AZ100s.

I thought the AZ80s sounded really good, and these new AZ100s sound even better, with clean, accurate sound that brings out details in your music you don't hear with lesser earbuds (Android users get support for Sony's high-quality LDAC audio codec). As for extra features, there's Dolby Atmos spatial audio with head tracking, plus you can pair with up to 3 devices simultaneously (most multipoint Bluetooth-enabled earbuds allow you to pair to two devices).

Reasons to buy

The Technics EAH-AZ100 are among the best-sounding earbuds, so if sound quality is a priority, they should be on your short list. Also, the fact that their noise-canceling and voice-calling performance has improved slightly is icing on the cake.

Reasons to skip/keep looking

While earbuds like the AirPods Pro 2 don't sound as good as these earbuds, they do offer superior noise canceling and voice-calling performance for less money, along with an even more robust feature set, particularly for iPhone users.

Why I like them

Simply put, the Pi8s are fantastic-sounding earbuds that also benefit from having a clearly improved design from the Pi7 S2 and Pi5 S2. It's debatable whether the Pi8s sound $150 better than the step-down Pi6s, but there's no doubt these are some of the best-sounding earbuds on the market, if not the best (everybody's sound tastes vary so it's hard to declare one set of buds the best-sounding overall). 

Like with the Pi7 S2, sound quality is the highlight here, along with the charging case's ability to transform into a Bluetooth transceiver. Noise cancellation seems improved, and noise reduction during calls seems better, but the voice-calling performance wasn't as good as what I got with Apple's AirPods Pro 2 and Samsung's Galaxy Buds 3 Pro.

Reasons to buy

The Pi8 are easily among the top earbuds for sound quality with refined, spacious sound and deep, well-defined bass. Also, their noise-canceling and voice-calling performance has improved from their predecessor, making them better earbuds all around. And lastly, that their case turns into a Bluetooth transceiver is a nice feature for frequent travelers who want to use their wireless earbuds with an in-flight entertainment system.

Reasons to skip/keep looking

The Pi8 are pricey earbuds that will be out of a lot of people's price range. And while models like the AiPods Pro 2 may not feature as impressive sound quality, they do offer slightly better noise canceling and voice-calling performance (and some other extra features) and cost less.

Why I like them
While I didn't get a new H3 chip and I was hoping that the charging case would be able to convert into a Bluetooth transceiver to use the buds on a plane with an inflight entertainment system, I did get most of what I was looking for in the AirPods Pro 3. The changes may seem incremental to some folks, but all the key elements such as fit, sound quality and noise cancellation, have been noticeably leveled up along with a single-charge battery. They're about as close as earbuds get to being complete: excellent noise cancellation, strong voice-calling performance and sound quality that rivals the very best. Few buds excel in all three areas -- and the Pro 3s manage it while packing in plenty of extra features, including the new heart-rate monitoring feature. Read my full review.

Reasons to buy
As I said, these buds are significantly improved in the four most important areas: fit, sound quality, noise cancellation and battery life. The result is that you don't feel like you're making any compromises when buying the AirPods Pro 3 if you're an Apple user.

Reasons to skip/keep looking
While they work with Android devices, you lose many of the AriPods 3's extra features if you're not using them with Apple devices and its iPhones and iPad in particular. They also may just be a little too expensive for many folks.

Why I like them

Last year, I awarded a CNET Editors' Choice to Earfun's Air Pro 4 earbuds, saying they were "hard to beat for the money." The same can be said for Earfun's new-for-2025 Air Pro 4 Plus, which also earned a CNET Editors' Choice award. Though these earbuds aren't without a few small shortcomings, those could easily be fixed with future firmware updates. At around $80 on Amazon, the Plus model costs $20 more than the standard Air Pro 4, but features a pretty significant upgrade to sound quality. (Note: Apply the code AP4PCNET at checkout on Amazon to get an additional 10% off.)

Reasons to buy them

The buds are equipped with a new dual-driver system that pairs a 10mm dynamic driver with an "ultra-light FeatherBA" balanced-armature driver that helps improve bass and treble performance. Typically, earbuds with dual drivers cost significantly more (these are the first earbuds that cost less than $100 that I've seen with dual drivers). The Earfun Air Pro 4 Plus also offers a comfortable fit and a pretty robust feature set, along with improved noise canceling that's quite decent. (Read my full review.)

Reason to skip/keep looking

If Earfun could figure out a way to raise the level of the voice-calling performance of its flagship earbuds from a B- to an A- or so, they'd be the almost perfect sub $100 true-wireless earbuds. We'll see if we get some tweaks and small improvements with future firmware upgrades, but as it stands, the Air Pro 4 Plus are still excellent for the price.

Why I like them

While the boxy design of Status's wireless earbuds isn't for everybody, its new Status Pro X buds have slimmed down -- they're 22% smaller than the company's Between 3ANC buds, with an 11% smaller case -- and should fit more ears better. They also have a new triple driver set up: an "enlarged" 12mm dynamic driver supported by two Knowles balanced armature drivers. The result is earbuds that deliver top Bluetooth sound quality, highlighted by excellent clarity and bass definition, along with good stereo separation, with instruments well-placed in the soundstage, allowing you to hear each one distinctly.

The earlier Between 3ANC buds also had good sound quality, but the new model's sound just seems richer and fuller; it's clearly a level up. Just as importantly, Status has improved the noise canceling and made the transparency mode sound more natural. Both aren't quite as good as the Apple AirPods Pro 3's ANC and transparency, but they're now quite respectable. And the voice-calling performance is also very good, based on my tests in the noisy streets of New York City. The buds have three mics in each bud, and Status says it's introduced Voiceloom AI Speech Enhancement, which "leverages deep neural net training to filter out background noise during voice communications."

IP55 splashproof and dust-resistant, the buds have "high-resolution" LDAC codec support to go along with Bluetooth LE Audio, enabling the LC3 codec and Auracast broadcast audio with a future firmware update. Status' companion app for iOS and Android has also been upgraded and now has robust EQ options, customization of the controls (the buds have touch controls as well as a physical button) and FindMy support. Finally, battery life is decent, with up to 8 hours on a single charge with noise canceling off and another 24 hours in the charging case, which supports wireless charging. With noise canceling turned on, the battery life is more like 6.5 hours at 50% volume.

Reasons to buy them

You're looking for earbuds that offer excellent sound quality, strong noise canceling and top-tier voice-calling performance -- and you like the idea that they look a little different from your typical AirPods-like stick earbuds.

Reason to skip/keep looking

The Status Pro X are pricey at $300. I like their sound slightly better than the AirPods Pro 3, but their price makes them harder to recommend over the AirPods Pro 3 for Apple users (they're a little better suited to Android users). I didn't love the ear tips that ship with the buds and used my own to get a tight seal.

Why I like them

As far as the hardware goes, the QC Ultra Earbuds (2nd Gen) look exactly the same as the original QC Ultra Earbuds, although Bose has added a new plum color to the line. There are two small changes. The 2nd Gen Ultra Earbuds now support wireless charging, a feature that should have been available with the originals. The included eartips now have wax guards, a fancy way of saying there's a silicone mesh that now covers the holes in the tips.

The reality is, they don't seem like a true 2.0 product. But they do feature improved adaptive noise canceling that's truly impressive (it's neck-and-neck with the Apple AirPods Pro 3's noise canceling for the best ANC in a set of earbuds), along with some sound quality enhancements, including a new spatialized immersive audio Cinema mode that widens the soundstage and makes "video content more lifelike" with clearer dialog. The mode also helps with spoken-word audio content like podcasts and audiobooks.

New features available in both the original QC Ultra Earbuds and Gen 2 model include:

• Bose SpeechClarity
• Spotify Tap
• Turn capacitive controls on/off
• General connectivity and stability improvements

Feature upgrades available exclusively to the Gen 2 model include:

• Enhanced adaptive noise cancellation
• Reduced noise floor (the faint hiss in noise-canceling mode)
• Case battery reporting
• Cinema Mode 

Reasons to buy

The Bose QuietComfort Ultra offer a comfortable, secure fit and feature superb noise canceling and excellent sound quality. While the improvements to this model are incremental, it's good that Bose has made some upgrades to an already great set of noise-canceling earbuds. They also work well with both iOS and Android smartphones.

Reasons to skip/keep looking

They're pretty pricey and a little bigger than some earbuds like the AirPods Pro 3 and Samsung Galaxy Buds3 Pro.

Noble, the maker of "artisanal" in-ear monitors and headphones, is edging into the more mainstream earbuds market with its most affordable buds yet, after releasing its Fokus Mystiq ($359), Rex 5 ($449) and Prestige ($599) models in recent years. While the Fokus Amadeus ($320) buds are on the large side, they do fit a little more comfortably than the company's earlier buds, and they feature active noise canceling. Though their noise muffling capabilities are merely decent (the ANC is certainly a step behind what you get with Bose and Sony flagship models), their sound quality is exceptionally good -- which is probably why they're currently backordered online (though you can reserve a pair).

You can tweak the sound in the companion app for iOS and Android, where you'll also find Audiodo Personal Sound that customizes the sound based on your hearing profile, but I was happy with what I heard out of the box. The buds are equipped with 8.3mm custom triple-layer drivers, and the sound is open and nicely detailed, and the well-defined bass is deep and visceral without sounding boomy. Instruments feel distinctly and appropriately placed in the sound stage, and I appreciated that the natural-sounding mids, where vocals live, are slightly forward and don't get eclipsed by the treble and bass (with the music I listen to, which includes a fair amount of rock tracks, I don't like it when the mids sound recessed).

Noble's top-of-the-line Prestige buds are considered more analytical, which may be what some audiophiles are looking for. But the Amadeus buds have a bit warmer sound profile and aren't so revealing that they overly accentuate the flaws in less well-recorded tracks. These are buds you can use for long stretches without any listening fatigue, and they work well for a variety of music genres.

Powered by Qualcomm's QCC3091 with Bluetooth 5.4, the buds have support for the AAC, LDAC and AptX Adaptive audio codecs. They have touch controls and are rated for 8 hours of battery life with noise canceling on and 12 hours with it off at moderate volume levels, which is better than average. Though they should withstand some light sweat, they have no water-resistance rating, so they aren't recommended as workout buds (they fit my ears pretty securely, but I wouldn't run with them). They worked pretty well for making calls, with decent noise reduction, but they're not top tier when it comes to voice-calling prowess. Again, the biggest reason to buy these is for their sound. They're easily among the best-sounding earbuds in this price class.

Why I like them

A trickle of earbuds from value-oriented brands has come out in the last year in collaboration with Bose, which has been gradually expanding its "Sound by Bose" initiative that brings its brand to more affordable headphones and earbuds. Like the Bose-infused Skullcandy Method 360 ANC earbuds, the Baseus Inspire XP1 features very good sound in a set of comfortable earbuds that share some similarities with Bose QuietComfort Ultra earbuds, particularly how they fit (they have similar eartips to the Ultras, and the buds fit my ears quite well). Out of the box, they have a fairly balanced, though marginally V-shaped sound profile with slightly accentuated bass and treble and slightly recessed mids (the mids do sound warm and natural). But like Bose headphones and earbuds, they're designed to sound good (smooth) with a variety of music genres, and they feature strong, punchy bass and relatively detailed sound along with a fairly wide sound stage. Read full review.

While their noise canceling isn't up to the level of the Bose QuietComfort Ultra (2nd Gen)'s superb ANC, it's quite respectable, especially for a set of earbuds that don't cost much more than $100 (and may dip to $100 during the holiday buying season). The Inspire XP1 are rated for up to 6 hours of battery life with noise canceling on, and they have an IP54 water-resistance rating, which means they're splash-proof and dust-resistant. It's also worth noting that they're equipped with Bluetooth 6.1 and Dolby spatial audio, though I didn't notice much of a difference in sound quality when I turned the spatial audio on (there's a mode for music and movies).

Reasons to buy them

The buds are well-designed and sound very good for the price, with solid all-around performance, including good noise canceling and decent voice-calling performance with 3 microphones per bud.

Reason to skip/keep looking

The Earfun Air Pro 4 Plus feature slightly better sound for less. But I like the fit of these buds slightly better.

I liked Bang & Olufsen's earlier Beoplay EX earbuds a lot, and the company's latest flagship buds, the Beoplay Eleven, are easily among the best-sounding earbuds, though they're quite pricey. From a hardware standpoint, they seem nearly identical to the EX and are equipped with the same 9.2mm drivers. But they do have some upgraded components, most notably upgraded microphones. As a result, they not only feature slightly improved noise canceling and a more natural-sounding transparency mode with a bit more amplification, but they also have some software tweaks that improve the multipoint Bluetooth performance and touch controls. Their voice-calling performance remains top-tier, with very good background noise reduction during calls.

From a sound standpoint, I think the Eleven sound just a touch better than the EX buds, which already sounded great. They're ever so slightly more open (wider soundstage), and the bass performance seems a tad better. But the difference in sound quality is quite small. Based on the modest upgrades, it's hard to defend B&O for raising the list price of the Eleven by $200 (the EX list for $399), although a B&O rep did tell me that a B&O service center can replace the batteries in the buds should they die, extending their lifespan.

Like the EX, the Eleven buds feature a comfortable, secure fit (except perhaps for folks with really small ears). The build quality is top-notch, with premium design elements, including a brushed aluminum case that offers wireless charging (the buds aren't heavy, at 6 grams, but they feel more substantial than most earbuds with stems). They offer superior sound to Apple's AirPods Pro 2, with better clarity, deeper, more powerful bass, and richer, more accurate sound.  

Battery life is still rated at 6 hours at moderate volume levels with noise canceling on, and there's an extra 14 hours of juice in the brushed aluminum charging case (wireless charging is supported). The buds have an IP57 water-resistance rating, which makes them waterproof and dust-resistant. They have ear-detection sensors and still feature Bluetooth 5.2 and support AptX Adaptive for devices like Android smartphones that support Bluetooth streaming with the AptX HD audio codec (AAC is also supported). In the streets of New York, I did experience the occasional wireless connectivity hiccup (partial dropout), which was also the case with the EX. Because this happened infrequently, it wasn't too annoying, but this really shouldn't happen at all with buds that cost this much.

In 2024, Edifier released a set of earbuds, the Spirit S10, from its audiophile brand Stax that featured low-distortion planar magnetic drivers (planar magnetic drivers have only recently started appearing in true-wireless earbuds). The sound of the Stax buds was a little too neutral for some folks, including me, and the noise canceling wasn't quite strong enough. But both the sound and noise-canceling have improved with Edifier's similarly styled new-for-2025 NeoBuds Planar. While they retain the clean, clear sound of the Stax buds, they serve up more bass and sound more alive and dynamic than the Spirit S10s. They also have more effective noise canceling, plus good voice-calling performance.

Along with those planar magnetic drivers, the NeoBuds Planar are powered by a Qualcomm chipset that supports all audio codecs in the Qualcomm Snapdragon Sound suite, including aptX Audio, aptX Adaptive and aptX Lossless, plus HD codecs like LDAC and LHDC 5.0 (most Android smartphones support LDAC). Additionally, the more universally supported AAC codec is on board, and you can tweak EQ settings via Edifier's ConneX app.

Though I used these buds with both an iPhone and a few Android smartphones, I think these are slightly better suited for use with Android devices, particularly those certified with Snapdragon Sound. As you'd expect from earbuds that cost this much, the NeoBuds Planar are equipped with ear-detection sensors and wireless charging. Battery life is pretty average (up to around five hours with noise canceling on), and they're IPX55 splash-proof and dust-resistant. 7 different ear tips are included to help ensure you get a tight seal, which is crucial to getting optimal sound quality.

Why I like them

The original Powerbeats Pro were released in May 2019, so Beats has had a lot of time to plot how to improve the second generation of its popular ear-hook style true-wireless sport earbuds. And improve they have -- by quite a bit. Not only do they feature a new, more refined design with better ergonomics, but new drivers, a more powerful Apple H2 chip, a new built-in heart-rate sensor and, yes, active noise canceling for the first time in a pair of Powerbeats. And that noise canceling is quite good, as is the sound quality and voice-calling performance -- so long as you get a tight seal from one of the five different included eartips. Read my Beats Powerbeats Pro 2 review.

These new Powerbeats Pro 2 fit my ears better thanks to Beats improving the overall ergonomic shape of the earbud and completely redesigning the ear hook -- it's 50% smaller and incorporates nickel-titanium alloy, so it's both flexible and durable. The buds themselves are 20% lighter.

Reasons to buy

Fitness enthusiasts prefer earbuds with ear hooks to prevent their buds from falling out of their ears during intense workouts. Typically, such earbuds don't offer the greatest performance, but the Powerbeats Pro 2 share many of the same qualities and features as the AirPods Pro 2, featuring very good sound quality, along with strong noise cancellation and voice-calling performance. In short, they're versatile, also performing well as everyday earbuds. It's also worth noting that while the Powerbeats Pro 2 have some Apple-exclusive features, Beats does have an app for Android users that makes these more Android-friendly than AirPods.

Reasons to skip/keep looking

While Beats has improved the Powerbeats Pro 2's design and ergonomics, they still may not be a comfortable fit for everybody's ears, and some people may not get a truly tight seal from any of Beats' eartips. (I had an issue and had to use another set of eartips from my collection.) If you don't get a tight seal, you'll likely be unimpressed with the sound quality and noise canceling and may want to return them to the store where you bought them. (Try to find some alternative eartips before you do that.)

There a lot of new gaming earbuds out there, but what makes the Sony Pulse Explore earbuds special is that they feature planar magnetic drivers, a speaker technology typically found in high-end over-ear audiophile headphones but rarely in earbuds. While they're missing some features found in typical premium earbuds (noise canceling and ear-detection sensors), that they're as good as they are for listening to music and making calls is a revelation. In fact, they sound clearer and more articulate than Sony's flagship WF-1000XM5 earbuds, with tight, powerful bass. That doesn't necessarily mean they sound better than XM5s, which sound a little fuller. But I wasn't expecting them to compete at all with the XM5s for music listening.