Nothing Headphone 1 Review: A bold design with some strange lapses

The first pair of over-the-ears headphones is nothing, affecting the company’s signature retro-transparent design, it has been introduced with the phone 1. But so far, this design is mostly in your pocket or peeping out of your ears. $ 299 Nothing with Headphone 1, you have to be committed to wrapping that beauty around your head or hanging from your neck.

I spent about a week with Headphone 1, to see how it fits between competition – and with your outfit.

Nothing resembles a cross between the headphones 1 Apple’s AirPods Max and the 1980s FM radio headphones. I dig the design, but it seems foolish to wear it on my head. The housing seems cheaper than the $ 549 airpods of the maximum aluminum cover and is less…. I am almost embarrassed to wear it on the road and I feel that I think I am cossplaying as a Sibborg. The ear pads look like a generic headphone, with rubber and plastic surefire pads and a memory foam center. Although I do not care about the texture, they are comfortable, and I don’t feel tired while wearing all day as I do with Sony WH-1000xm6.

Button design is my favorite part of the headphone. The volume is controlled by a roller, which is like a rubber wheel that you spin, not far from Apple’s digital crown, but are oriented in its favor. Roller presses on dramas or prevents your audio, and prevents it from togging one of the three mode – cancellation, transparency, or off.

There is also a paddle button, so that you can leave the tracks, can go backwards on the back tracks, rapidly or rewind, or hang the phone call when held below. I have not yet found an app that works with fast forward / rewind control, but nothing claims that it is dependent on the platform.

Outside the right ear cup, an adaptable button can be set to launch a voice assistant such as Google Gemini, use an EQ preset, mute the microphone, control the noise, or enable spatial audio. These adaptations are done with nothing X apps (available on iOS and Android). If you use the headphone 1 with the phone 3, you can use that button for “channel hop” between different audio apps – a feature that will eventually be rolled out for anything else. I was not able to test it, because I do not have the phone 3.

Headphone 1 has the facility of head tracking, so that you can anchor your position while listening to the audio and rotate the paning according to how you bend your head. This is a tendency between flagship headphones – such as Apple’s spatial audio, Bose’s immersive mode, and Sony’s spatial audio mixing – but this is nothing that I want to use anytime. It does not look very reliable, and most of the time, it makes the audio sound worse. Like the worst versions of Apple Music’s spatial audio track, it simulates the “stadium” mode from the old stereo receiver.

The noise canceled works well, outside the call. It is a little easier to distribute good active noise cancellation (ANC) with over-the-air headphones as compared to earbuds due to its size and ability to cover your entire ear, but I have found that headphone subway can easily block subway sounds, loud humes and humbles of the city. I will feel comfortable to bring them as my travel headphone on a trip.

I will not over-infly with sound quality, but nothing is Bad Compared to other flagship headphones. I do not think the headphones look good as 1 airpods Max, but I prefer the frequency reaction of nothing for Bose’s Shantcomfort Ultra and Sony’s Wh-1000xm6. This is nothing equivalent to the earbuds line and even its budget CMF-branded earpiece, which surprisingly compete well with other major earbuds.

My biggest problem with these headphones is how they handle voice calls. Nothing claims that the Headphone 1 has four built-in microphones with AI-operated clear voice technology to separate its speech and suppress the background noise, “but I went to a busy train station in New York City to call with some colleagues, and they did not understand what I was saying. In a quiet office, I had no trouble in communicating on calls, and it also felt fine against other headphones. But in a large hall with the sound of the crowd, it started to cancel my voice with everything. The headphone also does not seem multipoint; Ruckus There is nothing to confirm, but not yet to listen back.

Headphone 1 comes in a slim, softshell zipper case made of a material to lift my white cat fur. The zipper is a bit a bit and is easily caught when it is closed, but it seals very well when it is completely zipped.

Headphone 1 also comes with nothing-designed USB-C cable, which can be used for both charging and hearing, and analog headphone cable to hear on the headphone jack. Analog Jack does not work when the headphone stops or occurs when charging, so if the battery dies, they are unusable until you get the USB port. This is unfortunate, especially if / when these batteries die of old age. but you Be able to do Listen to Bluetooth or USB-C when recharging at least.

The 35 -hour battery with ANC does not promise life and uses 37 hours of talk time with AAC codec (perhaps most common scenario) and just ANC. With the ANC off, nothing claims that the headphones offer up to 54 hours with playback and LDAC codec using AAC codec. After a week’s accidental use and in my working day, I never had to charge them, and I had gone for two days without plugging them.

$ 299 Nothing Headphone 1 provides many features that compete well with Bose, Apple and Sony, and a lower price may get some people to choose it. If you are planning to use a headphone for voice calls, I am not sure this is the right pick. But if not, and if the design fits your personality, saving $ 200 for this audio quality and noise cancellation makes a package to consider it.

Photography by Owen Grove / The Verge