The Best Noise Cancelling Headphones... Bose or Sony?
The Best Noise Cancelling Headphones... Bose or Sony?
2018-12-23
it's time for a little bit of a showdown
what's happening in noise canceling
wireless noise canceling that's that's
what people are upgrading to this what
humans want to know about block out the
ambience you could sewn-in you could do
your stuff these two guys right here
then the conversation was centered
around these two models and so I thought
man these are the ones that have to go
head to head right now the WH 1000x m3
and we also have the quiet comfort 35 to
when it comes to noise cancelling most
people's first experience with it is
likely through a Bose QuietComfort
product but sony has a legit challenger
here in the form of the m3 I have to get
to the bottom of this rated at 30 hours
of battery life with noise cancelling
turned on compared to 20 on the Bose
product that said the Bose product is a
bit lighter
they quit charge now which is one of the
reasons to upgrade if you have an old
set so in the case of the Sony here you
can turn a 10 minute charge into five
hours of listening time that was one of
the major drawbacks to wireless
headphones in the past less so now with
these really short charge times and they
also support voice assistance Google
assistant is built-in to both of them
will can I get a price update this
should be close the QC 35 s right now
through the link down below they're
probably 300 bucks while you're watching
this the m3 is on the other hand are a
little bit more expensive
around 350 some paperwork and then
everything else is in this carrying case
user manual up top get the app turn on
your headphones and everything else is
in this carrying case holy smokes the
travel size is actually quite similar a
mesh and threaded kind of design this
one is like a faux leather and then a
medial Prine pocket so like they're
really and then a loop here and a loop
here they go on head to head
ladies and gentlemen padded Alcantara
headband little pouch on this side there
is a cable included as well both of
these headphones can work in a wired
fashion 2.5 millimeters on the part that
connects to the headphone three point
five millimeters on a part that connects
to the audio source so type C is
available on the Sony's but it's micro
USB with quick charge on the Bose
interesting the thing you're going to
notice about the Bose there are tactile
buttons physical buttons volume up and
down a dedicated assistant button
they're using a new more robust material
apparently so they should hold up to
wear and hair slightly better I like how
this is not a button but a switch and
when you turn this on it will
immediately go into bluetooth pairing
mode okay there's the Sony's the cable
in this case a little more robust both
three-point-five replacing this cable
gonna be a bit easier than this one big
fan of type C I'm gonna give that
advantage to the Sony side the airline
adapter this is a little bit uncommon
these days they're usually on the plane
if you need one unboxing experience and
accessories may have to give it to the
Sony's you know what that doesn't
actually feel as heavy as I expected
getting the difference in numbers on
paper it still feels very lightweight
you don't have a ton of buttons or
switches here you can see you have the
NFC logo there there's a dedicated power
button but it's very similar to the
ambient or noise cancelling switch
though I do like having a dedicated
switch this will quickly give you access
to ambient noise if you mean to hear it
type-c connector over here and also an
LED light that's a nice little touch
this is actually touch controlled volume
controls play pause you can answer a
phone call and you can also skip tracks
forward and back you can also hold your
palm over top of the ear cup which will
then mute the sound of your music and
allow you to hear an individual who's
talking to you so you can quickly you
know you walk up to the Starbucks you
order a drink you quickly hold your hand
over it it's nice it's better than
having to take the ear cup off that is
comfortable it is light without having
them turned on and having the noise
canceling function enabled they're still
cutting out a lot of the ambient noise
one thing I look for with headphones is
like how much are they squeezing me in
order to achieve that this is not too
much of a squeeze I feel like I could
wear these for hours and hours huh
passively these are not blocking as much
they're comfortable the head bed is
slightly less wide a slight bit more
pressure from it just Comfort not even
listening to them I'm probably gonna
give it to the Bose right now these ones
come off and fold like this so when you
pick them up out of the case you go like
this the Sony's fold the other way like
this kind of gotta fold them and then
turn them
see what I'm saying maybe there's a
reason for that but it's worth noting
turn these guys on will do the Bo's
first easy setup I turn these on and ask
me to pair right away drag to connect ah
this is in reference to the voice
assistant which it looks like is
accessed via this button on the side
here oh wow
noise canceling full effect now okay so
when you hit the button it tells you the
time tells you if you have any
notification it says you don't have any
new notifications now if you did it
would read them to you you don't have to
go reach for your phone what's the
population of Toronto fast they said 2.7
million you hold it and the cool thing
that it does when you're talking to
assistant is it lets you hear your own
voice so the microphones on the outside
are picking up your voice so there's a
few different settings here for noise
cancellation it's in the high mode right
now I can't hear anything right now
while I'm talking to you okay so let's
go ahead and play some music now hmm
Jack you know this track it's a classic
look at that make some noise Curt let me
see if I can hear you
man that's a track though
noise cancelling is just crushing right
now it's destroying the world right now
it's incredible Kirk was talking over
there turn attract forget it I didn't
hear anything it's just lips moving
sound I'm not gonna talk about it yet
give me a second here okay now let's get
the Sony app and let's do a quick
compare
oh wow Google assistant figured it out
right away tap to connect well done so
the integration here with assistant is
bananas I didn't even need to get the
app I mean I will also a hundred percent
battery out of the box
jaci out of you a couple points give him
a couple points for that alright woah
Wow okay so here's their app adaptive
sound control noise cancelling oh my god
that is crazy okay so it gives you
control over ambience based on your
circumstance and they give you these
images in order to distinguish like what
the activity might be appearance-wise
guys these these don't look as good
right jack is actually giving the looks
to these I thought because they were a
bit bigger you might not like the look
as much but you don't really notice that
these two we got two votes here for
these Wilkin and you saw the bows which
appearance do you like better okay wow
that's three votes for these on
appearance the configurability is
extreme I can go in here and toggle the
amount of ambient sound I come here I
couldn't do that over here if you're the
type that likes to use these on public
transit you know they announce the
different stops and whatnot if you have
the ambient sound control on it's
blocking out some stuff but letting some
stuff in oh my god the noise cancelling
comes on full blast
say something Kirk Oh interesting I can
hear you the adaptive sound control it
knows that I'm staying Wow so it knows
I'm not moving right now it's got it
mostly noise cancelling that's pretty
smart look at this it has optimized
based on little details including
atmospheric pressure the sound position
control what well I can change the sound
stage there's a surround virtualizer
there's an equalizer this is a much more
comprehensive app from a personalization
configuration standpoint oh baby if I
just cover this ear cup it's full feed
microphones through to my head
oh my god and it's instant as well whoo
we may have some contenders yeah I mean
you listen to music yet
this quiets the music but I can have a
conversation and we still Phil Collins
beneath it barely there and then and
then it's like this he's back he's back
hold on we're not we're not talking yet
hold on hold on hold on all right
look I mean maybe you could tell from my
reaction maybe not I feel like he's a
step up on a sound quality holy moley
that's a crush factory right there at
the base like if you want it blow your
head right clean off quick point from
Jack he says these are more sealed less
sound bleed substantially I mean having
the equalizer built-in lets you really
tune the sound performance of these as
well and just all the other various
configurability attributes in the app
for the Sony's is pretty wild pair that
with the fact that the way you interact
with it with a double tap or the palm
over top of the ear cup to have a quick
conversation the ambient mode it's a
wild package a one thing I like about
the Bose is the slightly smaller ear cup
this is a really tough choice these do
not sound bad we're talking about a
marginal kind of thing going on here and
you may or may not hear that as much as
I do it's obvious to me that these are
the better sounding headphones of the
two I think the noise cancelling here
performs a little bit better at maximum
capacity you can't really go wrong with
either of these but if I'm out there and
I got 300 or 350 bucks this is where I'm
going now you can let me know down in
the comments which one would you take of
these two if it was your choice either
one of these will do but you want my
pick go this way
We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.