Bose QuietComfort 20 Acoustic Noise Cancelling Headphones for Apple Devices (Black)

Product Information

The big news for the QuietComfort Ultra Earbuds is they feature Bose Immersive Audio, which is basically the company’s spatial audio tech. A better, more sound isolating interface between the earphone and the human ear canal would help a lot.

Note that you do not need to have the QC20 system attached to a device to get the noise reducing function. Further along the cable, we have the noise cancellation control and battery compartment. It has green status LEDs to let you know what modes you're in—when the noise cancellation is activated, for instance, a green indicator appears; if you press the Aware Mode button, the green noise cancellation indicator disappears; and if you're listening in passive mode, there are no indicators at all.Essentially, you have a faster moving target, and if you fire even slightly late, you have the possibility of the two wave peaks coinciding and thereby doubling the sound pressure level (SPL) of the ambient noise. I’m willing to bet that the Bose QC20 earphones used in active cancellation mode under big over-the-ear sound isolation headphones, like those used at a gun range, would get us very close to that level of performance. High frequencies are much faster, with much less time to process and align the various peaks and valleys of these short-period, fast waves. What Hi-Fi?, founded in 1976, is the world's leading independent guide to buying and owning hi-fi and home entertainment products. Our comprehensive tests help you buy the very best for your money, with our advice sections giving you step-by-step information on how to get even more from your music and movies. Everything is tested by our dedicated team of in-house reviewers in our custom-built test rooms in London, Reading and Bath. Our coveted five-star rating and Awards are recognised all over the world as the ultimate seal of approval, so you can buy with absolute confidence.

So currently, at best, this device can only cancel persistent and consistent noise. There might still be hope for the future, however.Unlike many rivals, the Bose tips are super soft and, although they don’t burrow into your ears, they still manage to maintain a great seal. You just slide and twist them into place and they sit there – during testing, the general consensus was they’re more comfortable than the Sony WF-1000XM5. It’s timed 180 degrees out of phase, such that the highest peaks of the ambient sound waves coincide with the lowest valleys of the processor-produced “cancelling” sound waves.

But you may be better off simply using a motorcycle Bluetooth intercom system and connecting your cell phone or music player with the Bluetooth intercom headset. I think people call this white noise, or “droning” noise. Perhaps this is why the Bose QC20 earphones seem to be effective at cancelling only these sorts of ambient noise. And they do it much, much better by a big margin than any other noise reducing earbud systems we have tried. This may be a deliberate design feature by Bose, but there’s nothing I see in their information that indicates this is so.

International delivery

In my opinion, this points out what I take to be a design flaw in the Bose QuietComfort 20 earphones. But I’m certainly not blown away by the sound quality of the Bose system. It’s OK — better than most earbuds — but not superlative, in my opinion.

The sound reduction seems to be about the same as wearing a pair of good quality, correctly inserted, disposable foam ear plugs.

Unfortunately, it seems that in the media business, the end product and its value to the reader seems to matter less than anything else. But what you have done here is valuable. But I digress.