The Perfect Answer is Three!
Over the years, I have owned countless pairs of headphones. Going back to the days of the tape/cassette player, the portable cd player, portable minidisc player, and then the mp3 player.
Then came the iPod and several iterations since then and then finally the iPhone, and all is good. I can still hear my parents telling me, “nobody wants to listen to your music; wear your headphones.” It was simple back then, you used what worked, and hopefully, you had a pair of wired headphones in which both ears would emit sound. Now and then, there would be a short in one of the ears, or you would accidentally cut one of the ends.
Today we have many options, and wireless seems the best way to go. In these instances, I have currently settled on the following three options:
Apple AirPods Pro is my go-to headphones of choice in many situations. I can use these amongst my Apple line of products, whether it be my MacBook Pro, iPad Pro, or iPhone. They can be easily switched between these devices, and the sound quality is excellent. I rely primarily on these for their superb quality, portability, and noise cancellation feature. Case in point, I travel by plane consistently, and the noise cancellation is a feature I don’t ever want to be without, especially on a plane with distracting background sound. The AirPods are more than sufficient to drown out the outside world, with my focus directed to the music I am listening to.
Next up, I have written about these particular bone induction headphones by Shokz.
Open Ear (Bone-Conduction) Headphones- "My Experience" There is a need to hear the outside world- sometimes!
It is important to note that you can’t always shut out the world around you. In those cases where you need to be aware of your surroundings, this pair of headphones serve the purpose.
The OPENRUN PRO’S hover above your ear, allowing you to hear your music still, answer your phone, and go about your daily routine. These are great for exercising, particularly running and biking, as you can still hear outside noise. In all transparency, my one complaint with these is the ease of losing the proprietary charging cable. I have since bought two additional charging cables so as not to be unable to charge should I misplace the line again.
Last but certainly not least is my premium set of headphones made by Sony.
These are beyond compare to both the AirPods and the OPENRUN PRO. The noise cancellation is out of this world, the sound quality is spectacular, and the battery power is close to 30 hours. It is important to note that these can be used both wirelessly or wired, depending on your preferred usage or whether you have taken the time to charge these properly. Since I purchased the Wh-1000XM3 headphones, Sony has released two subsequent models: the XM4 and XM5 models (Best for another article). All this means is you will be able to pick the XM3s up for a great price!
Jeffrey Clos is a participant in the Amazon Associates LLC associates program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com. There are some links within this article to the described product.