‘Cringe’: Wild price tag of new Sony buds

The new Sony LinkBuds have a price that stings but they have a few unique features that set them apart says Elly Awesome.

REVIEW

Holy moley! Sony have just released a new pair of earbuds which are some of the most unique looking buds on the market right now.

Why? They kind of look like a mint melded to a grommet, however, different doesn’t necessarily mean lousy as Sony has their reasons for this new look.

Design

The LinkBuds come in two colours, white or grey. And interestingly they’re not just one uniform colour, they have a slightly speckled design which is likely due to Sony using recycled plastics from car parts to create the buds.

There’s also no plastic packaging and the buds come in a fairly simple cardboard box, which goes along with Sony’s commitment to reducing the environmental impact of the products. Inside the box you’ll find a matching small and lightweight charging case and a USB-C to USB-A charging cable (no AC wall plug).

The earbuds come in white or grey and with no plastic packaging in their box. Picture: Elly Awesome

The look of the LinkBuds are hard to describe but the idea of their ‘open ring driver’ design is to allow you to the best transparency mode possible – ie, while in use you can hear what’s going on around you clearly at all times.

Additionally, they’re also super lightweight and ultra-small to offer you all-day comfort. They’re great when you’re working at your desk and listening to music and you need to know when someone approaches you or hear the doorbell. Best of all you won’t feel the need to remove or fiddle with the LinkBuds.

However, on the flip side, when moving around busy areas or on public transport the audio is harder to hear because they’re letting in quite a lot of surrounding noises.

Even though the shape of the LinkBuds are totally different to most earbuds on the market they seemed to nestle in the curvature of my ears quite naturally and I hardly felt them in my ears over time. Interestingly, when I compared how they sat in my partner’s ears though they were slightly different but Sony has provided five different sizes of ‘fitting supporters’ attachments so no matter the shape of your ear you should be able to get a secure fit. However, if you can try these before you buy that would be the ultimate scenario.

The LinkBuds are super lightweight and small to offer you all-day comfort. Picture: Elly Awesome

Features

One of the craziest features of the LinkBuds would have to be the way you use the tap gestures to control the buds. Instead of tapping the buds themselves to pause or play a song you actually tap your face!

I’ve never really experienced a feature like this and it was honestly mind blowing how well this feature worked for me. For example, all you do is tap twice just in front of your ear or on your cheek to pause or play and the earbuds respond instantly. I think this really adds to the comfort of the buds throughout the day. It’s clever, because you don’t need to touch them, your ears aren’t reminded of the sensation of the buds resting against them.

All you need to do is tap twice just in front of your ear or on your cheek to pause or play and the earbuds respond instantly. Picture: Elly Awesome

Audio quality

For earbuds that don’t actually go into your ear canal the audio quality is surprisingly good, along with the comfort. It’s not going to compare to anything with built in noise cancellation or Sony’s excellent WF-1000MX4s but the sound is clear, well balanced with a little bit of bass and certainly not at all tinny.

This is a luxury critique but I would love it if the bulbous part of the buds didn’t protrude from my ears as much and were more slimline like the ring portion of the earbuds. However, I assume that’s a necessary part of the design to house all the important tech. It would simply be awesome looks-wise and not necessary for my enjoyment of the buds. I wonder if Sony could do it in the next model? Not many other buds could compete with that kind of slimness.

According to Elly, the audio quality is surprisingly good. Picture: Elly Awesome

Battery Life

The buds gave me around five hours of listening time, which is close to Sony’s quoted five and a half hours of battery life. However, if you place these back into the case you’ll be able to charge them a few more times to use for up to seventeen hours in total. Though I especially loved the feature where I could put them back in the case to charge for about ten minutes to get around an hour of playback on the buds – so handy!

You can place the earbuds back in the case to charge for about ten minutes for an hour of playback. Picture: Elly Awesome

Price tag

I’m impressed with the design, the sound quality and how small these are yet I still can’t help but cringe at the price tag. These retail for a whopping $319, which is a similar price point to earbuds that have active noise cancellation on top of transparent modes, which offers a close experience to wearing LinkBuds (where you can continue to hear what’s going on around you).

However, similarly priced buds simply cannot match the comfort of the LinkBuds, especially due to the fact that they don’t even have ear tips sticking into your ear canals.

On the flip side, it’s hard to say for certain whether these will be comfortable for all users. All in all, if you want earbuds that aren’t painful to wear for an extended period of time, along with the ability to clearly hear what’s going on around you while enjoying your content (more so indoors), then these are a winner.

Elly Awesome is an Aussie tech and lifestyle vlogger. | @ellyawwesome | YouTube