The Jaybird are better built and have a more neutral sound profile. They also have longer-lasting battery life, and their companion app offers a parametric EQ and presets to help tweak their sound. The good news is they sound better than both the original BeatsX and standard AirPods. They also work well for making calls and have better battery life than the original. Their design is passe in a world now dominated by true wireless earbuds.
The included USB-C charging cable is minimalistically short, but gives you enough leeway overall. Fortunately you won’t need to use it constantly, as you’re getting 12 hours of battery life off of each full charge. As an aside, I also noticed that the buds connected much faster to my Pixel 5 with the app installed, which helps cut down on the previously mentioned power on/connection tone delay. There’s no app for iOS because the features offered here are native on iOS thanks to the M1 chip in the Flex. The buds are light, there’s plenty of length to the connected cord so it doesn’t constantly pull on the buds, and even the controls on either side are lightweight enough that I don’t even notice them. Overall, these are probably some of the most comfortable neckbuds I’ve worn in … well, as long as I can remember, really.
The standard stable connection for most true wireless earbuds is about 30 to 35 feet away from an audio source, and these buds surpass that mark by about 10 feet. It felt joyous and liberating to stream music around the house while my phone was charging in the bedroom. I didn’t experience any dropout during calls, nor was there any stuttering when streaming Spotify. Beats’ most affordable wireless earbuds give you basic on-board controls with AirPod-level quick pairing. The Flex has longer battery life than the BeatsX as well, but the overall sound quality is not great.
They have a couple of nifty features like automatically pausing the music when you take them out or answering a call when you detach them. Sitting nicely on my collar bone, the in-line controls were well-positioned to use. From the round button on the left-hand side, you can pause or play the music and skip through tracks. On the right, you’ll find the power button where you can activate Bluetooth as well. In the early days, Beats headphones were notorious for massive, booming — but almost painfully overbearing — bass tuning. The company has opted for a more even-handed approach as of late, and the Flex continues that trend.
This isn’t classic Beats sound of old, swimming in mid-bass with a very overt generalized bass boost. Still, they have a boost in the low bass and sub-bass frequencies, which is particularly good at giving electronic and pop music more energy. It is much harder to test the signal of Bluetooth headphones beats solo pro wireless than it was in 2019. Packed train stations are the perfect place to see if a pair’s signal will break up thanks to interference. And train stations just aren’t as busy as they once were. The Beats Flex have a flexible but formed neckband that grips the back of your neck ever so slightly.
Deviate from the script, however, and holes begin to appear. It makes sense Apple-engineered buds should work best with its own devices, but a bit more democracy wouldn’t go amiss in 2020. A dose of digital processing is there to fine-tune the frequencies and provide enough audio separation. Beats isn’t rewriting the rulebook here, but on a pair of fifty pound earphones things are rarely this well balanced. Beats Flex aren’t just an iPhone 12 proposition, though, and the Beats team deserves credit for making sure Android users are as welcome as they can be. While there are undoubtedly ways to get better audio quality out there, they generally cost considerably more than the $50 that Beats Flex ask for.
The controls on the neckband end-caps are not the most intuitive, but they’re easy enough to get used to. There’s a volume rocker on one side, a play/pause/multi-function on the inside of the same side, and a power/pair button on the other side. The design is comfortable enough and easy to wear, but I found the neckband to be less convenient and get in the way.
I don’t expect them to do everything for $50, but if you’re hunting for similarly stylish Beats headphones that will hold up better during workout conditions, you might want to check out the Beats Powerbeats. As soon as I got the bt earbuds the package was a red flag….I thought man they must be using a super slim wall adapter to charge via the “usb-c” cable. Be advised that if your newer computer doesn’t have a direct port for usb-c …
Beats puts a single driver in each earbud, with a dual-chamber acoustic design and vents to help balance pressure inside the ear. Given the price, I didn’t have expectations of the finest audio, but I proved to be pleasantly surprised. Designed to snake around the back of your neck, the cable is finished in a soft-touch rubber that won’t let them tangle up, while two in-line blocks house the battery and other electronics. At 18.6 grams they’re hardly heavy; Beats includes four eartips in the box, and I found that with the right size it was no problem having them stay in place, despite the cable weighing on them in my ears. In the process they’ve become the cheapest wireless headphones that Apple sells, the company having quietly stripped third-party options from its shelves.