EarFun Air Pro 3 Review: ANC Earbuds Ready For Tomorrow

Worth When Reviewed

$79.99

Greatest Costs As we speak: EarFun Air Professional 3

$79.99

Pardon me whereas I stand and salute EarFun’s new flagship noise-cancelling earbuds, the Air Professional 3. These feature-filled mighty mites ship dynamic, detailed, and full-bodied sound. Whereas they’re only a bit shy in bass articulation, they ship a lot of what you’ll get from buds with a lot larger value tags.

Consolation degree is sweet — I can put on them for hours — and the energetic noise cancellation (ANC) is improved in comparison with the corporate’s earlier efforts, wiping away a goodly quantity of aircraft, prepare, and bus noise in addition to walk-about wind noise.

What actually units the Air Professional 3 aside from its mid-priced competitors is a futuristic characteristic set that might develop in usefulness and repair for years to return. Tapping the brand-new Qualcomm QCC3071 audio chip, EarFun outmanoeuvred the majors to ship the very first earbuds to help the next-generation Bluetooth LE Audio structure, working hand-in-hand right here with the equally new LC3 (Low Complexity Communications) codec. Collectively, these upgrades may present a rash of user-friendly enhancements — if {hardware} makers on the playback facet of the equation additionally undertake these requirements and play to their strengths. Because it stands, nonetheless, that’s a really massive “if.”

EarFun additionally presents the Air S – equally styled nozzle-tipped buds which can be additionally rather more inexpensive options to the “true wi-fi” choices from Apple, Bose, Jabra, and the like. Whereas I loved the battery options, value, and total sound profile of the Air S, I had gripes: These buds are slippery in my ears and wish periodic readjustments to remain seated in primo place. Additionally they have mediocre noise cancellation and flakey contact controls.

The Air Professional 3 addresses and largely fixes these points, making me really feel just a bit prescient.

Jonathan Takiff/Foundry

The curvature of the brand new buds’ enclosure has been shaved and reoriented, so this stuff sit nonetheless and preserve a tighter seal in my ear canal — which is essential for each passive and energetic noise cancelling — they usually ship fuller bass efficiency.

The newly planted dimples on the prime of the earbuds’ pipes aren’t only a cute ornamental design ingredient, they assist the wearer land a finger on the precise location for some thermal contact management operations. EarFun’s person information, nonetheless, nonetheless doesn’t adequately clarify how you can get the quantity up (utilizing the right-hand bud dimple management) and the quantity down (on the left-hand bud) to cooperate. The instruction to “faucet as soon as” ought to actually counsel “shortly flick your fingertip up (or down)” within the thermal contact zone. Let your finger linger and the bud’s sensor will interpret the gesture as a double-tap, pausing the music. It’s very unusual. And its very annoying.

On the upside, I’m glad to report that the Air Professional 3’s noise cancelling has been upgraded with a six-microphone-array (the sooner mannequin used 4 mics) and I discovered that it really works moderately properly at suppressing a wide range of whining/roaring motor in addition to wind noises. It’s nonetheless not a lot assist at shushing the sound of different individuals chatting in your presence (dwell or on TV), or for suppressing extraneous environmental noise when answering cellphone name. Callers have mentioned I sound muffled and requested “Are you exterior?” even after I wasn’t.

These points aren’t discovered on as we speak’s most subtle ANC earbuds — the Bose QuietComfort Earbuds II, the Apple AirPods Professional (2^nd era), and the Sony WF-1000XM4 — however you’ll pay three or 4 occasions extra for a set of any of these.

How do the EarFun Air Professional 3 sound?

Jonathan Takiff/Foundry

The EarFun Air Professional 3 cosy up kindly in your head, with a really clear and current midrange and well-articulated high-end response. There’s a tad extra bottom-end kick right here than within the Air S, though the wooly heat bass continues to be not as nuanced as you get in top-tier buds.

I’m additionally glad to report that the factory-set equalising of the three noise-cancelling modes has been adjusted, so the sound contouring of essentially the most energy-efficient “Regular” setting is now extra balanced and fewer trebly.  

A less-than-ideal most quantity degree stays an ongoing EarFun situation with the Air Professional 3. They play loud sufficient for me indoors, however on a loud city-street stroll, I actually craved extra kick from a brand new assortment of rock live performance performances I discovered on Amazon Music: Glory Days, Glory Reveals!, compiling tunes from Springsteen (after all), Bowie, The Doorways, Genesis, Speaking Heads, Chuck Berry, and Roger Waters. As I found with the Air S, it’s attainable to compensate, to circuitously crank up the quantity of the Air Professional 3 no less than a pair decibels by opening the EarFun app’s EQ display screen and pushing up the digital sliders on all six frequency bands to the max place. Do this and also you’ll discover there’s greater than sufficient quantity to play with, albeit with some sign compression.

This sonic squeezing is hardly noticeable or troublesome when listening open air; however in quiet zones, with much less distraction, my crude trick blunted the intimate charms of Melody Gardot’s cooing chanteuse vocals and arty-acoustic ensemble on the aptly named The Absence, till I remembered to hit the EQ-reset button. That returned all of the frequency sliders to the “flat” place, restoring the candy sonorities to Ms. Gardot’s sonic panorama.

Jonathan Takiff/Foundry

What else is new with the EarFun Air Professional 3?

EarFun’s top-of-the-line earbuds help Bluetooth 5.3 — they should, to work with Bluetooth LE. Their deeper bass response is due to their 11mm wool composite drivers. They ship run time of about 7 hours with ANC on, 9 hours with it turned off. And their charging case can ship 4 full recharges. The case itself may be recharged with its USB-C cable or on a Qi pad (present your personal). You’ll be able to observe each the buds’ and the case’s battery degree within the app.

Activating Sport Mode reduces the audio lag time to 55ms (from 100ms within the Air S) to enhance gamer twitches and video lip-synching; however within the “no free lunch” division, Sport Mode reduces battery run time.

I used to be stunned to find the absence of 1 widespread characteristic of contemporary earbuds, which can robotically pause the music once you pull them out of your ears. The AirFun Professional 3 preserve enjoying and can shut down provided that you disconnect them the paired system or return them to their case. They will pause the music and briefly change to a cellphone name, even in the event you’ve been streaming music from a special Bluetooth supply. That’s how the multipoint connection works: You’ll be able to pair the buds with two gadgets on the identical time, one energetic and the opposite in standby.

Jonathan Takiff/Foundry

A phrase in regards to the subsequent era of Bluetooth

In growth since 2015, Bluetooth LE’s developments are a number of and vital. Begin with decrease energy consumption for longer battery run time. And the Bluetooth SIG says the brand new LC3 codec can compress a 1.5Mbps audio stream to only 160Kbps, in comparison with 345Kbps utilizing the SBC codec that arrived with the unique Bluetooth spec.

Another promised Bluetooth LE options have but to be delivered, however the largest downside is the basic “Which comes first, the hen or the egg?” dilemma happening right here. There is perhaps just a few not-ready-for-prime-time points, too. Even with Bluetooth 5.2 and 5.3 compatibility baked into a number of new smartphone fashions, and notations of “LE Audio” popping up in just a few spec sheets (e.g. the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 4), smartphone makers have but to completely embrace the brand new commonplace.

Are the EarFun Air Professional 3 good worth for cash?

The EarFun Air Professional 3 retail for $79.99/£79.99. You should purchase them immediately from EarFun US and EarFun UK, or from Amazon US and Amazon UK. Amazon usually has reductions on this product, bringing the value all the way down to as little as $59.99/£59.99 (US readers can use the code AP315OFF within the coupon subject on Amazon).

Even when your playback system can’t take full benefit of the EarFun Air Professional 3’s superior Bluetooth options, these wi-fi earbuds ship an entire lotta efficiency utilizing applied sciences together with the AAC and aptX Adaptive codecs – that are extra extensively supported as we speak. And so they do it at a really affordable value. Add within the lengthy battery life and superb audio efficiency, and you’ve got a powerful worth in private audio.

Try our charts of the very best earbuds, and the very best finances earphones to see how rivals examine.