You don’t have to be an avid audiophile to realise that your standard iPhone earbuds aren’t going to do your music justice (and if you’re one of those commuters who’s content with your smartphone speaker – we don’t wanna know about it).
So what happens after you toss that tangled white mess away? Where do you look for your headphone purchase?
There’s two common answers for Aussie consumers. Head into your local JB Hi-Fi and pick up the next cheapest set of headphones you can find, or fall into the trap of buying brand; the heavily marketed and heftily priced cans from Beats By Dre for example.
No-one really believes splurging hundreds of dollars on the bigger and flashier headphones means better sound, right? But who has time to dive into the complicated world of tech reviews, let alone the overwhelming range offered both online and off?
Well, fittingly, the folks at TIME.com do. After an exhaustive analysis of nearly 3,000 headphones – ranging “from budget earbuds to full-featured DJ pairs”, the publication has come up with what it believes to be the definitive list of the 18 headphone brands, ranked from best to worst, as Consequence Of Sound reports.
‘So what does TIME know about audio quality?’ we hear you scoff, but they’ve actually let the professionals do the hard work, assigning each headphone pair a score of 1 to 100 based on two key factors:
1) 75% – expert reviews (CNET, Wired, TechCrunch, What HiFi, Good Gear Guide, PC Mag)
2) 25% – specs and features (frequency, sensitivity, noise canceling, etc.)Love Music?
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The final breakdown of the 18 brands – which ranges from recognisable IT titans like Sony and Pioneer to familiar studio brands like AKG and Audio-Technica – contains some interesting results, and proves you don’t have to spent a small fortune to get some cans that makes your tunes sound the way they were intended.
Unsurprisingly, the popular brands like Beats and Skullcandy are some of the worst value for money on the list, while even the likes of Sennheiser and Bose that some audiophiles swear by, aren’t the top performers. (Of course, how good your music sounds is dependent on the quality of your audio source – but that’s a debate for another day…)
They might be pricier, but the most reliable buys on the list are Shure, Klipsch, and Gado thanks to their “outstanding performance and consistently glowing reviews from experts” but if you’re on a budget, it turns out that Sony and JVC will offer a fine listening experience at a fair price.
Check out the full list of the 18 brands and their score (out of 100) below, and keep it handy for the next time that shoddy pair of earbuds gives out on you.
- Shure (90)
- Grado (89)
- Klipsch (84)
- Pioneer (83)
- Sony (80)
- AKG (79)
- Sennheiser (78)
- JVC (75)
- Audio-Technica (74)
- Panasonic (74)
- Apple (74)
- Bose (73)
- Philips (72)
- Creative (68)
- Koss (68)
- Skullcandy (62)
- Beats by Dre (58)
- Plantronics (57)
