Bose SoundSport Wireless Headphones - Black

A little background on myself, I own a Samsung and I use these daily. Working nights I listen to podcasts while the stores shut and also on the commute to and from. I take a battery pack to work so keep it in mind that I do charge them one time during the night. Before picking these up, I used to use cheap wired earphones. The ones that claimed to be official Apple/Samsung but I knew deep down that was bollocks as it was around £5. But it did the job. I found myself looking for wireless buds after the wire on my old ones kept on getting caught up even if I tucked the wires under my clothes. My friends had the wired version of these buds and recommended them to me as they knew I'm a slight audiophile despite my cheapskate ways. I was hesitant at first as I found gummy earbuds didn't fit my ears properly and kept on falling out. However after having tried out my friends pair, I was impressed with both the audio and the fact that they didn't fall out.That was 2 years ago. I've brought these twice now. The fact I repurchased these should indicate I think they're pretty good. but I'll go on. They last roughly a year if you're not throwing them away as soon as something falls off. I'd say the rubber around the earbud (And also the control panel) starts to become loose around the 9 month mark. For some, this would cause them to buy a replacement and that's totally understandable. For me, I'm replacing them as the power button rubber seal has become loose to the fact it takes a couple presses before I actually hit the button. This isn't a issue as a year is quite a long time. Especially coming from he cheap headphones I used to buy which only lasted 2 months-ish.It's come around to the time where I should replace the earbuds and I've decided not to repurchase these for a third time. Instead, I've decided to go for the bigger brother, the truly wireless SoundSports as the audio quality must be similar + I want to give something a new a try. But back to these, if you're looking for headphones which can do the job with great audio quality, you would be doing yourself a favour by buying these.(I was trying to make this review flow into each section freely but I couldn't figure out where to slot this into the first paragraph. I forgot to add what I listen to usually as that'll get you to know what genres I was satisfied with when listening with these earbuds. I mainly listen to Hip-Hop in which these earbuds do the job in providing a clear vocal performance but also the bass bangs. I also listen to R&B and Soul to which you can hear all the little details in the background.)

The bad : Firstly let me point out that 4 stars have been given not to the quality of the audio from these headphones but the average battery life ( rated at 6 hours but i am managing to get 4 to 5 at my volume levels ). Enough for gym and sport but when i`m gardening all day these will not last . Its not a bad battery life but not deserving a full 5 star ratingThe good :I purchased these as i used to own their wired soundsport headphones and i still rate them as the best in class for audio. However the cable was of poor quality and would require frequent soldering . Expensive if you cant solderWhen i saw these i had to buy hoping the audio would come close ( despite bluetooth loss) . In my opinion they match and even surpass the quality of their previous wiredversion I listen to mainly classical and opera . I also listen to spoken radio.The character of the audio on the Soundsport is detailed and punchy - Bose doesn't allow you to EQ the headphones or offer any audio mode presets, but they do say that the Soundsport will use "Active EQ" to optimally adjust the audio for whatever's playing. I found this to be the caseThe Soundsport offer a surprising amount of bass , very clear mid-range, and reasonably good highs. Detail is well-preserved and I found that while not always very faithful to the character of some recordings, the Soundsport always sound pleasantThey also get very loud, if you're concerned with that .The app itself is clean and well-designed, and performs exceptionally well on my note 8 phone. simple and intuitive when i connected to the headphones the app updated the firmware of the headphones and i was good to go.They are not the best looking and possible a tad bulky in appearance ( needs the driver size i assume to deliver such decent audio) but fit so snugly with the default medium buds i did not need to experiment with the extra small and large ones provided too.Once in ear they stay locked in place and i tested out this running,cycling and xtrainer. Also some yoga ( even inverted poses) and strength training.These are not noise isolating and so some background noise can be heard but safety first i presume,especially if out on road.I toyed with giving these a 4 star review due to battery life but they more than compensate for this with build quality,comfort and of course that BOSE sound quality. So 5 stars and my whole hearted unbiased recommendation for anyone looking for sport/outdoor headphones .