Sony LinkBuds Wireless Earbud: The majority of wireless earbuds try to keep outside noise out of your music, podcasts, or phone calls. Some models, particularly those with active noise cancellation (ANC), are particularly good at it. Others, particularly ones without a silicone tip to seal your ear canal, don’t block nearly as much sound. However, we’ve never seen a set of earbuds made specifically to allow the outside world in, which is what sets Sony’s $180 LinkBuds apart. Their donut-shaped speakers enable both desired and undesired sounds to pass through uninhibitedly into your ears while still delivering clear, well-balanced audio.
The LinkBuds, according to Sony, is the answer to an increasingly common problem: how do we seamlessly merge our physical and digital worlds, given that many of us now jump between them in seconds? I strongly believe the LinkBuds succeed at this — at times remarkably so — but the formula may be improved.
Sony LinkBuds Design
The LinkBuds’ design is unlike anything else. Whether you pick the white or gray variant, the speaker enclosure’s donut design with polished chrome internal ring is completely distinctive. And though you may not be able to tell by looking at a photo of a single LinkBud on its own, these are exceedingly tiny earbuds. When you compare the LinkBud to a third-generation AirPod or even a Jabra Elite 7 Pro (one of the tiniest earbuds available), it’s clear that the LinkBud is smaller. Sony’s flagship earphones, the WF-1000XM4, dwarf it as well.
The aesthetic consideration of lowering the appearance that you’re wearing earphones comes first, because Sony sees them as gadgets you’ll wear more or less all day as you go from one activity to the next. The LinkBuds are supposed to make discussions easier, but if people are continually worried if you’ll hear them when they talk, that could be a problem.
The speaker piece, on the other hand, must be able to tuck into the very bottom of your concha – that small U-shaped space just behind your earlobe. In a bit, we’ll discuss how well that works out.
The LinksBuds and their case are constructed entirely of recycled plastics, and they come in a 100% recyclable package with no twist ties, plastic poly bags, or foam of any type. Only paper and cardboard were used.
The charging case is also quite small – not quite as little as an AirPods case, but near enough. The lid features a lock that must be opened with a little button on the front, unlike the majority of charging cases. It’s a little tricky; you have to hold the case on its sides so that the cover doesn’t get in the way when you hit the button. The lid will spring up when you get it exactly right, displaying the earphones in their charging ports.
The latch-based design is also carried over to the charging sockets by Sony. Instead of allowing the alignment magnets to suck the LinkBuds into place, you gently press the buds against the charging contacts, physically locking them in place. This was initially irritating to me. But after a few shots of taking them out and putting them back in, I’m a convert: pressing them into place is pleasurable, and the click sound serves as tactile assurance that the buds are properly docked.
There is no wireless charging option, so you’ll have to rely on the USB-C cord that comes with the device.
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Sony LinkBuds Comfort and fit
The LinkBuds design, as brilliant as it is and as compact as it is, may not be small enough for certain people. That donut-shaped speaker pod could be a thorn in the side. It’s flawlessly smooth and rounded, but it’s also completely rigid.
If you have a small concha cavum (the pocket behind the U-shaped notch), the speaker pod may be too big, or it may just create a pressure ridge that’s difficult to ignore. My wife and teenage daughter, on the other hand, were not pleased with the fit.
Sony supplies six sizes of “fitting supports,” which are little silicone loops that hook beneath your antihelix (the cartilage ridge in the middle of your ear), giving a gentle anchor for the earbuds’ upper section. These loops won’t help much if you can’t get the speaker pod situated comfortably.
However, if you’re anything like me, you’ll find the LinkBuds to be surprisingly comfy for extended amounts of time, which is precisely what Sony intended. They’re a breath of fresh air for anyone who get tired of the bug-wedged-in-your-ear-canal feeling of classic silicone-tipped designs, and they’re also more secure than semi-open earbuds like the AirPods. Unfortunately, I discovered that dislodging the buds while talking or eating was really easy – at one point, the right earbud literally popped out of my ear.
Is it possible to use them for workouts? On the one hand, their open design and IPX4 sweat and water resistance make them excellent for everything from the gym to lengthy runs in urban areas. Your — ahem — mileage may vary because the fit isn’t nearly stable enough for high-impact exercises.
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Sony LinkBuds Wireless Earbud Sound quality
Is it feasible for a pair of earphones to sound excellent if they block out all external noise? Yes. And, as odd as that may appear on the surface, we do have a solid precedent: Audiophiles and audio professionals have long lauded open-back headphones for their natural, open, and airy sound quality. The LinkBuds can be thought of as the first “open-back” earbuds in that sense.
The Sony LinkBuds Wireless Earbud, like over-ear open-back cans, provide a sound that is far more natural than typical earbuds. They’re more like listening to a set of speakers than producing the ultra-immersive experience of having the sound inside your skull.
However, there are significant drawbacks to having an open design. Even at modest volumes, everyone close will be able to hear what you’re listening to, and annoying external noises will intrude. To remedy this, Sony adds an optional auto volume feature that adjusts the volume in response to changes in ambient noise – and it works surprisingly well. When I ran water in the sink to wash some dishes, it automatically increased my volume and then decreased it when I turned off the water.
Sony LinkBuds won’t be able to drown out loud traffic, especially if you’re listening to a podcast. And, to be honest, you shouldn’t utilize volume to drown out other sounds on a daily basis, as this can cause noise-induced hearing loss (NIHL). Even at maximum level, the sound of a nearby treadmill was enough to completely drown out the sound of my podcast while I was at the gym. You’ll need a calm environment to get the most out of the LinkBuds.
Sony is working hard to promote the LinkBuds as the ideal partner for augmented reality (AR) games like Niantic’s Pokémon Go and Ingress, as well as location-based guided audio tours. They have a lot of potential here, but how much external noise you have to deal with will have a big impact on your experience.
The LinkBuds require some getting used to if you’re used to the sound of ear canal-sealing buds, especially if your current buds accentuate low-end bass, as many do. However, if you start digging into your favorite music, you’ll notice how often the bass may suffocate the other frequencies.
The bespoke 12mm ring-shaped drivers offer a much more balanced and clear sound quality, especially in the midranges and high frequencies. You still receive low-end, but it’s in a much more subtle way. You won’t be able to feel it in your chest like you might with earbuds. I suppose that’s another drawback when it comes to working out with the LinkBuds, but I’m sure there will be plenty of people that want a less obnoxious bass performance.
It’s both broad and narrow, and it leads to some delightful moments, such as listening to Yosi Horikawa’s Bubbles, a tune that begins with the sound of beads, marbles, and other small things being dropped upon a hard surface. You want to reach out and grasp them because it sounds so real. The LinkBuds also do a great job with immersive formats like Dolby Atmos Music and Sony 360 Reality Audio (360RA), though you’ll have to pick and choose which tracks you want to improve. Some sound great, while others don’t.
When it comes to sound quality, there is one major caveat: the ring drivers must be correctly positioned in your ears. Even minor departures from their sweet spot can have a significant impact on quality, particularly when it comes to volume and bass. And, as I previously stated, it’s all too easy for them to stray from that optimum location.
The Sony Headphones app has many EQ presets to pick from, as well as custom settings, and an optional bass boost feature compensates effectively for the loss of low-end that comes with an open design.
Sony also includes its DSEE technology, which tries to convert compressed digital audio such as MP3s to CD-quality.
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Sony LinkBuds Wireless Earbud Controls and connections
Touch controls on the LinkBuds function by tapping on the spherical component of the buds. However, they offer a feature called Wide Area Tap that converts neighboring areas of your face into tappable surfaces. It may sound weird, but it actually works rather nicely. I only had to softly tap the area of my cheek in front of my ear to get the LinkBuds to respond.
Wide Area Tap isn’t required, but once I started using it, I couldn’t go back to touching the earbuds themselves.
Only two motions are available per side: a double-tap and a triple-tap, for a total of four orders. When it comes to what you can accomplish with those taps, Sony unfortunately employs the control groups model. You must select one of the following options for each earbud: Playback Control, Volume Control, Select Song, Voice Assist Function, Amazon Alexa, or None. You may utilize the right earbud’s Playback Control and the left earbud’s Volume Control to play/pause, skip to the next track, and adjust the volume. That is all there is to it. There’s no way to skip backward tracks, and there’s no way to use the voice assistant.
You can’t mix and match controls from the groups, thus you can’t use the right earbud to turn up the level and the left earbud to lower it down. Because the Select Song group replicates the Playback Control group’s skip forward feature, choosing these two effectively wastes one of your four precious gestures.
I’ve already chastised Sony for their control scheme, and I’ll continue to do so until it adopts Jabra’s system, which allows full customization of each gesture on each earbud. Sony, I apologize! Users of both Android and iPhone can use Spotify Tap, but only Android users have the option of allowing Google Assistant access.
Still, credit where credit is due: When you remove an earbud, the built-in wear sensors automatically silence the music (and resume when you reinsert it). The LinkBuds also use Sony’s WF-1000XM4 and WH-1000XM4 speak-to-chat technology, which pauses your music when you start speaking. They’re both practical and helpful, and they operate flawlessly.
Although Google Fast Pair is beneficial to Android users, connecting the LinkBuds to an iOS device is as simple as picking them from your Bluetooth menu. The LinkBuds’ connection is solid but not robust, so you won’t be able to get as far away from your source device as you could with other wireless earbuds.
The LinkBuds’ lack of Bluetooth Multipoint, which allows wireless earbuds and headphones to connect to two source devices at the same time, is more disappointing. You could not require this feature right now, in which case it’s not a problem. It’s an unfortunate omission, given that Sony has positioned the LinkBuds as the ideal Work From Home (WFH) companion. The LinkBuds’ main selling point is their ability to move fluidly throughout your day, and having to actively switch from a PC to a phone goes against that purpose. If Jabra, Technics, and Soul have managed to incorporate this into their wireless headphones, I don’t see why Sony can’t as well.
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Battery life
Sony was unable to provide the LinkBuds with a particularly long battery life, maybe because to their compact size. The claim is 5.5 hours for each charge, with a total of 17.5 hours when the charging case is included. Those are extremely low numbers for wireless earbuds, but they represent the best-case scenario – as long as the volume is set to around 50% and most advanced capabilities like speech detection, auto volume, and Wide Area Tap is off. When those are turned on (and why would you want to turn them off? ), though, battery life plummets.
The LinkBuds barely lasted a little over two hours with those functions turned on. There is a rapid charge option – 10 minutes of socket time equates to 90 minutes of additional playtime, but only if all of the power-hungry special functions are disabled.
Sony LinkBuds Wireless Earbud Call quality
The LinkBuds’ phone (and video) calls are fantastic. The microphones pick up your speech well, and you’ll sound crystal clear to your callers in all except the most noisy environments. Wind can sometimes cause issues, but not as much as it does with most of the wireless buds I’ve tried. However, another advantage of the LinkBuds’ design is that you don’t need a transparency or a side-tone feature to hear your own voice while talking. In fact, you’ll be hard-pressed to find a more natural calling experience on any headphones or earbuds.
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