Sony’s LinkBuds win me over with their weird design
28.2.2022
Translation: Julia Graham
Pictures: Thomas Kunz, Valentina Sproge-Werndli
Sony’s LinkBuds have a completely new headphone design, which I decided to put to the test for ten days. The open in-ears with hole are as simple as they are good. But that’s not to say they’re suitable for everyone.
When I had my active noise cancelling headphones on a few days ago, I missed the postie when they rang. I then had to traipse to the post office to pick up the parcel myself. If I’d been wearing the LinkBuds, this wouldn’t have happened. That’s because these open in-ears let you hear your surroundings as well as the music – for example couriers ringing the bell, pasta water bubbling over, cars or approaching trams.
The LinkBuds are Sony’s antithesis to noise-cancelling headphones. The design is as simple as it is unexpected. There’s a hole in the middle of the headphones.
Out and about with the headphones open
I immediately put the LinkBuds to the test. First of all, I see how they hold up to cycling in urban traffic. In this kind of scenario, it’s essential you can hear the car behind you and the children playing on the pavement. And would you look at that – it works. With the LinkBuds, I can hear enough on the bike that I don’t pose a safety risk as I’m cruising around Zurich's streets. I begin by setting the music to a third of the volume – safety first. You can adjust the volume by tapping on the headphones, so I turn the volume up while I’m waiting at the lights. When it’s at three quarters of the volume, I can’t hear the birds chirping on the branches, but I can still detect enough background noise for it be safe for cycling.
Fortunately, unlike many headphones in transparent mode, the wind doesn’t drown everything out. You can only faintly hear the wind. The LinkBuds are built in such a way that most of the time, the wind can’t blow into them directly.
You hear a true reflection of your environment with the LinkBuds. which is a far cry from aware modes. In other words, modes where closed headphones record and pass on the noise using microphones. That’s to say, the sound on the LinkBuds doesn’t seem artificial or too far away. Because the LinkBuds can’t offer any noise cancellation due to their build, they’re obviously less suitable for the morning commute on the train.
Sony itself says that the headphones are also suitable for the office. I wouldn’t agree. If I hear the chatter of my colleagues alongside my music, it stops me being able to concentrate on my work. The LinkBuds only come into their own and have their full raison d'être in a home office, where it’s quieter and you get the postie ringing the bell.
These headphones also prove to be suitable for jogging. For a start, they sit well in your ears. As they’re IPX4-certified, meaning they’re resistant to splashes of water, they’re safe to use if I’m sweating or running around in the rain.
Sitting comfortably in the ears
Sony includes four other rings in addition to the mounted silicone loops that you put under the antihelix, the Y shaped part of your outer ear. It’s worth trying them all out to see which fits best. At first I thought Sony had sent me an uncomfortable earbud until I realised only the smallest ring fits in my ear. Once you use the correct ring, the headphones are so comfortable that from time to time, it’s easy to forget I still have them in my ears when I’m not listening to music. It’s a nice change not having silicone or foam attachments in my ear canal, even though I normally really like in-ears. The fact that the buds are so comfortable also comes down to their weight, with a single earbud coming in at a mere 4.1 grammes.
Inserting the buds into your ears properly can take a bit of practice. That’s because it’s more unusual to only place them partially into the ear canal. At first, I pushed them in too straight, which meant they weren’t far enough into the ear canal. As a result, the sound was distorted and I only heard half of what was coming through the headphones. But after a few goes practising in front of the mirror, I don’t have any problem inserting them properly. When used correctly, the LinkBuds will stay in place and won’t budge.
You can also easily wear them under a helmet, cap or headband. Problems only arise if your headgear is too tight. In that case, the controls, which are fairly sensitive to begin with, start to take on a life of their own. Even when I have a cap over my ears I can still hear ambient noise.
However, people around me might also hear some of my music depending the playback volume. The open design causes slightly more sound to escape from the LinkBuds. But I found that with the volume set at three quarters, I didn’t get any complaints from my colleagues.
The secret agent controls
Sony has added a new type of control to the LinkBuds. You can now control the handset from the front of your ear using the wide area option and the in-built Sony sensors. To do this, tap with one finger in front of the base of the ear.
If this all seems a bit too high-tech, the good news is you can still control the LinkBuds normally on the earphone itself. You’ll find that those controls are a little more reliable. But having said that, it’s more comfortable not needing to tap the buds in my ears.
In the app, you can adjust the controls yourself and set what happens when you tap. Nevertheless, Sony doesn’t give you a large range of options to choose from. If I want to control playback forwards and backwards, that means I can’t tap to pause anymore. If I set it so I can pause, I can’t return to playback. But I can can set it to stop automatically when I remove a headphone.
I like the sound
Given the LinkBuds don’t sit directly in the ear canal in the style of other in-ears, the sound they deliver is a bit softer and less defined than what you may expect, but I like it. That being said, if you’re the kind of person who likes enough bass to shake your ears, you’re not going to like the LinkBuds with their modest bass. In terms of sound, I’d describe it as balanced, clear and true. Sony's ring driver reproduces a natural and balanced sound.
I give Now Or Never by Swiss exile Buvette aka Cédric Streuli a whirl on the headphones. The LinkBuds deliver the intro in a composed and unexcited way, but it’s still catchy. Then the singer cuts in. The LinkBuds demonstrate they also have a good handle on the mid-tones. It’s only the lows that could benefit from being a little richer in my ears – something I’ve already pointed out about the bass. On the other hand, the headphones reproduce the synthesiser trebles cleanly. There are only a few places where it’s too shrill for me.
If I’m somewhere very loud, such as a main road, the noise obviously drowns out the sound from the LinkBuds. Or I only catch a snippet of music.
The Sony Headphones app for Android and for iOS lets you customise the sound using eight Sony presets or adjusting it manually. I tried them all out and then went back to the basic settings. In terms of the equaliser presets, I find them exaggerated, and in fact, I prefer the natural sound. If you overdo it with the equalisers, the sound through the LinkBuds becomes shrill relatively quickly.
Sony’s 360 reality audio feature is also available in the app. This is Sony’s surround sound format and a competitor to Dolby Atmos Music. But before you can use this feature, you have to take a photo of your ears and analyse them via the app. You don’t need to sign up to use the headphone app, but Sony does keep asking you to create an account.
Connections and battery: no multipoint but enough battery
The LinkBuds support Bluetooth 5.2 and AAC as well as SBC codecs. Unfortunately, it doesn’t include Sony's almost loss-free LDAC codec and AptX. Thanks to Google’s Fast Pair, it only takes a few seconds to connect to Bluetooth with an Android device. On iOS, you have to pair manually, which is something I managed to do when I tested it out on an old iPhone 7. It can take a few moments. You have to press the button on the back of the LinkBuds case for about eight seconds.
The connection with Android and iOS is stable without any dropouts. You don’t even get any annoying latency when watching videos. However, you do need to psych yourself up a bit to change the playback device. The reason being that the LinkBuds don’t have multipoint. In case you’re wondering, multipoint is when headphones can store several active Bluetooth connections – in other words, something the LinkBuds can’t do. That means you always have to put them back in the case for a moment if you want to change the device. There’s no option to reconnect them on the headphones themselves.
As for battery life, the LinkBuds can keep up with their competitors in spite of their small size. But it’s worth noting that if I listen to music cranked up loud, the battery life falls about an hour short of the five and a half hours Sony specifies. In the case, you have an extra runtime of twelve hours as well as a fast charging feature. For every 10 minutes of charge, you get 90 minutes runtime. The only thing is you can’t charge the case wirelessly.
Impressive call quality
The LinkBuds perform well in terms of voice quality on phone calls. They’re unlike a lot of true wireless headphones that deliver poor call quality, as the other person on the phone can hear me clearly.
You can check out the phone call quality yourself from the video I filmed below when I recorded a call with my colleague Luca Fontana via Microsoft Teams. On my end of the call it was quite loud in the background, as a number of people were talking about five metres away.
Incidentally, I’d advise against trying to call when you’re near a main road as it doesn’t work so well. But that’s the case for all headphones.
Verdict: good features, but not suitable for everyone
The LinkBuds design has been completely overhauled. I think it’s a success. The headphones are perfect for jogging, cycling and walking. They let me listen to music without making me a danger to others or myself as I’m still aware of everything going on around me. They’ve also earned their place at home. When using them in a quiet home office, I won’t miss another parcel.
However, the LinkBuds aren’t for people who commute regularly and want to have some peace and quiet during that time. And if you like a lot of bass, you’re going to be disappointed. Neither can I recommend them for use in the office. That kind of environment is way too loud and if you add music to the mix, you’re likely to get cognitive overload.
The new design isn’t the only thing that sets the LinkBuds apart from other true wireless headphones. They also stand out when it comes to good call quality. And the special control is a nice feature. Looking at the price tag, they’re in the mid section of the market when you take their competitors into account. The open design is extremely practical when you need it, and it makes the LinkBuds worth it.
Testing devices and gadgets is my thing. Some experiments lead to interesting insights, others to demolished phones. I’m hooked on series and can’t imagine life without Netflix. In summer, you’ll find me soaking up the sun by the lake or at a music festival.
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