Bad smart features ruin these

These B&O;Headphones do some things extremely well, but fall flat in other areas. I’m actually surprised by how bad some of the features are in these headphones, because the overall comfort and audio quality are superb. For this price point, and considering how good the audio and comfort is, some of the additional features built into this product really drag it down.

AUDIO QUALITY -

Right away I noticed how great the audio quality was for these headphones. Bluetooth headphones are always going to be fighting an uphill battle for audio quality, as they are basically a digital reproduction of the music you’re listening to, and the technology to do so is still not perfect. Nonetheless, B&O;are probably the best on the market, with a very crisp quality to the audio that makes it feel very authentic. Whether I was listening to classical music, audiobooks, podcasts or Top 40 radio, everything sounded great and I never felt like I would have been better served by a non-Bluetooth alternative. Compared to other luxury headphones I've tested, the audio is a minor improvement.

COMFORT -

I have a large head and sometimes headphones can be a little tight, but thankfully this pair has no such problem. They can fit very large heads with room to spare, and the padding on both the headphones themselves and the bridge is soft and comfortable. After using these for several hours in a row, I didn’t notice any tightness or discomfort. It even breathed well, so my ears weren’t left feeling clammy or sweaty. When it comes to comfort, these are by far the best headphones I've used, with no pinching or tightness over long term use.

FEATURES -

All the additional features is where these headphones really fell apart for me. I’ll go through them one at a time.

TOUCH CONTROLS - The touch controls found on the side of the headphones are iffy at best, and a real pain at worst. These include tapping to play/pause, swiping a little circle to turn volume up or down, skip songs, or turn on/off things like the noise cancelling. The only one that worked regularly for me without any issues was tapping to play/pause. Every other option, despite hours of experimentation, was either extremely difficult to make work (like the skipping) or virtually impossible (adjusting volume). The manual included, as well as the app that can be downloaded, provide little to no instructions for anyone struggling to make these features work as intended.

AUTO-OFF/ON - The auto-off/auto-on feature that is meant to pause your music if you take the headphones off, and play again when you put them on, is so poor it actively hurts the use of these headphones. Anytime I tilted my head a little while listening to music the headphones would pause, forcing me to unpause them manually. The few times I tries to use this feature to my advantage and took off the headphones, it failed to pause at all. Previous B&O;headphones I have used that included this feature were similarly broken. You cannot turn this off via the app. It's a huge problem because if you are having trouble with this feature acting buggy, or like to move around a lot while listening, this feature is not something you can get rid off. Other luxury headphones I've used allow this to be turned off. and speaking of the app…

The app that is meant to be paired with these headphones is useless. This app gives you a little tutorial in the various touch controls, but no actual instructions for how to make them work if you’re struggling. Even worse, you cannot skip a step if you have trouble with it, so when my headphones would not auto-pause after taking them off I was forced to cancel the tutorial altogether because it would not allow me to proceed. In the app proper, the only thing you can do is customize the audio profile (more bass, less, etc.) and listen to some built-in audio streaming that is as bare-bones as possible. You cannot deactivate the poorly implemented smart features or touch controls, which leaves your headphones crippled by a terrible suite of “smart” features.

STYLE -

These are surprisingly plain. It's not a bad thing, but I'm partial to a bit of flash/style, so the plain black isn't my favourite. However they are perfect for those who like a more muted style, or want headphones that don't look unique at first glance. The leather is genuine, so if you're vegan or don't buy leather products, you'll want to skip these, but for everyone else they are classic and good quality, just a bit plain.

OVERALL IMPRESSIONS -

These headphones are a tragedy. They provide great comfort and amazing audio in a stylish package that is lightweight, but all of that is completely ruined by the smart features, none of which have been implemented well. After several days of using these headphones exclusively, I was so happy to never wear them again. Listening to a good book or great music is ruined when you never know when they are going to pause randomly. On average mine paused 6 times every 30 mins of listening, that's every five minutes.

After the first ten times you try unsuccessfully to use the touch controls to swipe to the next song or turn up the volume, you’ll never use those features again. The smart features ruin this product so badly that I would never want to use these again, nor would I want to inflict them on someone else.

It's a huge shame because when it comes to audio quality and comfort, these are king, but I cannot justify recommending them until the smart features are improved.