When strolling through the headphone department of large electronics stores or through the online shelves of Amazon & Co., it quickly becomes clear: the selection of headphones is huge and confusing. Underwire, in-ear and true wireless headphones or do you prefer stylish on-ears? And should active noise cancellation be included or not? COMPUTER BILD helps you with some real blasts. With these headphones, price and performance are right.
Bluetooth headphones: Sennheiser HD 250BT
- Clean sound
- Long battery life
- Takes getting used to on the ears
- No jack socket
The Sennheiser HD 250BT shows that good on-ear headphones don’t have to be expensive. In the test, it delivered unspectacular, but really good sound. It reproduces the music beautifully clear and unadulterated, only the bass lacks a bit of oomph. The battery life is decent and it sits lightly on your head due to its low weight. However, it has no jack connection, so it only works via Bluetooth. For just under 40 euros, the technology is almost unbeatable (as of January 2022).
Noise-canceling headphones: Sony WH-XB910N
- good sound
- Smart noise canceling
- Ex-works bass too loud
- 360 Reality Audio limited to a few titles
A real hit is the Sony WH-XB910N, which offers great sound and a long battery life of over 45 hours. In addition, the noise canceling works excellently and just as well as with more expensive Sony models! The intuitive control is easy to do by hand, the great app also enriches the offer. The best: The price is less than 140 euros (as of January 2022).
True wireless headphones: Samsung Galaxy Buds 2
- First class sound
- Active noise cancellation
- Somewhat fiddly operation
- Limitations for iOS users
The Samsung Galaxy Buds 2 offer a price of 95 euros (as of January 2022), a real board in terms of sound quality and features. The active noise suppression largely blocks out the surrounding noise, the sound is once again extremely strong. Operation is a bit poor with few touch functions and poor acoustic feedback. There are long faces among iOS users, because the full range of functions of the Samsung In-Ears has not yet been available to them.
Over-ear headphones: Teufel Real Pure
- Good wearing comfort
- Still good sound with soft bass
The Teufel Real Pure over-ear headphones offer a great overall package at an almost unbeatable price. The sound is good, the wearing comfort is very high. For phone calls – for example in the home office – there is even a hands-free function on board. The Teufel over-ear is available for 90 euros (as of January 2022).
On-ear headphones: Beats Solo3 Wireless
- Comfortable to wear
- Long battery life
Do you like the headphones to be on instead of over your ears? Then you might be interested in the comfortable Beats Solo3 Wireless for around 150 euros (as of January 2022). The sound is pleasantly warm, with uncolored voices and good stereo imaging. As is typical of the Beats, the bass is quite dominant. The battery lasted over 34 hours in the test.
In-ear bargain: Huawei FreeBuds 4i
- Decent battery life
- Good noise canceling
The Huawei FreeBuds 4i retain the old strengths of their predecessor: The sound is convincing, the noise-canceling works well and the true wireless in-ears do not interfere even with long periods of use. And the Chinese manufacturer is turning what was previously the greatest weakness into a plus point: the battery lasts almost nine hours with active noise suppression – strong! But the price is the real highlight: the FreeBuds 4i is already available for 55 euros (as of January 2022).
Cheap headphones: conclusion
As you can see: In all conceivable headphone segments there are not only inexpensive models, some models also convince with extremely good technology. This is confirmed by the headphones listed above. So you hardly have to compromise even with a smaller budget.
