Sony ULT Wear test: our full opinion –

Sony is finally putting bass back into its headphones and speakers. Disappeared from the radar for several years, Extra Bass technology and before it Mega Bass, have delighted fans of powerful and robust sound. We think of the excellent Sony SR-XB33/43 portable speakers or the vibrant little Sony MDR-XB650BT supra-aural headphones. With the new ULT range, Sony is reconnecting with a glorious past and offering several portable speakers – soon to be tested – and a headset, the Sony ULT Wear.

Sony ULT Wear Technical sheet

This test was carried out with headphones loaned by Sennheiser.

Sony ULT Wear Comfort and wearing detection

The Sony ULT Wear (WH-ULT900N) is a large over-ear headset with remarkable comfort and an attractive design. Our example displays a full matte gray, with no variation in color between the headband, the shells or even the ear cushions. This deep gray also tends towards green and the impression of quality that emanates from it is obvious. Only the acoustic decompression grilles at the top of the shells and hidden by the arch attachments are made of aluminum and tinted titanium gray. In short, the Sony ULT Wear is a headset with a sober and neat look.

The ULT Wear’s controls are split between the buttons on the left earcup and the touch area on the right. On the left, there are three buttons: one for turning the power on and off, another for active noise reduction and a last one to activate ULTra bass mode. The touch zone on the right earpiece allows you to adjust the listening volume by successive vertical slides, as well as temporarily activate the transparency mode to hear around you, by pressing the palm of your hand on the touch zone. It’s very useful.

The connection includes a USB-C charging port and a line input in 3.5 mm mini-jack format, to connect the headphones to an analog source (walkman, CD player, hi-fi amplifier, etc.). Sony provides a 1.20 m mini-jack cable for this use. The Sony ULT Wear is foldable and takes up relatively little space when stored in its semi-rigid case. The latter is covered with a large-knit anthracite fabric, pleasant to the touch and visually.

Wearing comfort is excellent, the pressure exerted around the ears is very moderate and the weight of the headset gives it fairly limited inertia. You can shake your head without worrying that the helmet will move too much or fall off. Another point, the contact noise between hand and plastic generates little parasitic noise, proof that this headset is seriously designed.

Sony ULT Wear Tailor-made sound

Sony ULT Wear controls can be customized in the Sony Headphones app. By default, they work as follows:

• Vertical swipe on the touch area: volume adjustment
• Horizontal sliding on the touch area: next or previous track
• Double press on the touch zone: pause, resume reading
• Long press: smartphone voice assistant
• Press ANC button: noise reduction or transparency mode
• Press ULT button: reinforcement of low or high intensity low frequencies

The Sony Headphones app allows you to assign an additional function to the ANC button, which, when pressed for a long time, can activate the Spotify Tap function (playing a playlist) or the Endel music app.

ULT Clear Bass mode to massage the ears

Sony Headphones have a sound equalizer with integrated listening profiles (lively, enthusiastic, calm, relaxed, singing, etc.). If by chance none of these modes please you, you can switch to manual mode and play with the five equalization keys (400 Hz, 1 kHz, 2.5 kHz, 6.3 kHz and 16 kHz). Low frequencies have a dedicated menu called Clear Bass, with a scale of twenty graduations, which impacts frequencies below 100 Hz without further precision.

The ULT1 and ULT2 modes correspond to two settings on the Clear Bass scale, ULT2 being fixed at maximum. As it is easy to quickly get lost in this deluge of settings, Sony offers a wizard to refine the sound of the headphones in three steps. It’s quite effective, even if the default sound signature is designed to please as many people as possible.

More generally, Sony Headphones deserve a facelift, because the interface is overloaded and the placement of buttons and functions is not always clear. We find our way there, obviously, but the competition offers much more intuitive apps (Sennheiser, Bose, Nothing, etc.).

360 Reality Audio and Ear Photography

Sony being the originator of the immersive audio format 360 Reality Audio, it is common to find its support in the manufacturer’s headphones and headsets. The Sony ULT Wear is no exception to the rule and allows the listener to take photos of their ears to optimize the playback of 360 Reality Audio files. The results are not very convincing and, since Tidal, the layering of the sound plans disappoints regardless of the 360 ​​title listened to. The voices are often too far behind or the instruments too present. Better to listen in simple stereo.

Strong Bluetooth connection

Simultaneous Bluetooth connection to two devices is possible, provided you enable this option in the Sony Headphones app. You can then switch from one source device to another, from a smartphone to a computer for example, without having to manually disconnect from one for the other. The only downside is that LDAC high-speed audio transmission is then deactivated in favor of AAC. Nothing serious, because the differences between the two codecs are minimal.

The Sony ULT Wear has a solid radio connection and I didn’t experience any interruptions through thin partitions or wooden floors, within the limit of 10 meters. Latency is noticeable in video games where the sound always arrives after the image, without this being prohibitive because the delay is slight. In video playback, the synchronization between image and sound is perfect.

In terms of transmission technologies, SBC, AAC and LDAC codecs are supported, with no obvious difference between each. I even obtained more precise listening in AAC with an iPhone than with an Android smartphone in LDAC.

Sony ULT Wear A good level ANC

The thickness of the Sony ULT Wear materials gives it very good passive insulation, which, combined with an active reduction system for surrounding noise, places the listener in a bubble calm enough to enjoy their music. We are not far from the excellent Bose QuietComfort headphones. The ANC impacts the bass sounds and a little the midrange. In the car, rolling noise is virtually eliminated at low speed and sufficiently reduced on expressways to listen to music peacefully. In the street, intense and clear noises still come through, but when listening at high volume, the sound immersion is good. In short, the noise reduction of the Sony ULT Wear is perfectly valid.

The ambient sound mode has an intensity setting (scale from 1 to 20), which allows you to hear what is happening around you and hold a conversation. However, the maximum volume is not very high and you often have to strain your attention.

Sony ULT Wear Lots of bass

There is never too much bass. At least when it is balanced and articulate. Drums, percussion and stringed instruments are never as delicious to listen to as when their lower harmonic frequencies are reproduced with power (and precision). The announcement of Sony headphones capable of producing a lot of bass was good news from this point of view. However, the Sony ULT Wear presses far too hard in the upper bass, which casts a veil over all the other frequencies. No luck, the app’s equalizer doesn’t offer any key to fixing the problem. Beyond the excessive volume in the upper bass, it is the lack of speed which is even more problematic. It sounds like a poorly tuned bass reflex port, a bumper car speaker.

To illustrate the extent of the problem, I measured the Sony ULT Wear without ULT mode (blue curve), then with ULT1 (pink dotted) and ULT2 (orange dashed) modes. In the latter case, the level of the bass register is at least 15 dB higher than the medium frequencies and 20 dB higher than the most sensitive high frequencies… while 6 dB is enough to double the acoustic intensity. The curve is then rather peaceful up to the treble gates, but the masking effect is too strong for the ear to benefit from it. As for the treble, it is not very rigorous.

Dynamic behavior and soundstage

The sound of the Sony ULT Wear also lacks discernment and all the music sounds a bit similar. This is due to the strong coloring of the low frequency register, but also to a lack of speed of the transducers, which mark small dynamic differences very poorly. The result is a narrow soundstage in both width and depth.

When listening to music, it systematically gets stuck and it’s only when watching a series or an action film, or even playing a video game – via the line input – that the ULT Wear does well. game.

Sony ULT Wear Poorly filtered calls

Can you trust the Sony ULT Wear to make phone calls? Certainly, but on condition that you call in a quiet place, because the reduction of surrounding noise is not very effective. Clear sounds around the user are attenuated, but only when the user is not speaking. As soon as you say a single word, the background noise returns and the voice quality deteriorates. We are understood by the person we are talking to, but the comfort is very average.

Sony ULT Wear Exemplary autonomy

Endurance, on the other hand, is a quality for the Sony ULT Wear headphones, which generally last the 30 hours announced by Sony, active noise reduction in operation. I measured 29h15 without low frequency reinforcement, in Bluetooth AAC connection with an iPhone at 50% volume. By deactivating ANC, the headset would last up to 50 hours according to Sony. Its charging time is around 3h30 with a 5W charger.

Sony ULT Wear Price and release date

The Sony ULT Wear headset is available in black, white or gray at a price of 199 euros.