During last year’s Cyber Monday sales after Black Friday, I decided to get Sony’s WH-1000XM3 ANC headphones. The XM3 headphones have been Sony’s flagship ANC headphones for over a year now. I’ve been using them for a little over a month now, so I’ll be writing about my experience with the headphones.
Initially, I was considering getting the Sennheiser Momentum 3 headphones, but compared to the XM3s they were considerably more expensive. However, they did boast a better build and sound quality which I was certainly interested in. I couldn’t justify the price for it though, so I ended up opting for the XM3s.
The headphones have been really comfortable so far, but sometimes if you wear them for a long time your ears might get a bit uncomfortably warm. However, I think this is something that happens with most over the ear headphones anyways. Most of the headphones are made out of plastic which still kind of worries me; especially since the headphones I usually use for playing games feel higher quality while being cheaper. Fortunately, I haven’t had any issues concerning the durability of the headphones yet, but after all, it’s only been a month.
Sound-wise, the XM3s certainly perform much better than any other pair of headphones that I currently have, but I wouldn’t say that they would be better or as good as a pair of studio headphones. I don’t think that the sound quality of the headphones is the main selling point of the headphones although it is important. Most people would agree that the active noise cancellation feature of the headphones is the best part of the headphones. The XM3s have some of the best noise-canceling technology according to a lot of people, and I can say that it definitely works from my experience.
Unfortunately, I do have a few complaints about the headphones though. While they aren’t too big of an issue, I still think there could’ve been some areas of improvement. The first thing is that there isn’t any function for multi-point pairing with the headphones which means you have to repair the headphones if you want to use a different device. A lot of headphones already have this feature, and this was one of the biggest downsides of the headphones. The other issue that I personally don’t really like is the touch controls on the side of the earcup where you control your volume and tracks. Every time you want to change the volume or track without taking out your phone feels really awkward, and sometimes you even perform the wrong action by swiping in a weird direction. Some people have also experienced the touch controls activating without touching the headphones in cold weather, but I haven’t experienced that yet.
Overall, the WH-1000XM3 headphones have been really good in my experience. They’ve been doing everything I’ve expected them to be able to do, and since Sony hasn’t announced a new XM4 model the current XM3s should hold up for a while. The headphones were really easy to set up and get going, and figuring out how to use them was simple as well.