As WIRED’s chief headphone reviewer, I’m always asked the same question, with one follow-up. The question: What are the best headphones I should buy? The follow-up: I don’t want to spend a lot of money. My answer is also a two-parter: Always wait for a sale, or just buy Soundcore.
Soundcore is my go-to budget headphone brand. It's built a reputation as an affordable audio staple that punches far above what its price tag would suggest. Case in point: the Soundcore Space 2. They’re my current favorite over-ear headphones for anyone on a budget. They launched back in April and have gone on sale a few times, but this is the lowest price they've ever been (even lower than Prime Day).
The Soundcore Space 2 have a lot going for them. They are understated, comfortable to wear for hours at a time, not too heavy, have easy-to-use physical button controls, and fold down nicely for stuffing into a bag.
On the inside, sound quality and active noise cancellation (ANC) are far better than you would expect for something that costs a little over $100. ANC makes everything muffled and lets me use a much more comfortable listening volume compared to other budget headphones. Battery life is killer—50 hours with ANC on, 70 hours with it off. That’s better than all the big names you usually think of (Sony, Bose, Apple) when you think of over-ear headphones.
A great pair of earbuds for under $100. The Liberty 5 don't have the impeccable call quality of the Liberty 5 Pro , but they are smaller, slimmer, and more comfortable in your ear.
An older version of Soundcore’s open ear earbuds, the AeroFit 2 at $80 are a great way to try out an open earbud design without investing a ton of money—after all, not everyone loves the form factor.
Power up with unlimited access to WIRED . Get best-in-class reporting and exclusive subscriber content that's too important to ignore. Subscribe Today .
