Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I am a giant Anker fan. I have owned their cords and cables for years as they have always been high quality items at reasonable prices. A few years back, Anker branded their speakers and headphones under the Soundcore label. Soundcore follows in the footsteps of their parent company in making really high quality stuff at a great price point. These Q35's, while not as inexpensive as their prior models, are simply amazing. These are the first Soundcore headphones to offer the LDAC Sony codec which makes them capable of HiFi less compressed sound. You will be able to take advantage of listening to Spotify on the very high quality setting or, better yet, really hear Tidal Masters the way they are meant to be heard. I am not a giant over ear guy. I have a ton of ear buds. My wife has the world class Sony WH-1000XM3's which I have traveled with a great deal. I owned the Soundcore Q30s for a few days, loved them, and gave them to my oldest who was whining that he needed a pair. I currently own the Microsoft Surface 2s that I got primarily for working from home. Love them but the sound is just average for music. So, enter the new Q35's. I have had these about a week. Here is the breakdown: -Sound / App: It is amazing. One of the reviews complained about sounding muddy. I am no audiophile but I just don't hear that here. These are crisp and vibrant sounding. Yes, Soundcore does tune these to emphasize the low end a bit. They come preset to the "Soundcore Signature" profile. However, Souncore gives you a very robust app to work with. Just get in there and tune these to your liking. You can use one of their many presets or make your own custom sound. When you get these going with a high quality stream, at the risk of sounding overly dramatic, it is breathtaking. Listening to The National, The Eagles, and Metallica on Tidal all just sound incredible. Great lows, full mids, crisp highs, all of which are nicely separated and balanced. Beautiful to listen to. Also, when watching video there is zero discernible latency. Voices match what you are watching. Well done. -Battery life / Connectivity: Really as good as it gets. 40 hours or so with ANC on and 60 hours without. Just about best in class. Bluetooth 5.0 is here so easy pairing and rock solid range and stable connection. -Active Noise Cancellation: If there is an area to ding these, it is here. The ANC is good. Soundcore has been steadily improving in this arena for some time. It is not Sony / Bose good. However, for most, I believe this ANC will be more than fine. It should handle planes and traveling. The only things that really get through are sudden high frequency sounds. Again, overall good, but just not as spectacular as everything else Soundcore offers here. -Form Factor / Controls: The Q35's build is outstanding. They feel great in your hands. Not like $129 headphones should feel. I feel no discernible difference in quality from the Sony headphones. The controls are handled via physical buttons on the right can. The left can has power and the ANC toggle. One nice feature that Soundcore borrowed from Sony is that you can enter transparency by simply resting your hand over the right can. It's great! Something new I love is autopause. All my buds have this but I have never seen over ears use this. Simply slide a cup off of either ear and whatever you are listening to pauses. It is really helpful. My son walked up to me and began speaking. I didnt miss anything he said and didn't need to worry about pausing my content. Great addition! Soundcore also gives your a 3.5mm audio cable if you want to go wired. I haven't tried it here yet but it worked great on the Q30's. -Call Quality: The Q30's were nothing special with how they handled calls. The Q35's still aren't special but seem to be vastly improved. They have added an AI algorithm to the beam forming mics that seems to be more effective at isolating your voice especially in loud environments. I still get too much wind noise when outside but calls are solid and very capable here overall. I will update as I go here. For $129, Soundcore is offering you a tremendous value proposition. HiFi sound, good ANC, great battery, and tremendous build quality. If High Fidelity sound isn't your bag, get the Q30's. Same build, same ANC, and same great app, for about half the price. However, if you want to really hear music buy these, find some uncompressed (or less compressed) music, and enjoy. It really is something you need to hear. *Update* I have really been pounding these and didn't really say anything about comfort. They are lightweight and very comfortable for long term wear. I am a hot guy (sweaty not physically) by nature and these are warm but overly hot like so many over ears I have worn. I have had them on now for about two hours tonight. All good. I am warm in there but not too much so. Solid. ***Update for later model Samsung users***So one really important note I just figured out thanks to testing the new B&W PI7's is that you really want to make sure you have HD Audio (in this case, LDAC) enabled on your device. Samsung actually deactivates it by default. If you go in to developer options, you can turn it on. Go to "about phone", go to "software options", and find your Android build number. Tap on that 7 times. Back out and go to "developer options." Connect your Q35's to your phone (or any LDAC capable headset) and then scroll down in developer options and you should see an HD Audio button. Slide that over to activate it and it should automatically connect to your highest possible streaming option that headphone offers. Don't worry, you will not hurt anything here. Get your Tidal account going or move your Spotify quality to "very high" and you will be off to the races. Game changer for me and my S21 Ultra!