Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Much as I like and use a lot of Anker products, these don't make the cut, and sadly for a lot of aesthetic and clunky design reasons that don't have much to do with their intended functionality. At their core, they provide good ANC, and pleasant - if a tad bassy - sound quality. That said, I'll outline the pros and cons I've observed in using them on the first day: pros: - as noted, nice sound quality, with some reinforcement in the mid-bass frequencies, but the bass is tight, and the mids and highs are mellow - almost inaudible difference to sound quality with noise cancellation enabled, and no notable hiss with ANC on - ANC is not 'make the world go away' levels, and lets some higher frequency sound through; this is great, as I am looking to cancel out midrange and bass sounds like an air conditioner, nearby dogs, and the wearing rumble of airplane engines during long flights - aside from the slightly too small earcups (for my tastes), they are comfortable to wear - neither too loose nor too tight - the various audible and voice prompts are pleasant and at a reasonable volume cons: - big problem: can't charge and listen at the same time - big problem: no ability to use as a phone headset in wired mode (these are headphones only when used with the cable, with no mic available) - the earcup material is too insulative, resulting in unpleasant warmth and sweating under fairly normal circumstances (74F / 45% RH, just sitting at computer doing work, so these would suck for truly warm, humid, and and/or strenuous activity) - when switching ANC on and off, the enhanced bass enables momentarily, which is just sloppy design, and rather jarring - they have stiff creaky hinges and pivots, which is emblematic of inexpensive plastic-on-plastic construction - they have a light but unpleasant chemical smell, which I suspect is from the earcup material, and it's not dissipating any too quickly - a general lack of build refinement - they're nice enough, but the point where the earcup cushions meet the body was wrinkled and unevenly finished All this said, I can't really recommend these, since I think refinement and solid build quality should be reasonable expectations at a $70 price point. If I could give them 3.5 stars, I would, but since their core functionality is great, I'll go with 4 stars instead of 3.