These wild-looking open-ear headphones have some even cooler anti-leakage sound technologies
The best open-ear headphones have become very popular lately, as people seek out sound options that don’t shut you out from the rest of the world. But these headphones work by blasting sound into your ears, and this can mean sound leaks out to those around you. NTT Sonority thinks it has the answer: an over-ear design (already unusual in the world of open-ear headphones) that uses noise-cancelling technology to not stop you from hearing the outside world, but to stop the outside world from hearing you. (via Check notebook)
NTT Sonority calls its system Personalized Sound Zone, and it achieves this by adding a second driver alongside the main 35mm driver. This second driver, a 12mm tweeter, uses phase cancellation to create a waveform that reduces audio loss from your soundtrack, theoretically making you a much nicer person to sit next to in the office blasting techno tracks to work.
And as an added bonus, they also look incredibly futuristic.
nwm ONE: key features, pricing and availability
The big advantage of open-ear headphones like these is that you can hear the world around you, and as a result, these headphones don’t have active noise cancellation to cancel out external audio for you. They’re often positioned as fitness headphones or commuter headphones, allowing you to enjoy music or podcasts without missing crucial sounds, like approaching vehicles while you’re running or public transit announcements during your commute.
In addition to the usual SBC and AAC Bluetooth codecs, the nwm ONE headphones also support the better-quality Bluetooth LE Audio LC3 codec and the higher-quality mSBC voice codec. There’s support for Auracast, the Bluetooth multi-listener broadcast standard, and there are dual microphones and voice separation for clearer speech on calls. Bluetooth is 5.3 and the frequency response is 40Hz to 20kHz, so if you’re looking for bass monsters, these might not be the best wireless headphones for you. However, the headphones do support Sony 360 Reality Audio for immersive spatial audio from compatible apps.
The battery life is said to be 20 hours, which is not exactly long for a headphone. Furthermore, charging an empty battery takes 1.5 hours. As with other headphones, you can quickly charge an empty battery. In this case, you can charge the battery for five minutes to get another hour of listening time.
The nwm ONE just launched in Japan with a price tag of 39,600 yen, which works out to about $250 / £195 / AU$380; there’s no indication of a wider launch yet. For now, the best open-ear listening options in the US and other countries are Sony’s LinkBuds and the Bose Ultra Open Earbuds – but those are earbuds. We’re eager to see how well this headband design works in practice.
