Known for their soundbar, Sonos recently released its first Bluetooth headset with an undisguised ambition: to compete with Apple and its famous AirPods Max. Discover our review of the Sonos Ace headphones.
Do you know Sonos? If you have beautiful audio and visual equipment in your living room, it is likely that you have already seen or even own an object from the brand. Sonos is a specialist in portable speakers as well as sound bars that can equip your television. More recently, the firm surprised its audience by unveiling its first Bluetooth headset, the design of which is reminiscent of Apple’s AirPods Max.
Is a very good soundbar manufacturer capable of making good quality Bluetooth headphones? This is what you wanted to check with our Sonos Ace test.
A plastic design but so pleasant on a daily basis
The Sonos Ace comes in a very nice cardboard box that sports the color you have chosen (white or black). For this test, we had the white color. This box contains in particular the headset, instructions for use, a carrying case, a USB-C/Jack cable and a USB-C cable. A beautiful set whose cover is both practical on a daily basis and above all much more useful than the “covers” provided with the Apple headset for example.
The Sonos Arc is presented as a headset with an entirely hard plastic covering and equipped with a head rest and soft ear cushions. The latter also have different colors in order to quickly differentiate the left side from the right side and to benefit from audio spatialization which we will not return to later in this test.
The daily wear of the Sonos Ace is very pleasant. If the plastic coating can be a little “cheap” compared to the AirPods Max, but this design allows a much more pleasant comfort on a daily basis, especially in terms of weight. The Sonos Ace weighs about 65g less than the AirPods Max and this is clearly felt in use. Whether wearing it on the street or at the gym, wearing the Sonos headset is pleasant and you never feel a certain heaviness or discomfort even after hours of use.
On the left side of the Sonos Ace, there is a single button: the one dedicated to power and Bluetooth equipment. Simply press to turn the headset off or on, and hold to make it discoverable for your Bluetooth-enabled devices. Nothing too complicated. Just below, we find the USB-C port that you can use to recharge the headset or plug it into a jack.
The right side of the Sonos Ace is a little more furnished. There is a button to alternate between noise reduction and transparency mode as well as a more prominent button allowing you to control music, calls and their volume.
Generally speaking, the different buttons on the Sonos Ace are quite well thought out. These react well to our different interactions and fall well under our fingers or thumb without us having to constantly look for them. A great lesson in ergonomics.
A decent sound, but lacking in intensity
It’s often said that first impressions are good and this often holds true with audio equipment testing. If we were particularly impressed from the first use of the AirPods Max or the recent Nothing Ear headphones, the surprise was not really there with the Sonos Ace headphones.
Let’s be clear: the sound produced by the Sonos Ace is good. The different tones are rather carefully transcribed. Thus, the mids are well balanced and the highs fall just right. However, we will criticize a slight lack of bass on certain well-defined music such as “Bad Guy” by Billie Eilish, “Another One Bites The Dust” of Queen or “Seven Nation Army” of the White Stripes. If this music remains very pleasant to listen to with the Sonos Ace, we can complain about a small lack of power or character in the restitution of the different lowest tones of certain passages.
It should be noted that the Sonos Ace is compatible with the aptX Lossless codec which guarantees lossless listening for your different music. Unfortunately, this coded is not yet supported by many devices or smartphones. In particular, it is only found on certain smartphones from Vivo, Asus, Sony, Nubia or Motorola at the time of writing these lines. We are therefore far from the biggest representatives of the industry.
Used during video game games, we did not notice any particular latency when using the Sonos Ace. Games requiring audio responsiveness such as online FPS such as Call of Duty Mobile remain fully playable without indicating any delay between the action in progress and the sounds reproduced by the Sonos Ace.
The microphone on the Sonos Ace headset also seemed to us to be of good quality. The calls we made by telephone or via applications like Facebook Messenger or WhatsApp posed no problem during our weeks of testing and our interlocutors understood our discussions perfectly despite the surrounding noise.
Very good noise reduction and effective transparency mode
The Sonos Ace headphones offer a noise reduction mode that can be activated directly in the Sonos companion application or quickly with a button located on the headphones. This mode allows you to attenuate surrounding noise in order to “cut off the world” and hear more of the sounds from your headphones.
The noise reduction of the Sonos Ace is simply excellent. Used in the middle of a room full of discussions or near a crowded square, we had no trouble fully enjoying our music or our telephone conversations which were fully audible. The only exceptions remained vehicle horns or certain alerts from the Paris metro.
You don’t like to isolate yourself so much and prefer to stay alert to the noises around you? Sonos Ace’s transparency mode lets you continue to enjoy your music while still hearing the sounds around you. The latter are amplified so as to be audible despite your music or your conversations and prove to be quite faithful. Some wireless earphones or headsets sometimes produce quite artificial results when their transparency mode is activated, but the Sonos Ace gets by without difficulty in this segment.
A fairly basic companion application
These days, many wireless headphones and earphones have a dedicated app to personalize your listening experience. The Sonos Ace is no exception to the rule with an application soberly called “Sonos” and available on both the Google Play Store and the App Store.
More focused on connection and personalization around the brand’s speakers, the Sonos application now integrates the company’s first portable headphones and has some additional features. In particular, it is possible to control the active noise reduction, the transparency mode and the equalizer of the headphones to adjust the bass, midrange and treble according to your preferences.
And… That’s basically all that can be said about the Sonos Ace companion application. The latter also allows you to pair the headphones with other speakers from the manufacturer, but we did not have this available for this test and therefore cannot judge whether the headphones integrate correctly into the Sonos ecosystem.
Correct autonomy for a recharge… Adaptive?
The brand’s official website mentions up to 30 hours of battery life for the Sonos Ace. We were able to use our test copy of the headset for an entire weekend, from Thursday evening to Sunday, and to take full advantage of it until its battery finally reached 0%. A very decent battery life, therefore, which allows the Sonos Ace to be used for two to three long days without worrying about the battery.
Once our headset is empty of battery, it’s time to test its recharge! We connected our Sonos Ace using the cable included in its box and here are our different readings:
- 2:15 p.m.: 0%
- 14h25 : 25%
- 2:35 p.m.: 53%
- 14h45 : 65%
- 2:55 p.m.: 85%
- 3:30 p.m.: 90%
We therefore observe very fast charging which allows the Sonos Ace to fill half of its battery in just 20 minutes. After this big push, the headset seems to charge more slowly and it will take a little over an hour to refuel. Ideal for quickly recharging for an evening or a day without the risk of damaging the battery by pushing it too hard.
Our conclusion to the Sonos Ace test
Sonos’ first nomadic headset is a real success. The firm has succeeded in creating a headset with a design that is very pleasant to wear on a daily basis and practical to carry with its included cover. This is indeed the best point of the Sonos Ace: its all-plastic design which makes it very light and so comfortable to wear, even for long hours (unlike its competitor from Apple).
On the good side, we will also note its ease of use and connection. Once the headset is connected to your device via Bluetooth, it is very easy to use it on a daily basis.
The audio quality of the Sonos Ace is also very good. The different tones of our music remain generally good even if we criticize a slight lack of bass on certain sounds. On this point, we would tend to go for the AirPods Max or even the AirPods Pro 2.
Overall, we therefore find a headset that is very pleasant to use on a daily basis, but whose sound qualities are perhaps a bit disappointing compared to the asking price of 499 euros. If you already have a Sonos ecosystem, purchasing the Sonos Ace makes a little more sense.
