The Headphone
by Bragi
Bragi has a really cool wireless pair of headphones called the “Dash” with lots of sensors, on board storage, touch controls and sports a price tag of $299. This puts it outside the reach of what most consumers want to pay for a pair of earphones even wireless ones.
Enter “The Headphone” at a price point of $149, it has a more consumer friendly price tag and features the same audio quality as well as the much bragged about Audio Transperancy of the Dash product.
Bluetooth support works nicely with your iOS or Android device. The mic supports A2DP (v1.3) Hands Free Profile and Headset Profile. The speakers support the A2DP profile and come with the added benefit of AAC audio codec (and of course SBC audio codec). It should yield excellent audio quality for a Bluetooth connection. I say should because that’s generally what you come to expect from other Bluetooth headsets in this price range (ah-hem Jaybirds).
On paper :
These earbuds look amazing. They are completely wireless, and support a feature the company calls audio transparency which will allow you to be able to listen to your surroundings while listening to your favorite audio. In a way it turns these headphones into somewhat of a type of hearing aids. If you are in a quiet office and you power up the audio transparency (which by the way you cannot save as a default mode) you can listen to your podcast or music, while also gaining the audio of your surroundings. This is not the same as having a cheap pair of headphones that don’t block out the audio around you, because the audio remains crystal clear. In a quite office you may notice the sound from the A/C unit a bit more clearly :(. Where this feature really shines is on a run. They do have a mic that is always on when audio transparency is on. As a result, as with most microphones out in the real world, you pick up wind noise on a fast walk or a run. Some other reviewers have commented that it defeats the purpose if you are getting a lot of wind noise. It isn’t pretty, but it doesn’t change that you can still hear traffic, so the sound of a car approaching an intersection is easily detectable even when you are cranking up your favorite tunes! Speaking of cranking up the volume, I found the volume to be quite low. I don’t need to be able to blow out my ears, but in a noisy traffic area, the sound might almost drown out your music. Turning off the audio transparency feature lets you enjoy your music if you’ve selected the right earbud tips (silicone or foam) for your ears, however, now you can’t hear the traffic when you reach an intersection!
I was able to get about 6 full hours of constant use out of the Headphone playing back podcast, phone calls and music. The sound is descent for a pair of headphones this small and completely wireless. The highs are right where you expect them as well as the mids. What is lacking is the bass. Bragi provides a few pair of silicon tips as well as a pair of foam tips which help with the sound quality of the bass. I played with the smaller tips but while the bass was better it did not meet my expectations for a pair of $150 headphones. The foam tips helped to bring in more of the bass sound but overall, music still sounded like it was missing a bit of of a punch.
It lacks bass
First impressions:
When you open the packaging you find “The Headphone” packed very nicely. The care and attention are part of buying a premium product. Included with the left and right headphone pieces is a carrying charging case. This is not a battery charging case. This means you’ll find yourself hunting for a power source if you forget to bring a power bank with you when you are on the go. You also get a lanyard, which could be convenient for on the go charging but it’s a bit of a bulky item. lastly and just as important is the micro-usb cable for the charger case. You can manually tuck it into the case but it’s not designed to be carried inside the case, so I guess you have to figure that part out for yourself!
Usage:
You Must wear at least the right headphone to hear any audio in the left earphone. The right earphone has the control and an LED light that lights up when you power them up. when they are in your ears, the headphone provides a nice tone sound letting you know that they are powered on, and also when they connect to your phone (or other bluetooth device). Charging the Headphone is easy. The Headphone earpieces snap into place in the charging case via a magnetic seat. Once there is power to the charging cable the Headphone powers down and they light up glowing intermittently while they charge. The LED light will be steady once they reach 100% charging capacity. In my usage it took about 2 hours to fully charge to 100% from 0% which is in tolerance from the documentation.
Comfort:
Earphones are extremely subjective, the silicone and foam tips are a needed included accessory in this category because people’s ears are so different. I started out with the pre-installed medium tips but found that they hurt my hears. The small silicone tips worked well but I found the bass audio to be too flat. The foam tips I found provided the best seal, and audio quality vs the silicone tips. The problem here is that the foam tips are too big to allow the earpieces to snap into the charging case via the magnet. They don’t connect the pins in the case well unless you push down on them, and at times I found one ear piece out of the two that would not be charging because I did not properly push it into the case. This was not a problem when using the silicon tips and I think it’s a big mistake on Bragi’s part for not allowing more space below the foam tip for this. I mean, it’s not exactly like the case is tiny or compact, what’ the difference if they add a few more mm here for proper charging.
Enabling Audio transparency requires the user to fumble with the on board buttons. Once the option is on I did not find a way to leave this feature on by default. Contacting Customer Support I received a response 2 days later confirming my suspicion.
Call quality was excellent and I received many positive comments about the call quality while on a call with various people. The headphone are comfortable to wear. These devices work as a pair, or you can opt to wear just the right ear piece, sorry lefties.
Final Thoughts:
I used the Bragi Headphone(s) for one week to help me draw a conclusion. I used them at the office, on a walk, and on several runs I motivated myself to take. While the audio quality is acceptable, especially if your music is not particularly heavy bass set, I found the sound of many music categories I listen to, to be flat.
Indoors at my computer occasionally the audio would clip from the left ear. It didn’t matter if the headphones had just been charged or if they were powered on for several hours. If I disconnected the headphone from my phone and connected them to my iMac, the audio transparency feature would not work out of the right ear leaving me to feel a bit off balance.
There were a few times where the audio on my computer or phone would drop, the audio player would show that the content continued playing but there would be no sound coming out of the headphone. I confirmed that the device was still connected and that the Bragi was the audio output selected source, but to no avail. After a reboot of the Bragi they resumed operation. That’s ok for a cheap pair of headphones but I don’t think that’s the level of quality we expect from something that costs $149. The most frustrating experience was when I was out for a walk and the left earpiece just quit responding. Mind you I am not walking around anywhere with extreme temperatures. It was about 65F degrees outside and it was my fourth day trying out the Bragi. When I returned to my desk I sat the left earpiece in the charger and let it charge for about 5 minutes, and it was still unresponsive. I docked both earpieces in for about 30 minutes and when I checked once again the left earpiece had resumed working for the rest of the day without major issues (occasionally the audio transparency would stop functioning.) Customer Support confirmed that the only way to reset the left earpiece was to dock it into the charger and charge it back up again.
Lastly, this is not a knock on the Bragi Headphone but they come with all the inconvenience of bluetooth headsets, so switching devices is a pain. It’s not Bragi’s fault but it’s something to consider if you are deciding between Apple AirPods and Bragi the Headphone.
After a week I will be returning these headphones back to Bragi because while I can live with the lack of punchiness of the bass, I absolutely could not understand why at random times the audio just dropped even though my phone still showed them as connected. Other bluetooth headphones do not drop out on me like this in the same environment leading me to believe it’s the headphone and not my device that was the problem.
