Photo credit: Jabra
The Jabra Elite 75t headphones are supposedly better than the competition. Is that really true?
If you use headphones, you know that they are quite convenient for everyday use. Especially while working from home, hearing aids have been my best friend, drowning out any noise or conversations around the house.
I have a few pairs of wireless earbuds, but lately I’ve heard that the Jabra earbuds were great for the price, design, and sound quality. Jabra sent me a pair of their Elite 75t headphones for an honest review, and I was eager to put them to the test.
Overall, when considering prices for a reliable set of headphones, the Jabra Elite 75t offers solid sound quality for less than its competitors.
They work just as well, and even better, depending on your unique customizations for your audio. And this goes beyond sound performance – the physical design of these headphones is far more attractive than anything else hanging from your ear.
These headphones cost $ 179.99 and have multiple color options.
Initial reactions
When they first arrived, I was excited to see what they looked like. After removing the lid from the box, there is a tab that you need to pull to reveal the headphones. When unpacked, the headphones are in the center with a note from Jabra informing you about their Sound + app allowing you to customize your sound.
The buttons are shiny with a smooth matte finish around the earbuds. The charging case also has a smooth matte finish. The case is comparable to the size of a TicTac box and was extremely lightweight, even holding the headphones.
Pulling the headphones out of the frame, I was a bit concerned that they would look and feel small in my hand. However, once I put the headphones on, I was impressed with how perfectly they fit.
For one thing, these headphones seemed to penetrate a bit deeper into the ear canal than other headphones.
In fact, I enjoyed that because there wasn’t much sticking out or hanging from my ear.
Jabra provided three sizes for the gel ear-tip: small, medium and large. The headphones come standard with the medium tips already on, and they performed with a perfect fit for me compared to the others. But in addition to all the physical characteristics of these headphones, I finally wanted to test the sound quality.
Sound quality:
Most importantly, I was ready to test if they are better than AirPods. I really wanted to test them with songs from different genres that I am currently listening to on repeat.
The songs I tried it with:
These headphones have a HearThrough function. For this initial sound check, I turned off the HearThrough feature so that I could really examine the sound quality right out of the box. Without making custom sound adjustments, there is a well balanced crisp tone for each of the songs. It is comparable to its competitors in solid sound quality. The noise-canceling experience on these felt more isolated though, and I enjoyed it.
If you have the volume at 50% it still seems pretty low. But once you hit 75%, you get a well balanced sound. It’s easy to hear everything that happens in the background of songs.
The maximum volume of the headphones really made the experience different from the other sound levels. It would be a huge benefit to Jabra to improve the volume features and how good it sounds at all levels and not just the highest mark of 75% and above.
Sound customizations: One of the cool features of these headphones is the HearThrough feature. The HearThrough function amplifies surrounding sounds, whether music is playing or not.
This is something that I have not experienced as a characteristic of a pair of headphones or earphones. One downside was that by amplifying the sounds around me, the sound quality dropped a bit.
With the HearThrough feature turned off, it really prevented other sounds from interfering with the music and sound quality. When you have the HearThrough function activated, it amplifies the sounds around you, whether or not music is playing. The wind would muffle the music, and that was not a good combination. I found it useful when exercising near busy streets to listen for cars to pass or honk; Other than that, you probably wouldn’t use that feature much.
Now, I was ready to see what the audio experience would be like playing with the app customizations. You can customize your sound with the music equalizer, explore preset ambient sounds, and control the HearThrough function option.
When toggling with the music equalizer, there is a bit of static that you can hear when you are making adjustments. The static disappears once you’ve decided where to put your preferences on the equalizer.
I like the personalization feature because it made my listening experience unique for different genres.
In addition to the sound customizations, there are several ambient sound presets. The ambient sound selections they had were a pleasant surprise. I enjoyed listening to the sound of the rain, the crashing waves or the songbirds.
Durability – I was also intrigued to see how this headphone model would withstand sweat from exercise.
Jabra has an active version of the Elite 75t headphones designed to resist sweat, but I thought why not try the non-active edition at a lower price. I was glad to see that they were holding up the sweat well, for the most part. If you are one of those who sweat much more easily with your ears, it is worth mentioning that the more sweat is produced, the headphones slip a bit.
Also, with exercise, if you are doing jerky movements or big jumps, the earbuds do slip a bit, but it’s just a slight push back for maximum safety.
Compared to the AirPods, there have been more times than I would like where I was bending over and one of the pods had already fallen off before I could adjust.
Final thoughts: After trying it out for a couple of weeks, I’d say they are a great alternative to their competitors.
If you are looking for price points, you will get more value from these for the price they are, as you will be able to customize your sound along with it. What makes these headphones great apart from their competitors is that the comfort and fit of these headphones really takes the cake. They don’t stick out and it doesn’t feel like anything is weighing on the ear.
As a bonus, the battery life was incredible. I didn’t have to charge them very often and even when I did, it took a bit of time to charge back to full battery.
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