A Little More Colorful and a Little Less Good

If you want Nothing’s only pair of over-ear wireless headphones, but you don’t want to spend $300, you now have one option at your disposal: the Headphone A, the first follow-up to the company’s Headphone 1 released last July.

Like Nothing’s previous A-branded devices, including the Ear A wireless earbuds, there’s a game plan, and it involves two major selling points: more colors and less money. Obviously, like any budget-friendly device with an “A” slapped on the end, those two perks don’t come without some compromises, and your main question should be: do those compromises outweigh the lower price tag?

The answer in this case? Frustratingly, yes and no.

An “A” in design

Before we get into the compromises, let’s talk about why you’d want to buy the Headphone A in the first place. The two main reasons are that they look cool, and they cost a little less than the Headphone 1. This time around, the Headphone A add a pop of color à la Ear A, including a new pink and yellow. No notes here; more color is fun, though you may be disappointed to find out that the yellow—the color that the brand specifically advertised in its teaser for the wireless headphones—is actually limited edition. Womp, womp. White, black, and pink all go on sale on March 13, while yellow will go on sale on April 6.

Somewhat unfortunately, I was only able to review the white unit, but despite the bland colorway, I think these wireless headphones look pretty cool. They lack the same flair as the Headphone 1, which has a cassette tape motif on the earcups, but they’re still doing more than most competitors. I like the rectangular earcup shape, like on the Headphone 1, and the circuit board-like plastic accents behind them. They are, however, plastic as opposed to the aluminum used on the Headphone 1, which definitely makes them feel cheaper. The silver lining is that they also feel lighter, and that’s because they indeed are lighter. The Headphone A weigh 310g compared to the Headphone 1, which clock in at 329g.

That slight weight reduction makes the Headphone A even more comfortable to wear than the Headphone 1, and the memory foam earcups feel as plush as always, so what you wind up with is a cool-looking pair of wireless headphones that feel really nice to wear. Similarly, I have no complaints with the buttons, including the volume roller and the paddle, which have both been retained in the Headphone A. Just like in the Headphone 1, I found myself reaching for those buttons fairly regularly when I’m on the go, especially when I’m on the subway and I want to change songs without fishing for my phone. As a refresher, the volume roller can adjust volume by rolling to either side and also change between noise cancellation modes with a long press. A single press can play or pause. The paddle can also skip tracks and fast-forward or rewind songs.

In both look and feel, the Headphone A fall pretty close to the Headphone 1, which is a good thing, since the Headphone 1 are a solid pair of wireless headphones. When it comes to sound, though, that’s where that price difference starts to show.

Are they the Headphone A? Or the Headphone B+?

As I said before, there are compromises to every budget-focused device, and the Headphone A are no different. I already covered a couple of aspects, including the pared-down design and the cheaper materials, but those are a little less obvious (and important) than arguably the biggest compromise in the Headphone A—the sound. In my opinion, you can hear the difference between the two pairs.

While the Headphone 1 leaned premium, courting a hi-fi crowd that also wanted some style, the Headphone A sheds that identity just a little bit. The most obvious way it ditches that selling point is in its sound tuning. The Headphone 1 were tuned in partnership with hi-fi audio brand, KEF, but the Headphone A have no such tie-in, which may seem fine on the surface, but could actually translate to a less nuanced listening experience.

I tested the Headphone A back-to-back against the Headphone 1 and much prefer the latter’s sound. It’s not that the Headphone A sound bad, just that the Headphone 1 sound noticeably better, particularly in higher frequencies. To me, higher tones just sound a little tinny in the Headphone A compared to the Headphone 1, especially in rock genres. I tested each pair by listening to “Sixteen Blue” by the Replacements back-to-back, and everything about Paul Westerberg’s gritty vocals and the band’s disheveled alt-rock/punk sound comes across better. The Headphone 1 sound just a little more natural and distortion-free.

Similarly, in genres where the low end is accentuated, like electronic music, the Headphone 1 have an edge. Bass and low-end in the Headphone A befall the same hiccups as a lot of low-to-midrange wireless headphones do in their insistence on beefing up lows to an almost oversimulated degree. If you love bass, you might put the Headphone A on and think to yourself, “Wow, nice,” but to me, it just sounds exaggerated. I prefer a more natural bass tuning—one that doesn’t overpower the mix.

Sound-wise, I find some similarities between the Headphone A and Nothing’s former sub-brand (now its own spinoff company) CMF, which released the CMF Headphone Pro last year. The Headphone A still have the edge over the CMF Headphone Pro in terms of sound quality, but not by as much as I had expected. Like the Headphone Pro, I find the bass to be a little too pronounced and artificial-sounding at times, even on the balanced EQ settings out of the box.

Similarly, call quality is just okay with the Headphone A. I took a several-minute phone call while walking around the Gizmodo office, and though the voice quality was fairly clear, the person I called reported hearing a lot of ambient noise, including people walking. They could also hear the running water when I washed my hands. The consensus was that the ambient noise was a little distracting, which means you may not want to take calls in louder environments. Overall, the call was rated a seven out of a potential 10 points in terms of quality by my friend, which isn’t bad, but isn’t great either.

When it comes to sound, you’re getting what you pay for across Nothing and CMF’s lineup. The CMF Headphone Pro, the Headphone A, and the Headphone 1 are good, better, and best, respectively.

AAA battery life

While the Headphone A are behind the Headphone 1 in the sound department, they’re actually stellar in other categories, including battery life. Nothing advertises 135 hours of battery life when active noise cancellation (ANC) is disabled and 75 hours of battery life with ANC on. For context, that’s not just good stacked up against the Headphone 1, which gets 80 hours with ANC off and 35 hours with ANC on, but it’s great in the wireless headphone world, period. In my testing, those battery life estimates seem to hold up, too. After three days of use, including five commutes to or from work of about 45 minutes to an hour, I’m at about 60% battery after starting at about 75%—and that’s with ANC activated almost the entire time. If battery life is a big selling point for you, these wireless headphones are absolutely worth a look.

Likewise, on the ANC front, I was impressed by the Headphone A. They blocked out a lot of noise both actively with software and passively through the tight seal created around my ears. On the subway, I was able to almost entirely tune out an evangelist screaming about Jesus (I think) for several long stops. Thanks, Nothing! While you can turn adaptive ANC on in the Nothing X app, I never felt the need to, given the fact that I use ANC mostly on the train, where max noise cancellation is preferable. In the ANC department, I found the Headphone A to be just as good as the Headphone 1, which is great considering the $100 price difference.

Feature-wise, there’s really nothing different this time around, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. With the Nothing X app, you can take advantage of advanced and preset EQs, including the “explore” tab, which lets you use custom EQ tuning from other Nothing X users. You also have features like low-lag mode for when latency may be an issue (if you’re gaming, for example), and spatial audio like “concert mode” and “cinema mode.” I tested both modes on movies and music, respectively, and while cinema mode doesn’t really translate to a huge difference in sound, concert mode just made things sound… worse. What would otherwise be a competently balanced tuning gets thrown out of whack the instant “concert mode” is turned on—bass is too upfront, and mids are dimmed to a muddy degree. I would not recommend.

There’s also a transparency mode for when you want to hear a bit of your surroundings that’s serviceable. It’s not beating Apple’s AirPods Max anytime soon, but voices don’t sound overly tinny, and you can hear a decent bit of your environment when it’s turned on. Ultimately, the Headphone A have the same feature set as the Headphone 1 for $100 less, which is hard to argue with.

A compromise worth making?

Whether you find value in the Headphone A will depend on one thing in particular: how much do you value sound? If you’re okay with compromising on sound quality a bit for things like battery life, then it’s an easy choice. Sure, the design is a little less cool, but is the cassette aesthetic on the side of the Headphone 1 worth $100? For most people, probably not. Better sound tuning might be worth it, though, and for me, I still lean toward the Headphone 1 being the better value. If you can spare the extra expense, I’m still going Headphone 1, but if you’re lured by new colors, a lower price tag, and a really beefy battery, the A in this case may stand for “affirmative.”