Although these are the first headphones from Sonos, the Sonos Ace are a pretty good product, but not without flaws and things that could be improved in a second generation.
Sonos has finally done it: it now has wireless headphones, and its first generation couldn’t have come at a better time. The Sonos Ace headphones are not only good headphones, but they are also a very important product for Sonos because they further expand its range of audio products.
I must admit that I personally already own several Sonos products. Specifically, a first-generation Sonos Beam soundbar and two Sonos One speakers. I’m immersed in the Sonos ecosystem, so headphones, in my case, are the perfect addition, even though I own their main competitor.
But the Sonos Ace doesn’t behave like its speakers, starting with the fact that it doesn’t have Wi-Fi, the star feature of its products. Yes, it’s true that it can work alongside the high-end Sonos Arc soundbar and they work in a special way together, but if you have another Sonos product, let’s say that these headphones are on their own.
Sonos Ace headphones cost $499, a high-end price and product that clearly wants to compete against the stars, the Sony WH-1000XM5 and the Apple AirPods Max. But can it really compete in design, features, and functionality against two of the best over-ear headphones on the market right now?
Design with the perfect combination of comfort and style
Sonos has a very good design team. And if I had to describe the design of the Sonos Ace, it would be very clear: they’ve taken the best of Sony’s XM5 and the best of the AirPods Max and remixed them to make a pair of headphones that are both good and beautiful.
The earbuds remind me a lot of Sony’s, although they are larger. The same goes for the foam headband that fits on your head. From Apple’s headphones, they’ve taken ideas from the bar that allows them to be made larger and the magnetic ear cushion system that allows them to be changed or cleaned.
I’m not saying they’ve copied them, but the ideas are very similar. As long as the result is as good as this, I welcome these ideas “borrowed” from the competition.
I have a “big” head, let’s face it, I’m a big head. But unlike other headphones, these Sonos Ace not only sit well on my head, I also find that they fit better in terms of opening.
They are extremely comfortable and lightweight, even more so than my Sony WH-1000XM5, which are the ones I use every day.
My ear fits perfectly inside the ear cushions and the passive noise cancellation seal is good, leaving no room for outside noise to enter.
It has 40 mm drivers per earpiece and 4 microphones per earpiece for noise cancellation and ambient noise elimination during calls.
Physically, there is a power button on the left earpiece, a button to control noise cancellation on the right side, and a button that you can press and slide to control volume and playback.
There are no touch controls like on Sony headphones or digital crowns like on Apple headphones. Not only are the physical buttons easy to identify, they are also easy to use. The play button has a standard function.
The ear pads can be removed extremely easily. This is an idea we’ve already seen in the AirPods Max. They’re magnetic, so if you want to clean them or replace them when they get dirty, you can remove them easily and without any fuss. In addition, the ear pads have a protective mesh to prevent anything from getting into the drivers.
The Sonos app is a disaster, especially if you have other Sonos products
If the Ace is your first experience with the Sonos platform, you won’t have any problems using the official app. But things are different if you’re a long-time Sonos user, because the new version of the app is, compared to previous generations, worse.
The Sonos community’s complaints about the redesign of the Sonos app are well known and have caused quite a bit of frustration. While all redesigns tend to be poorly received by loyal users, the app still needs some work to be “finished.” Features such as the option to add reminders, search for local music, and more have disappeared.
Accessing the headphone settings, especially if you have other Sonos products, is more complicated than it should be. If you play via cable, the Sonos Ace disappears from the app, as it is not using Bluetooth.
Sonos urgently needs to revamp its app, both in terms of organization, design, and more settings for the headphones, because they are light years away from other options such as Sony’s.
In terms of connectivity, the surprise with these Sonos Ace speakers is that they don’t use Wi-Fi to play music, one of the star features of Sonos speakers and soundbars.
Although the Sonos Ace has a Wi-Fi chip inside, the answer was officially found on Reddit, where the network manager confirmed that it is only used to pair with other Sonos products, not for playback, due to “range, power, and component” issues.
Therefore, we have to settle for Bluetooth 5.4 for practically everything, in addition to the USB-C connection that can be used to play music without compression.
Good sound, but noise cancellation lags behind Sony and Apple
The sound quality of the Sonos Ace is good, although not perfect and, of course, far from the lossless sound offered by other headphones thanks to special chips, as is the case with Apple’s iPhone and AirPods.
The sound quality using Bluetooth is good, acceptable for an audio connoisseur, although you can always use a USB-C cable to get lossless sound.
In the absence of Wi-Fi playback, which could technically give us uncompressed sound, at least it has aptX Adaptive, which is only compatible with the most modern Android phones for higher bitrate sound.
It also features Dolby Atmos and spatial audio. This feature allows you to listen to audio similar to a 360º system and, with spatial audio, as you turn your head, the sound focuses on the sound source, whether it’s your mobile phone or a soundbar.
You can play music losslessly by connecting via USB-C cable. This is the only way to get lossless audio from platforms such as Apple Music, Deezer, or Amazon Music.
Personally, without having a good ear, with Apple Music I notice better music quality in Dolby Atmos than with lossless audio. The difference is noticeable, perhaps because of the immersive effect of Atmos, but I would say—and apologies to audiophiles—that it sounds better this way.
If you use Android, you’ll get better sound quality if you have a phone with aptX.
The noise cancellation quality is good, and by that I mean that street noise, people talking near you, and the noise of airplane or train engines are eliminated without any problems, but it doesn’t quite match the quality of Sony or Apple. Is that bad? Not at all, it’s just a step below, but above other brands.
What is excellent is the transparency system, which Sonos calls Aware mode, which turns on the microphones so you can hear both what you’re playing and what’s going on outside. It’s a virtually perfect system. I can hear anyone near me clearly without artificially increasing the sound. You hear better than if you weren’t wearing anything, but not so much that it sounds like you have a speaker glued to a microphone.
One of the star features of the Sonos Ace is its integration with its platform and other products, such as the Sonos Arc soundbars. Sound sharing allows you to automatically connect the Sonos Ace to the soundbar, so you can use the app to play the sound from your TV through your headphones.
Sound sharing isn’t very polished. Starting with the fact that the feature isn’t available in the Android app, only in the iOS version for now, although Sonos is working on it, I find this totally unacceptable. In addition, the initial setup failed several times and the connection failed on a few occasions.
As for the battery, Sonos’ claims are almost spot on. The company says it provides around 30 hours of music playback with noise cancellation, and in my tests, I achieved between 25 and 28 hours of battery life when switching between noise cancellation and transparency mode.
The Sonos Ace is a good choice in headphones
Sonos Ace are very good headphones and as a first version they have hit the mark. Not without their first-generation problems, these are easy to overlook because the important things are there: they sound great, are very comfortable, look good, and have good noise cancellation and transparency mode.
They cost $499, which is currently $80 less than the AirPods Max, but $49 more than the official price of the Sony WH-1000XM5, although these are usually around $300-320 on sale. If you have to choose between these three options, the choice is not easy.
It’s a high-end price for a high-end product, which needs improvement, but with enhancements that should come via software updates, which, incidentally, have already seen two firmware updates since this review was published.
