i have been a skullcandy stan since like 2010, they have always been a solid budget choice and last a long time. my very favorite pair of theirs has been the Push Active. the fit, quality and price hit for me and i have used them for several years. however, the last couple pairs i had have stopped pairing, only showing up as “Tile” in the BT menu.
i replaced them with some Smokin Buds due to my tightened budget, and they worked alright for a month or so, but now there is no media audio. they still produce audio because when i put one in i get the “connected” message.
i just want a comfortable pair of earbuds for work that are sweat resistant, noise blocking, preferably with the over-ear hooks. i dont need outstanding audio quality, i primarily listen to audiobooks and podcasts while working. my budget is 50 bucks give or take.
i havent had the need to look outside of skullcandy til now, and looking at options online is very overwhelming for me. any reliable brands would even be a great starting point for me.
cheers!
Airpods are great, just connect and just works reliably
I’ve tried various Bluetooth earbuds and nothing else is as hassle free unless something changed in last couple of years
My sound isolation mic failed though after around 5 years and I’ve went back to wired earphones lol. Tired of charging them and dropping them
Do they still suck on android or has it gotten any better?
try soundcore… it’s owned by amazon so you may not want to. i have a pair of the space a40 and they are comfortable and have ANC… they make a number of different styles and then have different price points in each style
I’d recommend Anker’s Soundcore series too.
I was also a Skullcandy fan (still have a pair of their Dime 2 earbuds I like to use when I’m going to sleep). The Anker p31i are my daily drivers now, though. For around $30 on sale, they have active noise cancelling and the batteries last all day – I didn’t charge the battery in the carrying case until a month after I bought them.
Woah back up, no they aren’t. They are sold heavily on Amazon but Amazon doesn’t own any part of them.
my bad…apologies… bad brand association. i still bought them though
It’s all good. I was annoyed that the only way to buy their stuff is through Amazon. Even if you order direct from their website they just ship it from Amazon.
definitely want to avoid amazon if possible, but thanks!
Soundcore is owned by Anker, who also own eufy. While I wouldn’t trust Anker any further than I could throw them, I have owned Soundcore products since they were still branded as just Anker.
I keep a pair of Liberty 3(? Maybe) as my “kitchen” ear buds and I took my Q30s around the world with me (and it absolutely shows, they’re thrashed). They’re fine audio products but for the price - Amazing.
Any specifics on why you’re anti-Anker? If the quality sucks, that can be improved. If they’re actively trying to destroy democracy and the middle class, that’s kind of different.
Search for anker recalls. They have had plenty of dangerous recalls for bad batteries. I have multiple of their products and have been pretty happy overall, but there is a risk.
Anker’s eufy brand claimed all local storage for their security systems but they were routing everything through AWS for displaying the feed - hence not trusting them but as far as I know no major, flock-enabling scandals or anything.
Also, they’re a company. Yet another reason not to trust them. By the time I’m finished writing this post they could’ve done a bunch of terrible stuff.
Very true. Any publicly traded corporation is basically by definition operating as a psychopath. Sometimes we get lucky and they’re slightly less terrible than the others and sometimes that changes overnight.
For the record Soundcore is not owned by Amazon. They are sold heavily there but that’s it. And I also recommend their products, they are what I consider the best bang for your buck when it comes to audio equipment. Anker charging products are also the same company and also good cost to quality ratio.
i do like anker, lemme check that out!
I have the sport x20 and while they’re above your budget ($80) I just wanted to add my recommendation to soundcore. They’re my favorite over the ear earbuds that I’ve tried so far. They’re super comfortable, they stay in my ear whether I’m running or laying down with my head against a pillow, and the sound is pretty good. The only thing I don’t like is that the charging case is really finicky and if I’m not paying attention sometimes I dock them to charge and go to use them the next day and they’re completely dead. But I like them enough that when I can find a spare $80 I’m hoping to buy a second pair because I’m tired of constantly transferring this case around between my different backpacks for work, school and normal life and then having to go on a treasure hunt to figure out which bag I had them in last when I want to use them at home.
Take a look at Scarbir’s website he has a really extensive list of earbuds, often the more lesser known and cheaper bang for the buck brands.
Oh boy I love how Lemmy thinks that we need to have a system for handling users posting relative links for some reason. But specifically for relative links that change based on the viewer’s instance. Because under no circumstances will someone put in a URL without https://
This isn’t a Lemmy thing per se. Lemmy just takes the URL you enter and renders it into HTML; in HTML a
hrefwithout a protocol is treated as a link relative to the current domain (i.e. your instance).
Wow, thanks for that link, it’s a game changer!
You can usually get some late-model Soundcores in that range, and I’ve always found the ones with 4.6 stars or higher to be solid. Their ANC isn’t fantastic, and for music they aren’t great, but they’re my go-tos because I’m a podcast guy and the battery life is pretty good for the price. The Soundcore Life earbuds are the ones I might avoid, but Soundcore Liberty and Soundcore P##i series have been “fine” across the board.
I’ve had good experience with JBLs, using a Live Beam 3 rn. Cheaper ones might be around your price range.
A few days ago i saved a post from someone who recommended In Ear Monitors with a Bluetooth Adaptor as the ideal solution. I can’t find my saved post, but they even recommended specific brands.
The theory is that you get more bang for your buck because in ear monitors are a more competitive market? I wish i knew more
I actually keep coming back to Sony earbuds, because they seem to be the only brand that still makes the earbuds controlled by buttons instead of capacitive touch. Had the Sony WF-C500 for a couple years and they still work perfectly fine, but I recently bought a pair of WF-C510 because I wanted multi-connection Bluetooth (so that I can use my PC, tablet and phone audio without fiddling around and re-pairing all the time). They were like 35 bucks.
I also used to be a pretty enthusiastic Skullcandy user, but agree that in recent years they’ve pretty much downgraded to the reliability level of the cheapest no-name garbage you’d find at a gas station counter hanging between the cardboard air fresheners and unregulated sex pills.
Sony’s XM4s were the best
Earfun make some pretty good budget earbuds. Great value.
Missing the tile tracking feature which was honestly fire. Idk how sweat resistant
I’ve been very happy with my JBL 130. Nothing fancy, but good sound, excellent noise canceling for the price. For me few earbuds are comfortable but these fit well for me.
If budget is constantly an issue, maybe try some wired iems that will last longer than wireless. I can easily recommend the tangzu wan’er 2 (3.5mm, not 4.4mm) as you get a quality mass produced cable, great eartips that hold up against sweat, and they are tuned better for vocals which translates well in audiobooks and podcasts. I’m not an all out audiophile but I dabble. That would cost about $25usd + shipping and then you can get a jcally type c dac for cheap. If you’re on an iphone, you can just get a lightning to 3.5mm dongle instead of the jcally or other dac. You can obviously still go wireless if you’d like.
The best I’ve ever had is soundcore x20. They can take a beating, comfortable with adjustable hooks, have sound that’s enough to get you in the range between goregrind and dub, and have a decent anc, and usb-c charging port . The only downside is that battery is weakish.
Anker soundcore. They run in the $30-99 range, have all sorts of types that include buds, over the ear, etc. Some models have decent ANC. They also support being paired to 2 devices at once, which is really nice if you use your earbuds with more than one device. Lots of high end models still weirdly dont support dual connections like these $60 earbuds.
I use the sport x20 model mostly because I hate “stick in” earbuds. The ANC on them is solid for the train or general commuting, but isn’t up there with brands like Bose/Sony. Good enough for an office environment in my experience, but not “full” silence.
BT shocks openrun they’re conduction so you’d need ear plugs but tbf outside noise doesn’t really affect them. You could pop ear plugs in.
Linsoul zero 2’s are the best budget earphone I’ve brought not Bluetooth though.
I disagree with this suggestion. They said they have a tight budget and want noise blocking headphones. Shokz are great (especially for audiobooks and podcasts) but they are expensive and specifically designed to not block sound. They sound muffled and weird if you use ear plugs.
Yeah fair take, I got mine really cheap and they’re not looking for audio quality. For me they seem like the best value product for workouts, audiobooks etc they’re over ear hook. They shouldn’t die for a few years and costco have them on sale all the time so you have that as an option for added support. I don’t equate cheap with budget theres no point spending 4x20 over 2 years when 2x20 will serve you for 3.
