The Pixel Buds Professional 2 are the newest flagship wi-fi earbuds from Google and the second technology mannequin of the 2022 Pixel Buds Professional. This newest model makes reasonably massive claims of being probably the most snug earbuds whereas additionally having the ability to cancel twice as a lot noise because the Pixel Buds Professional due to the brand new Google Tensor A1 chip inside every earbud. Priced at $229 MSRP, Google is as soon as once more competing with the heavy weights of the business. Let’s see how they stack up.
Design
The Pixel Buds Professional 2 earbuds have been redesigned in comparison with the earlier technology mannequin. Gone are the bulbous tubers that felt like shoving grapes in your ears and have now been changed by considerably smaller buds that really feel extra like tiny ear plugs. Google says the brand new earbuds have been designed with 45 million information factors from completely different ears and are probably the most snug earbuds.
On the surface, the brand new earbuds have the identical round disc-shaped design that has been a signature aspect for all earlier Pixel Buds fashions. Nevertheless, on the within, the earbuds are significantly smaller. So small, the truth is, that they now function built-in wing ideas that assist safe the earbuds in your ears as there isn’t a lot mass to refill the cavity.
The earbuds might be worn one in every of two methods; you possibly can both insert them as is, at which level the earbuds are mainly floating inside your ears with little or no contact. This clearly makes them inclined to fall out so the opposite means is to twist them in. This permits the fin to dig into your ears and lock them in place.
The earbuds have a two-tone coloration design. The chosen coloration of the earbuds is simply discovered on the outer disc because the insides are simply matte black plastic. As with the earlier mannequin, the black inside plastic visibly reveals greasy smudges irrespective of how clear your ears are and demand fixed cleansing.
The outer floor of the earbuds is touch-sensitive and helps a number of gestures. These are straightforward sufficient to activate when you handle to determine the place precisely the earbuds are on the aspect of your face, as their small dimension makes them straightforward to overlook. Google says it makes use of IR proximity sensor to detect when the earbuds are worn however I couldn’t find the place this sensor was positioned. I did discover a spot the place the earbuds responded to bodily contact with pores and skin for play/pause detection however that’s not precisely how IR works so I am unsure what’s occurring there.
Google cleverly detects contact enter from each the outer contact floor and the within sensors to detect when you could have completed inserting the earbuds in your ears. It’s solely whenever you totally take away your fingers from the earbuds does the ANC kick in and the playback begins. This additionally means you possibly can by no means by accident set off contact gestures whereas inserting the earbuds in your ears, one thing that plagues so many different earbuds in the marketplace.
Shifting on to the case, there isn’t loads to speak about right here. The outside design is almost an identical and had it not been for the speaker port on the underside it could have been not possible to distinguish between our Buds Professional 2 and Buds Professional instances. The speaker is there to play sounds whereas pairing or charging and can be made to beep if misplaced. The case nonetheless has the identical glorious eggshell texture that does are inclined to stain extra time.
One very nice enchancment with the Pixel Buds Professional 2 is how the earbuds are positioned throughout the case. With the Pixel Buds Professional, the earbuds have been a bit annoying to pluck out since they sat practically flush with the case. The Pixel Buds Professional 2 stick out a good bit and supply room to tug them out with ease.
Having mentioned that, there’s a draw back to the tiny dimension of the earbuds, and that’s that they’re a ache to deal with. At the same time as somebody who’s not often clumsy, I dropped the earbuds numerous instances due to how little floor space there may be to seize onto when you pull them out of the case or your ears. It’s a must to take excessive quantities of care dealing with these as they’re simply unbelievably straightforward to drop and keep away from dealing with them over issues like grates or gaps between practice or elevator doorways.
When it comes to construct high quality, each the earbuds and the case really feel fairly premium and well-made. The earbuds are IP54 compliant and the case is IPX4. Exterior of maximum abuse (maybe by dropping them continuously), each the earbuds and the case ought to final on a regular basis use.
Lastly, I do know it is a nitpick however having 4 coloration choices after which putting these colours solely on one small a part of the product feels a bit foolish. Positive, it’s the half others see probably the most however it’s hardly ever what you get to see your self. Different merchandise have their colours prolong over to the case however not solely has the case design on the Pixel Buds Professional 2 not modified, it’s additionally nonetheless simply white.
Consolation
Consolation is a giant promoting level for the Pixel Buds Professional 2 and Google appears to have gone by way of plenty of effort to make sure it’s good. I gained’t say a lot about the entire ‘most snug earbuds’ declare; I’m certain even Google realizes it overcooked that one a bit because it’s not possible to establish if one thing is probably the most snug when you think about the sheer variety of earbuds in the marketplace, to not point out the completely different ear varieties.
I’ll say that the Pixel Buds Professional 2 have been fairly snug in my use. The locking mechanism places a tiny little bit of pressure in your ears than when you simply allow them to be however I didn’t like how insecure they felt with out locking in so I opted to lock them in each time. I feel the earlier technology earbuds have been a bit extra snug general and I additionally have a tendency to seek out earbuds with stalks nicer to put on (and deal with). However all issues thought-about, the Pixel Buds Professional 2 are fairly good on this regard.
Software program and options
The Pixel Buds Professional 2 work with the Pixel Buds app, which comes pre-installed on Pixel gadgets and might be downloaded individually on different Android telephones. There is no such thing as a iOS model, which in some way feels pettier than Apple proscribing its earbuds to solely its telephones.
The Pixel Buds app has been round for a while now and nonetheless manages to really feel weirdly janky, particularly in the way in which it masses issues. The app detects the paired earbuds and solely masses options which might be particular to them however the way in which it does this isn’t very fluid and you’ll typically catch it loading some issues slower than others. The display additionally scrolls up randomly whenever you faucet sure gadgets within the menus and the EQ display tells you to create a customized EQ each single time you go into the EQ display. Some gadgets additionally didn’t reply to faucets at instances irrespective of how typically the app was restarted.
Pixel Buds app
By means of the app, you possibly can modify issues like ANC modes, contact gestures, EQ, spatial audio, multipoint pairing, and extra.
The ANC choices are reasonably easy toggles between ANC on, ANC off, and transparency modes. There aren’t any sliders or presets to pick the ANC or transparency mode strengths like on another competing manufacturers.
Contact controls
The EQ provides a number of usable presets together with a customized 5 band customized mode. Nevertheless, the EQ makes use of nomenclatures like ‘Higher Treble’ and ‘Low Bass’ as a substitute of simply utilizing the frequency values like everybody else, which makes adjusting a selected frequency band troublesome. The Quantity EQ choice from earlier fashions is right here and mechanically boosts bass frequencies whenever you pay attention at decrease quantity ranges to compensate.
There’s additionally a Listening to Wellness part, which gives helpful info in your present listening ranges. It additionally tells you in case your collected listening quantity is inside beneficial publicity stage or when you’ve got been listening at excessive volumes for too lengthy. The app can even offer you a notification in case your beneficial publicity restrict is exceeded.
Sound settings
The Spatial Audio function can be again with head monitoring utilizing on-board sensors on the earbuds. The implementation of this function remains to be fairly poor as a result of Google likes to faux Dolby Atmos doesn’t exist regardless of being in nearly each main smartphone as of late. Google’s spatial audio function is simply carried out in video apps, that too only a few on the time of writing (Google TV, Max, Netflix, Disney Plus). This implies you can not use it in apps like Apple Music or Tidal nor can you utilize it with your individual video recordsdata. The spatial audio additionally works solely with Pixel gadgets, which additional limits its use.
You can too replace the firmware by way of the app. That is considerably annoying as in contrast to in different such apps, the Pixel Buds app doesn’t simply allow you to verify if an replace is on the market. It should let you recognize, at its leisure, if such a factor does, the truth is, exist. If it does then it’s going to resolve, at its leisure, when to switch the replace to the earbuds. The firmware for Pixel Buds gadgets is utilized to the earbuds in addition to the case. Whereas the telephone transfers the replace to the earbuds, the earbuds resolve, at their leisure, when to switch the replace to the case. This complete course of is irritating to witness and tends to take ages to finish.
Listening to Wellness
Now onto extra critical complaints. My main criticism with the earlier technology Pixel Buds Professional was the litany of software program points that plagued the machine on the time of testing. Sadly, the Pixel Buds Professional 2 additionally has its justifiable share to report. The ANC within the left earbud didn’t work appropriately. When engaged, it could really slip in some noise from the surface, noise you wouldn’t hear if ANC was disabled. This wasn’t some tip or match situation as flipping the earbud to the opposite ear introduced with the identical situation.
When paired with a Home windows PC, there was a popping noise that performed once in a while whereas enjoying audio. There have been additionally situations the place the earbuds have been clearly paired and related with the take a look at smartphone however regardless of that the telephone was enjoying audio by way of its loudspeaker as a substitute of the earbuds. At one level the one faucet gesture on the left earbud stopped working however the different gestures labored nice.
Spatial Audio and different choices
All through these points, the earbuds have been manufacturing unit reset a number of instances to no avail. They have been and stay on the time of writing on the newest firmware model, which is 2.117. Trying on the Pixel Buds subreddit, I’m clearly not the one one having points with these earbuds, with different customers complaining about much more issues. I’m certain Google will repair a few of these points over time because it did with the Pixel Buds Professional however launching a brand new flagship pair of earbuds with such fundamental points each time is unbecoming for a software program firm of Google’s dimension and expertise.
{Hardware}
The Pixel Buds Professional 2 use 11mm dynamic drivers which might be fairly probably the identical ones used on the Pixel Buds Professional, though Google does declare to have a “new excessive frequency chamber for clean treble”.
Powering all the things is a brand new customized Tensor A1 chip that has devoted lanes for ANC and audio processing. Google claims the chip is 90 instances quicker than the velocity of sound so it ought to be capable to sustain with the calls for of the ANC algorithm, which the corporate claims leads to 2x higher noise cancellation over the earlier Pixel Buds Professional.
Regardless of all that, the corporate remains to be considerably caught within the stone age relating to its selection of audio codecs. The Pixel Buds Professional 2 help SBC, AAC, and Opus. Out of those, Opus is simply used for spatial audio content material, so that you’re principally caught with AAC for all of your common audio wants. This isn’t essentially an indictment of AAC, which is a nice codec regardless of its age and ease however you possibly can actually do higher than that in 2024 for the asking worth.
Efficiency
Audio high quality
The unique Pixel Buds Professional had first rate if unexciting audio high quality. In comparison with all the things else about it, the sound felt like considerably of an afterthought and actually was nothing to write down dwelling about. Fortunately, that’s not the case with the Pixel Buds Professional 2.
With the tuning of the Pixel Buds Professional 2, Google has chosen to go in a really completely different path from the Pixel Buds Professional or certainly what would typically be thought-about mainstream. Whereas the Pixel Buds Professional had a considerably typical bassy low-end and hotter general sound, the Pixel Buds Professional 2 are a lot leaner and cleaner sounding.
Let’s begin with the bass. The Pixel Buds Professional had a really thumpy low-end response, which was actually what the complete tuning was centered round. The Pixel Buds Professional 2 are available with a a lot tighter and leaner general bass response. The bass shelf now sits a lot decrease and whereas it’s nonetheless elevated over what one may think about reference, it has a way more exact and lighter high quality to it. You continue to get punchy assault and slam from drums and the heat from cellos and bass guitars however it doesn’t dominate the general sound.
Very like on the Pixel Buds Professional, the decrease mid-range on the Pixel Buds Professional 2 is pulled again barely within the combine, making among the vocals a bit more durable to listen to over the remainder of the combo. Nevertheless, the general mid-range readability on the Pixel Buds Professional 2 is far higher compared, which suggests all the things nonetheless comes throughout fairly effectively.
What the Pixel Buds Professional 2 lack is the timbre of the Pixel Buds Professional. The unique mannequin have a smoother, mellower tone to the vocals and devices whereas the Pixel Buds Professional 2 tends to sound fairly nasal and metallic within the higher mid-range. It’s not one thing one would instantly decide up on however going forwards and backwards between the 2 fashions it’s fairly obvious. Firming down the frequencies between 1-2kHz ought to assist a bit however you’re going to want one thing higher than the 5-band EQ within the app.
The treble response is drastically improved on the Pixel Buds Professional 2; the present model of the Pixel Buds Professional sounds fairly gentle and muted within the treble vary, which the Pixel Buds Professional 2 fixes. The draw back of that is that on some tracks the Pixel Buds Professional 2 treble response might be fairly sharp and sibilant. Nonetheless, these situations have been uncommon in my testing and general I a lot want the treble response on the newer mannequin.
General, I think about the tuning on the Pixel Buds Professional 2 to be a giant enchancment over their predecessors. As an alternative of a one-dimensional bass-forward sound, the brand new mannequin presents a balanced, cleared, and brighter sound. The sound can be rather more detailed and doesn’t sound fairly as gentle and fuzzy as earlier than.
The Pixel Buds Professional 2 even have first rate imaging and soundstaging. The sharper, increased decision sound has rather more distinct object placement within the combine and there may be higher sense of area across the listener. Even with out gimmicky spatial audio options, the sound is wider and extra three-dimensional.
Talking of spatial audio, it was fairly poor in my utilization, a lot because it was on the Pixel Buds Professional. For no matter purpose, the spatial audio combine is sort of gentle with a low-resolution, vague sound. The dynamic vary can be poor and all the things sounds roughly the identical quantity within the combine. The bass is bloated and principally what you hear in motion sequences with the dialog being no clearer than in commonplace stereo. It’s only a high to backside failure when you think about its restricted makes use of and the addition of additional {hardware} for the pointless head monitoring function.
One factor to notice is that there’s a important distinction in sound between the ANC modes. Whereas there isn’t any actual audible distinction whenever you change between ANC on and transparency mode, switching to the ANC off makes the sound significantly extra stuffy with a subtle higher mid-range and treble response and heightened bass response. Furthermore, the sound additionally will get extra boxed-in and two-dimensional, and nearly sounds monophonic compared. Often, there may be some distinction between ANC on and off modes however it’s hardly ever this massive. Why the distinction exists within the first place shouldn’t be clear since Google claims the ANC and audio sign take completely different paths throughout the chipset. There’s zero purpose for the ANC to have such an impression on the audio processing and I’ve to imagine it is a bug that somebody forgot to check.
Microphone
The microphone efficiency on the Pixel Buds Professional 2 was a combined bag. In comparison with the Pixel Buds Professional, the brand new mannequin has clearer sounding vocals. Having mentioned that, the earlier mannequin had a extra pure and fewer artificially enhanced voice even when it’s a bit quieter.
Nevertheless, when there may be loud background noise, the Pixel Buds Professional 2 simply falls aside. It will probably eliminate the background noise when you aren’t talking however the second you communicate, you hear your voice together with the supply of the noise within the background concurrently. It’s prefer it utterly offers up on doing any noise discount when it detects the individual talking and hopes the opposite social gathering will hear you over the noise. As compared, the Pixel Buds Professional really did an honest job of slicing out background noise even while you’re talking.
Only for the sake of reference, I attempted the OnePlus Buds Professional 3 once more below the identical situations and the distinction in background noise discount on the OnePlus is evening and day higher than both of the 2 Google fashions regardless of not having a elaborate chipset onboard and being half the worth.
Noise cancellation
Noise cancellation efficiency on the Pixel Buds Professional 2 is excellent. In comparison with the earlier technology mannequin, the brand new mannequin has higher attenuation within the mid and excessive frequencies whereas each are equally good at low frequencies. I can’t fairly affirm the 2x noise discount declare however it’s objectively higher in on a regular basis use. The ANC on the Pixel Buds Professional 2 additionally doesn’t appear to regulate its effectiveness as a lot or in any respect in comparison with another fashions primarily based on ambient noise ranges so that you don’t get a few of that fluctuations that you just may get elsewhere.
The transparency mode can be good high quality. Like Apple, Google goals for a extra pure sound over being artificially boosted, which makes it splendid to be simply left on whereas strolling round because it doesn’t distract an excessive amount of from what you’re listening to.
The Pixel Buds Professional 2 have a dialog detection function, which can detect the wearer talking and allow transparency mode whereas turning down any audio being performed. It labored effectively sufficient and was additionally sensible sufficient to solely activate whereas I used to be talking and never for others round me. It deactivates itself when you cease talking for some time so that you type of must hold talking.
The ANC on the Pixel Buds Professional 2 doesn’t appear to react to wind a lot; in a heavy wind simulation take a look at (a.ok.a. desk fan) the Pixel Buds Professional 2 ANC didn’t drop out because it often does in different fashions, which meant the buffeting noise was fairly obvious. Apparently sufficient, the earbuds will tone down the transparency mode in heavy wind to keep away from the buffeting however not within the noise cancellation mode. I made a decision to verify the primary gen mannequin and it too exhibited comparable conduct.
In comparison with one thing just like the OnePlus Buds Professional 3, which additionally has superb ANC, the Pixel Buds Professional 2 are a bit higher general. However what’s spectacular concerning the ANC on the Pixel Buds Professional 2 is how fast it’s. The OnePlus Buds Professional 3 take a few seconds to activate their ANC after which one other second or so to slowly modify to the ambient noise. The Pixel Buds Professional 2 ANC kicks in immediately and can be fast to modify modes. It’s clear the A1 chip is pulling its weight and makes the general expertise snappier.
Nevertheless, relating to ANC tech, it’s clear Apple is presently gentle years forward of the competitors. Not solely do the AirPods Professional 2 have excellent ANC, the transparency mode is so good now it may well rival medical-grade listening to aids. Apple has additionally expanded loads on this area, positioning the AirPods Professional 2 as a well being and health product. Sadly for Google, it’s not fairly there but and whereas the A1 permits the corporate to probably broaden the Pixel Buds Professional 2 performance by way of software program updates like Apple has on the AirPods Professional 2, the present product feels rather more fundamental in comparison with Apple’s providing.
Latency
The Pixel Buds Professional 2 have okay latency efficiency. On the smartphone, there isn’t any noticeable latency in video playback as video gamers can mechanically modify to masks that. Some video games had barely extra noticeable latency than others however they have been typically playable.
Nevertheless, when you play one thing within the browser, for instance, then you’ll get considerably extra lag. This additionally applies to issues like tapping sounds for the keyboard, which have an annoyingly lengthy delay to them.
When paired with a Home windows PC, the audio latency was fairly first rate. Often, earbuds with poor latency efficiency get uncovered when paired to a PC because the methods they’ll make use of on telephones to masks the delay don’t work on the PC. Nevertheless, the Pixel Buds Professional 2 latency was nice for watching movies and even for informal gaming.
Connectivity
The Pixel Buds Professional 2 have first rate connectivity efficiency. I didn’t come throughout any disconnections or massive audio dropouts when paired with a telephone. Nevertheless, there have been occasional popping sounds when paired to a PC. This didn’t occur each time so it was onerous to inform what was making it.
Battery Life
The Pixel Buds Professional 2 have a claimed battery lifetime of 8 hours of steady playback with ANC enabled and 12 hours with ANC disabled. Google additionally claims 1.5 hours of playback with ANC disabled after a 5-minute cost.
It wasn’t attainable to do our typical battery life take a look at with ANC enabled because the earbuds require contact with pores and skin to allow ANC or it will get shut down utterly. As such, testing was solely finished with ANC disabled.
On this mode, I acquired nearly precisely 12 hours of playback on a full cost. After a 5-minute cost, I acquired nearly two hours of playback, which is a bit over what Google claims.
Assuming the ANC determine continues this pattern of matching claimed numbers, the battery life on the Pixel Buds Professional 2 may be very spectacular. These numbers are increased than what a lot of the competitors is able to and solely Sony is ready to match Google on this regard.
As with the earlier technology mannequin, the case helps each wired in addition to wi-fi charging.
Conclusion
The Pixel Buds Professional 2 are priced at $229 however had already dropped to $179 on the time of writing. They’re obtainable in 4 colours, Porcelain, Hazel, Peony, and the Wintergreen pictured right here.
The Pixel Buds Professional 2 are a notable enchancment over their predecessor. The brand new mannequin is extra snug, has a lot better audio high quality, and higher lively noise cancellation. The battery life is comparable, which suggests it’s nonetheless nice and higher than a lot of the competitors.
The place the earbuds disappoint is within the high quality of the microphone audio, which is sort of poor in noisy environments. The small earbud design additionally makes them troublesome to deal with and straightforward to drop. The audio high quality with ANC disabled is sort of a bit worse and the janky Pixel Buds app shouldn’t be obtainable on iOS. The spatial audio function can be abysmal in each implementation and high quality.
However like with the primary technology mannequin, the principle situation with the Pixel Buds Professional 2 is the myriad software program points. Three months from launch, the earbuds nonetheless really feel like they’re in a pre-release state operating on beta firmware. Google has a observe report of fixing these points over time however it additionally has a observe report of getting them within the first place. Not one of the different earbuds I take a look at are anyplace even near having as many points as Google merchandise do at launch and most of them are from smaller manufacturers promoting cheaper merchandise.
That apart, I do nonetheless fairly just like the Pixel Buds Professional 2. The consolation is sweet and the sound high quality is without doubt one of the greatest in the marketplace. I do hope the corporate will get its act collectively and never simply fixes the present points but in addition makes certain they don’t occur within the first place as in any other case these earbuds actually are price shopping for if you may get them on the present discounted worth.
