Bowers & Wilkins Pi7 S2 True Wireless Earbuds - Active Noise Cancellation, Qualcomm aptX Technology, Bluetooth, Crystal-Clear Calls, Wireless & 15-Minute Quick Charging, Midnight Blue

The sound quality is far superior to any other product on the market. No other earbud at this pricepoint even comes close. To realize how amazing these really are, I recommend you subscribe to hi-res music services like Qobuz or Tidal. These services offer hi-res music in 96/24 formats. With these hi-res formats (compared to CD quality or MP3) the music is equivalent to being in the studio in a live performance. Even the smallest details are reproduced with stunning detail and accuracy. You may hear the musician tapping his foot to the beat, of fingers sliding on the strings of a guitar. Vocals are seductive and luxurious. The bass is thunderous, and at the same time tight and detailed. The fit of the earbuds is excellent and critically important to get the deep bass these are capable of. Take your time to select the earbur tip which best fits your ear canal. The HD codec aptx is amazing and works flawlessly. LDAC is supposedly superior (not supported in these buds) but those differences in technology don't matter if the amplifiers and drivers can't reproduce all that goodness. Make sure your phone supports these hi-res formats. The Pi7 S2 meticulously reproduces the magic of hi-res music. If you are an audiophile, where the quality of music trumps every other consideration, the Pi7 S2 is a a good buy at $399. Note that you need to play these buds for at least a week before they reach their full potential. Like most any speaker driver - a mechanical component - they need some time to burn in, figuratively.The app doesn't have an equalizer or other frills you typically see at this pricepoint. A well designed earbud doesn't need an equalizer to force it to do something it can't do natively. That's the case here. The Pi7 is already perfect, and doesn't need artificial EQ tweaks. The app has a built in music player that connects to Tidal or Qobuz.In initially purchased this as a renewed product. Big mistake. The case was defective and caused connectivity issues. I recommend you purchase new, and get the 2 year BW warranty.Hi res music is more demanding of a good and fast bluetooth connection. So keep the phone close by for best results.The various other purchaser comments about the app are true. It's overly complicated and unreliable for installing and accessing the product. Problems installing and connecting get annoying fast. Easily installed on one phone, but same buds refuse to install on a secondary phone. I've also observed that the replacement for the defective buds does not have the pristine sound of the original ones.Highlights:1. beyond spectacular music reproduction2. considering audio quality only, worth every penny even at $3993. subscribe to Tidal of Qobuz. you can easily transfer your playlists from other music services.4. Expect some challenges with the app. Customer has been very helpful so far. Easy to reach on the phone and responsive to email.I initially tried 2 renewed products and often these are fully capable products. With these buds, I strongly suggest not. Spend a few extra bucks to buy new and avoid some of the issues reported by other buyers. For example, the buds are matched to the case. they are not interchangeable. products look identical, so used you may get Pi5 in a Pi7 case, or buds and case that are incompatible.So what about the BUT...1. While the app integrates nicely with Qobuz and TIDAL, during playback via the app, it decides that a non B&W bud is connected and stops working. Only solution I've found is back in the case for awhile despite that the battery is still charged.2. Without fail, after 1-2 hours the right buds stops working. Back in the case for awhile despite that the battery is still 50% charged. The app doesen't differentiate between left and right battery level, so it's almost like the right uses twice the power of the left.3. ANC feature is generally poor. If ANC is at the top of your priority list, and you are willing to sacrifice audio quality, then the Bose QC may be the better choice. Bose QC II does not support hi-res codecs so the music reproduction is worse in a quiet environment but better in a noisy environment.4. No firmware update since release, so not sure if these issues will be resolved by some future update.5. The buds fit tight initially, but after a few minutes they lose the seal and sound quality degrades. The Bose QCII stay tight in the canal. This problem contributes to the poor ANC of the B&W.Everything considered, despite the stellar sound engineering, the problems are just too annoying. Back in the case every hour to charge or reset or whatever. No...

I wanted to try these because they're apparently for "audiophiles". Sound quality for music is good but not good enough to justify the price.The connectivity and app is worst.About 1 in every 5 times either one earphones will stop working or audio will have gaps and you'll have to turn it off and on by putting them back in the case.Call quality is just terrible, I'm not even talking about the ANC - the other side can barely understand you. So maybe instead of 2 or 3 microphones they can work on positioning one efficiently.No equalizer in the app, so you will have to you use the streaming app or a 3rd party to adapt different genres.I was looking forward to trying these, very disappointing experience.

Bass is very clear and powerful, not much sub bass, but not expected with aptx adaptive regardless. Would be cool if it had ldac. Treble a little too bright, responds really well to dampening by external eq (app doesn't have eq), or foam tips. Amazing soundstage, only tws I heard that has a broader soundstage is noble prestige with wide bore tips, but it's on another price bracket/product category. Nozzle on the larger side, does not fit standard tips really well. Transperancy is very natural, no hiss even at highest level. ANC subpar for 2024. Infrequent connection issues, especially if you're trying monobud.In short, out of all mainstream buds, one of the most versatile that also has high fidelity sound quality. I would expect the future versions to support aptx lossless, ditch master/slave connection method, upgrade to BT5.4 at least, and improve on ANC, and add multi connect. If they can fix the shrill treble, that would be the perfect TWS at any price

I wouldn't call myself an audiophile but my main use for earbuds are music (and not music while I work out, I do dedicate at least an hour of my day to sitting down and listening to music and nothing else).✅️First the pros:I own several pieces of "entry level" high quality headphones and earbuds, studio monitors, etc. These are by far the best sounding ones I've ever had. They handle mid-range perfectly and the sound is full without being gimmickally bass boosted. It's truly incredible in thar regard.The ANC is great, the earbuds are comfortable so as long as you're nor laying on your side, at which point they will stick out and jab into your ear. If you have a record player, the aux to bluetooth feature is also a huge plus (though running any analog output through Bluetooth kinda defeats the purpose of owning analog media)❌️Now for the cons:These aren't very functional. The battery life is abysmal and won't get you through a longer domestic flight, let alone an entire airport day. I thought that given my usage of them it wouldn't matter but it does and it's pretty inexcusable when cheaper alternatives are offering similar quality with 3x the battery life.The design is also pretty poor. The weird cylinder sticks out your ear and if you need to rest your head anywhere it'll jab into your ear canal.Lastly, regarding the app and connectivity, there's a general jankiness that would be acceptable if these were $40 dollars but is embarrassing at this price point. You're never quite sure where you stand with these earbuds, sometimes the app doesn't recognize them as paired (which makes it so you can't change pass through mode as there's no touch control for that setting, it's only done in-app) sometimes they don't charge to 100% after being in the case overnight, etc. The app is barebones and there's no custom eq feature.Conclusion:I knew about most of these issues coming in and I thought that the audio quality would make for all of them. It does not and this product definitely does not justify its price tag. At $400 we should be able to have this audio quality with at least some of the cons addressed. Battery life is probably the worst, but that added to the janky app and lackluster controls just put this one beyond recommending for me.You know exactly what the main competitor for this unit is, that is the one I traded it for.