Verdict
There ’s no arguing with the sort of dream OnePlus is showing here – this is a production with a big spec at an laudably unbig damage . But that will only carry you so far – and the compromise where level-headed quality and ANC are concerned will be too considerable for any routine of customer to countenance .
Pros
Cons
Key Features
Introduction
The world is far from short ofApple AirPodswannabes at all sorts of prices – but it ’s down at the more affordable end of the grocery store that the lookalikes are most prevalent .
The OnePlus Nord Buds 3 Pro ( yes , that entire matter is their name ) are the most late entrants into an already - saturated market – do they have anything to make them stand out from the crowd ?
Availability
The OnePlus Nord Buds 3 Pro are on sale now , and in the United Kingdom they trade for £ 59 a pair . In the United States you ’ll have to part with $ 79 , while in Australia the go away pace is AU$89 . So these are by no means the priciest truthful wireless earbuds around – but by the same keepsake , they ’re not just short of price - like contention .
Design
The Buds 3 Pro are yours in either soft hack or the starry blackamoor of my review sampling – the ‘ starry ’ bite bear on to the specked core on the lower portion of the charge shell ( honest it does , it ’s not that I just could n’t be bothered to wipe the debris off them before I took some image ) . No matter which finish you select , you ’ll be in will power of a 38 g saddle eccentric made of hard and slippery plastic , with a couple of dangly base earbuds inside that consider in at 4.4 g each .
There ’s a USB - one C slot on the bottom of the case , and there ’s a very short USB - A / USB - C cable provided in the promotional material , along with a sum of three otherwise sized pairs of silicone eartips . Despite the comparatively bulbous nature of the business concern end of each earbud , get down them securely and comfortably place is reasonably flat forward . There ’s a fit trial run in the control app ( rather counterintuitively called Hey Melody , and free for iOS and Android ) , along with the facility to rearrange the function of each earbuds ’ trace - surface .
While the charging case has no official rating against wet , dust or what - have - you , the earbuds themselves are IP55 - rated , and should therefore be fine in any realistic environment .
Features
The Hey Melody app also sport some EQ adaptation and a facility to offer personalised interference - cancellation ( your options for ANC are on , off and transparence ) . It , like the touch - control on the earbuds , is quite well - implemented and dependable enough in use . flat from the publicity , the earbuds have rather eccentric touch - control functionality – but the app is ready to hand for rearrange the import of various wiretap , press - and - holds and so on .
The OnePlus Nord Buds 3 Pro practice Bluetooth 5.4 for wireless connectivity ( which is good ) and there ’s compatibility with SBC and AAC codecs ( which is respectable as far as it goes , but does n’t really go far enough ) . Multi - full point connectivity is available , which is a ready to hand characteristic and proves stable enough in custom .
No matter which of those bog - stock codecs you use to get your digital audio content on control panel , it ’s finally served to your ears via a couple of 12.4 mm active driver . The company count a frequency reaction of 20Hz – 40kHz is available .
There are three mics on each earbud : one feed - forward , one feedback and one talk - mic – so these take concern of telephony as well as active noise - cancellation . It ’s worth note at this point that the ANC plays mayhem with battery life of the Buds Pro 3 – and also that the figures the manufacturer is quoting seem aspirational rather than strictly precise .
According to the product ’s World Wide Web page , the Buds 3 Pro should be good for 12 hr from the earbuds and a further 32 hr in the buck case if you leave ANC switch off , and with it on those numbers should drop to five and 15 hour respectively . In practice session , though , you ’ll be lucky to get nine hours out of the earbuds with ANC switched off and more like four hours if you switch it on . Those are n’t bad issue in and of themselves , but if you ’re expecting more you ’ll be disappoint .
The suggestion that topping up from flat to full takes around an hour seems fair enough , mind you . The Buds 3 Pro charge via the USB - C one-armed bandit on their case – there ’s no support for wireless charging here .
They ’re similarly compromised where fighting dissonance - cancellation is touch on . On the plus side , affiance the ANC circuitry does n’t affect the overall transonic theme song of the Buds 3 Pro in the slightest . But there ’s not a vast apparent effect on the sound of the out-of-door human beings when you do so – high - frequency distractions are dulled off a short , it ’s unfeigned , but in overall footing the good the OnePlus can do is manufacture a modest diminution in the vividness of outside audio .
Sound Quality
There are definite positives to the fashion the Buds 3 Pro present euphony , and they ’re almost all concerned with the animated , upfront nature of the sound . No matter if you ’re heed to a vigorous , uptempo recording like James Holden ’s In the End You ’ll Know or something more stately ( John Cale ’s Buffalo Ballet , say ) – it ’s all the same to these earbuds . They take over on the most forward aspects of a transcription fanatically .
And for those recordings that involve this kind of discourse , it works well . Low frequency are controlled quite carefully , and rhythm are evince with authority as well as forward impulse being maintained at all times . This sort of positivity is apparent in the midrange too , and the top final stage attacks with interchangeable decision . The Buds 3 Pro desegregate the entire frequency rove successfully , and the overall tonality is nicely judged too .
Detail floor are evenhandedly high , and dynamic variations both great and little are pay proper attention to . The sort of straightforward drive the Buds 3 Pro can summon makes for an industrious and entertaining listen . But manifestly thing are less comfortable when listening to less cooperative music . The John Cale tune does n’t much like being told to get a move on , and the tussle between earbuds that need to attack at every opportunity and a recording that would favor to walk rather than run is n’t all that well-fixed . In the end , no one ’s a winner .
No matter the sort of stuff you care to listen to , though , what the Buds 3 Pro ca n’t attain in any circumstance is a meaningful sensation of three - dimensionality . The soundstage they produce is of adequate size where depart / right is concerned , and on this axis there ’s a reasonable amount of blank between individual element and a sightly sensation of human elbow - room .
But there ’s a woeful want of the front / back equivalent – everything that happens seems to bump at the front of the phase . So while there ’s decent detachment where the breadth of the presentation is concerned , there ’s next - to - none when it comes to depth – and the event is a staunchly two - dimensional speech sound .
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Should you buy it?
If you like it up-and-coming and attacking , the Buds 3 Pro are among the serious Lebanese pound - for - pound options out there
Do n’t get your Hope up : the salutary - type scenario that has been used to measure the battery life does n’t live in the real world
Final Thoughts
It always seems counterproductive to measure available battery life in the most favourable variety of laboratory weather condition . After all , it wo n’t take very long for the user to establish exactly what ’s what where battery longevity is concern – so why get their hopes up unrealistically ? It ’s hardly a strategy for the long terminal figure , is it ?
Trusted Score
How we test
We try out every pair of headphones we critique thoroughly over an extended period of time . We employ diligence - standard test to compare features properly . We ’ll always tell you what we find . We never , ever , admit money to look back a production .
Find out more about how we test in ourethics policy .
FAQs
The IP55 protects the Nord Buds 3 against water and dust , but they ’re not completely rainproof .
