I am a fan of Sony headphones, so I was very excited to check out the WF-SP800N truly wireless earbuds. How did these fare after a few weeks of use?
Design
There isn’t much difference in the design of truly wireless earbuds. In the case of the SP800N, these are earbuds with fins, as opposed to tips that hang down your earlobes. The next-gen of Sony fitness headphones after the SP700N, the SP800N have a bigger case and a larger battery, which gave me hope for better battery life. The earbuds have a little weight to them. You can change the size of the ear fins and ear tips to lock them into place for working out. The earbuds are a mix of glossy and matte black, with the glossy part The case is a flip-top case that’s very large.
Experience and Features
Comfort
Most truly wireless earbuds fit me after proper tip sizing. I always suggest spending ten minutes figuring out the proper sizes. It makes a world of difference. I found the SP800N earbuds to be comfortable for long periods of time. Working out at home is different than hitting the gym. I don’t have as much outside noise to block out. These earbuds are rated IP55, so they’re ready to take on a splash of sweat (or rain)
Sound
The sound on Sony headphones is always good. I don’t expect anything less from them. It’s a bit more difficult trying to get full sound on truly wireless earbuds but I don’t expect anything groundbreaking. With these earbuds, you have the option of ambient sound and full noise cancellation. The noise cancellation is actually pretty good for wireless earbuds. Sony doesn’t slack on the bass either. But if you’re not a fan of the sound, you can slightly tweak it with the Sony Headphones Connect app.
With the Headphones app you can check the battery life, switch the touch-sensitive control settings. You can even set the ambient sound settings based on locations and the activity you are doing. For example, if you may want it louder when you’re working out in a noisy gym as opposed to when you’re jogging outside.
These are a great improvement over the 700N. The sound is much fuller and you can go further to optimize using 360 sound. I am not a fan of using the buttons on the headphones themselves because it feels like you’re drilling into your head and it’s just extremely uncomfortable. Luckily these are a much softer touch to control the music playback, so it’s not as bad. I resort to using the app to toggle things and my phone for volume control.
For the most part, I didn’t have any connectivity issues, but when I did, it was a series of skips when I turned my head in a certain direction. Afterward, it would go back to playing music smoothly.
As with the SP700N and some of the other headphones, you can use Google Assistant with them. You can set up one of the touch-sensitive controls to activate the assistant when needed. There’s a ton of things you can do with Google Assistant. So how is Google Assistant useful when it comes to headphones? You can do things like, add an event to your calendar, ask it to show you pictures from your Google Photos feeds, and even control the YouTube playback. It reads messages for you and lets you know if you have messages pending. I am not a fan of having Google Assistant in my ear, especially since it’s pretty easy to activate via voice or gestures on the phone. I kept that feature turned off. I’m also at home mostly, and there’s no need to have it so readily available on the earbuds.
360 Reality Audio by Deezer
For those that enjoy Deezer and want to get the most out of these headphones, the 360 by Deezer app allows you to listen to music with the enhancement of audio spatialization. The catalog isn’t as large as I’d like it to be but it is enjoyable.
Battery life was impressive. I got almost nine hours of playback with noise canceling on. The carrying case charges via usb-c which is a major win, as I want to usb-c all the tech! The case itself is quite large and won’t fit in small pockets.
Verdict
It’s difficult to recommend any earbuds at $199 . Not because these aren’t are high in comparison to other truly wireless earbuds out there. The battery life is much more realiable on these versus the last gen. The fit is comfortable to wear for long periods of time. The SP800N earbuds are available in four different colorways. https://amzn.to/32Z3Akw
