The Sony LinkBuds Fit wireless headphones are less elitist, more colorful, and way more fun than the WF-1000XM5. It retailed for $200 a pop at release but has since experienced a discount. In this comprehensive review, I will share why these headphones are an excellent alternative to Sony’s top-of-the-range models.
Good
- Comfortable semi-in ear format
- Compact design and attractive colors
- Good audio quality
- Good battery life
- Packed with features
Bad
- “Only” IPX4 certification
- Adequate ANC performance but not much passive noise isolation
- No wireless charging support
Sony LinkBuds Fit: All deals
The Sony LinkBuds Fit in a nutshell
The Sony LinkBuds Fit was released in October 2024 this year with an asking price of $199. Currently, you can find them for $179 on Sony’s official store or Amazon. Sony’s wireless earphones are also accompanied by accessories that are sold separately. Airfitting supporters are sold separately at $9.99. The case cover will set you back by another $19.99.
Sony LinkBuds Fit design
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The Sony LinkBuds Fit are comfortable and compact in nature. The semi-in ear format, with fairly short silicone tips, doesn’t impede the ear canal. Sony equipped its earbuds with support fins for a better fit, but these fins are hollow. They look like ultra-flexible air cushions. Once again, the advantage is to provide greater comfort while ensuring a good fit in the ear without a rigid ridge stabbing at your cartilage.
Sony also sells covers for the charging case and air-fitting supporters in 5 different colors. They cost between $10 and $20 apiece. This allows you to create color combinations for a little more personalization.
The earbuds are IPX4-certified, and with their air-fitting supporter, you can consider using them for sports. The charging case is also very compact, and I love its square format with rounded corners. The shade of white makes it look like a marshmallow. However, I’m not so keen on the marbled effect on the lid. When seen from a distance, it looked dirty but that’s totally subjective. The hinge had a bit too much play for my preference, too.
Sony LinkBuds Fit: Audio quality
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The Sony LinkBuds Fit have a very warm audio signature, with a little more emphasis on bass than the rest of the musical message. It’s a very classic and common rendering on the market. Sony’s proposal seemed to be very masterful to the naked ear to me. In short, I didn’t find the bass unbalanced in the overall rendering.
The only real flaw is the lack of passive noise isolation. Do note that this is the counterpart of the comfort offered by the semi-in ear format. The ear canal is less obstructed, so you hear more ambient noise. You can crank up the volume and activate ANC, but you lose detail as you accentuate the bass even more. In all honesty, though, I appreciated the audio quality of the LinkBuds Fit.
In terms of hardware, we find the same “Driver X” transducer and V2 chip as in the Sony WF-1000XM5 (review), the manufacturer’s current flagship. Support for the Bluetooth LDAC codec is also an obvious plus.
Sony LinkBuds Fit Active Noise Cancellation
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Sony LinkBuds Fit’s Active Noise Cancellation works on a purely automatic manner. Its intensity cannot be manually adjusted. Sony claims that its “ANC Optimizer” function adapts ANC to your sound environment. Overall, the Active Noise Cancellation is adequate, but suffers from the semi-in ear format of Sony’s earbuds, which don’t offer enough passive noise isolation.
On the other hand, the transparency mode can be manually or automatically adjusted. Depending on the volume of ambient noise around you, the Sony LinkBuds can increase or decrease the intensity of the transparency mode. In reality, this works pretty well. When an ambulance whizzes past or a subway door alert sounds, there’s bound to be a little lag, and you get the impression that the volume control is playing tricks on you.
But the transparency mode of the Sony LinkBuds impressed me overall. It amplifies relevant sounds well, and I didn’t notice any hiss or distortion.
Sony LinkBuds Fit features and applications
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Sony LinkBuds Fit are quite generous in terms of features. The five-band equalizer is top-notch, there’s multipoint connectiity for pairing with two devices simultaneously, and wear detection.
Sony fans will be delighted to learn that the Speak-to-Chat function is still available. Quite frankly, I need one of this function’s worshippers to explain to me what is the point of it. Am I too stupid to understand the concept? Personally, I hate it when my music pauses as soon as I cough or mumble a word. This is even more grating since I always have to wait at least three seconds for it to stop.
A new feature from Sony is the “Background music effect. The idea of this is to give you the impression that the music you’re listening to is background music, relegating it to the background noise category. Sony will artificially increase the depth of the stereophonic scene, giving the impression that the audio source is further and further away. There are three modes to choose from: My Room, Living Room, and Café. It’s fun, but personally, I found the echo generated by this mode rather annoying in the long run. The “My room” mode, which was the least intense, was the most tolerable.
It’s nothing new this time around, but the Wide Area Tap function is as great as ever. The earbuds come with built-in accelerometers. They can detect nearby vibrations. Hence, you can tap your temple without touching the earbuds to activate the controls.
Sony also added voice commands for the earbuds. Personally, I don’t see myself ever using them daily and especially not in public. This is even more limited since Sony only supports commands in English.
In any case, Sony is as generous as ever with its features. The manufacturer completely reworked its Sony Sound Connect application to better harmonize all its audio ecosystems with a centralized app.
Sony LinkBuds Fit: Battery and charging
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The 5.5 hours of battery life with ANC announced by Sony for LinkBuds Fit remains in the upper mid-range of the market. The earbuds can be fully charged three times via the charging case. Charging from 0 to 100% takes approximately two hours. Charging via the box takes three hours and is performed via a wired connection only; since wireless charging is not supported.
Personally, I used Sony earbuds under these settings:
- 100% charge.
- Wear detection disabled.
- No charging during my session.
- Active Noise Cancellation is always on.
- 50% listening volume.
- Paired to an Android smartphone.
- LDAC codec.
Based on the above parameters, I was able to exceed 5 hours of listening time without any issue. I haven’t tested it out, but I’m sure if you prefer SBC/AAC codecs, or even LC3 (LE Audio), you should easily exceed six hours, even with ANC enabled.
Conclusion: Should I buy Sony LinkBuds Fit?
Would I recommend you to buy the Sony LinkBuds Fit for $179? Yes.
Although the excellent Sony WF-1000XM5 are still my favorite wireless headphones, they’re still selling for around $230 online. The LinkBuds Fit features the same V2 chip and the same transducers.
If you don’t like in-ear monitors, they’re also a good compromise in terms of comfort. To get all this without sacrificing fit is another plus point. The charging case is super-compact and easy to carry. I also appreciate the many customization options offered by Sony, although you have to buy its accessories separately that do add up without you realizing it.
Best of all, they’re feature-packed. I love the vibration controls that lets me tap my temple rather than the earbuds. The Background Music Effect function is fun, and the new Sony Sound Connect application is more intuitive. Add LDAC to that, in addition to wear detection and multipoint connectivity, and you’ve got some very impressive earbuds in this price range.
What about you? What do you think of the Sony LinkBuds Fit after this comprehensive review? What else would you like to know about these Active Noise Canceling wireless earbuds?
