From the first moment I popped them in my ears and turned on some music, I knew I had my new, favorite headphones. And I have AirPods Max. I love those headphones despite the fact that I can’t recommend them. They are too expensive. And the over the head style is not for everybody. They are not even for me half the time. In the winter, they are a nonstarter because I need to wear a winter hat. Try that with cans. I needed something I could take with me and not be committed to having them on my head or around my neck the whole time I’m out. I keep trying buds but am always disappointed with something, until now.

If I gave out scores with my reviews, I would be tempted to give these a perfect score. I am never tempted to do that for headphones. There are 4 things that stand out to me. They are as follows:

Ecosystem

The Beats Studio Buds that came out earlier this year were designed with an Android first mentality. The company made two critical errors:

1. They forgot who their benefactors are. Apple bought the company and made it better. This is Apple’s company and Apple’s customers and Apple’s world-beating stores. Beats made a product that didn’t respect any of that.
2. They forgot that Android users are not where the money is for expensive headphones. The vast majority of people in the world will never see the point of $150 headphones. Apple customers are not as price sensitive and don’t mind overspending on good headphones.

Those Studio Buds didn’t have the H1 chip which gives AirPods their magic. There were almost no nods in the direction of the Apple ecosystem. Such an abomination was an insult in the Apple Store. It was like buying earbuds designed for Samsung phones and that treated Apple users as second-class citizens. It seems both Apple and Beats have learned their lesson. If the earbuds don’t respect your ecosystem, don’t give them a second look.

The Fit Pros check all the Apple ecosystem boxes because they were made with Apple devices in mind. They come with an app for Android users that give them some of the functionality. But don’t make the mistake of thinking these are designed with an Android-first or even Android-neutral sensibility. They’re not. These are for users of Apple products. Forget about the Android bits. Android users have plenty of choices made just for them. Like AirPods, this is ours. Not sorry.

Fit

The second most important factor in buying earbuds is almost tied with the most important factor. Fit is second because you don’t even need to try them on if they don’t work well in your ecosystem of choice. Once you determine that they do, the only next question is, do they fit.

I love the concept of AirPods and AirPods Pro. But the simple fact is they do not fit securely for millions of people who don’t have any other options for an Apple-centric headphone solution. We have had to make them work by doing modifications and buying third-party solutions. We either had to deal with the super expensive AirPods Max, or buy something that was outside the ecosystem. What we wanted was something like AirPods with wingtips that would also fit in the tiny case. No such luck.

These are the first Apple earbuds with no ecosystem compromises that actually fit. It is not just me. They will fit pretty much anyone. They have 3 different size ear tips plus the integrated wings. You will find a comfortable fit. And they are not going anywhere no matter how much head-banging, working out, sweating, or eating you do while wearing them. With those two boxes checked, we move to the third most important factor:

Sound

The best sounding headphones are meaningless if they don’t fit either your ecosystem or your ears. Once those two things are settled, you can settle in and evaluate the sound to see if it suits you. It suits me just fine. These sound a little better than the more expensive AirPods Pro.

Feel free to ignore the rest of this section as pure, subjective opinion. That is just the nature of sound. To my ears, the ear buds sound great throughout the entire range. There is a type of dynamic EQ that happens automatically when you are not using ANC or Transparency mode. If you just let the headphones do what they do with all external EQ enhancements turned off, these sound as good as any headphones I’ve used. AirPods Max have a little more bass. But that doesn’t mean the Fit Pros are lacking. They’re not

Full disclosure, I am something of a bass head. I sometimes kick in the bass boost setting in the EQ for tracks and albums that are mixed with more balanced sound than I like. You will be happy to know that when you want to kick up the base to insane levels, they can take it. Though the buds are in your ears, you can feel the bass in your gut with the right tracks.

I have eclectic tastes and listen to everything from classical to bluegrass. I don’t like hip-hop. Give me The Bee Gees any day. But for the sake of testing, I will listen to a lot of things I don’t personally like. I didn’t find anything that made me think another set of headphones would do better. And I have AirPods Max. I can’t emphasize this enough. When I want to sit down and really enjoy some tunes, I reach for the cans. Not any more. These might not be as good as the Max in ways most people couldn’t tell. But they satisfy my need for clean, sweet sound. I’m pretty sure you will feel the same way.

Controls

Without going into unnecessary detail, I will just say that the controls are just like every other set of headphones that use a multi-function button. They work exactly the same way with one exception. You can repurpose the long-press as volume. Left ear is down and right ear is up. I tried it but set it to something else. The right ear is Siri and the left ear cycles between ANC and Transparency. I’m glad the volume option is there. But when long-pressing, there is no way to have fine control over where the volume adjustment stops. At least they tried something, which is more than most.

ANC/Transparency

These headphones have active noise cancelation. It is much better than the feature on the Studio Buds and not quite as good as AirPods Pro, but close. The same is true for transparency.

Call Quality

I have heard audio samples from reviewers. The audio for calls sounds plenty good enough. The bluetooth range is long and the connection is rock solid. These ear buds were not engineered to be great at call quality. But they do a passable job. It is neither a pro or a con. I only mention it because people ask about such things. But they don’t tend to make purchasing decisions based on call quality.

Conclusion: Ahead of the Pack and an Easy Recommendation

Right now, you can buy the Beats Fit Pro ear buds for $200. It is worth it. The difference in price between these and the $250 MSRP AirPods Pro might be that AirPods Pro comes with a MagSafe charging case where as the Fit Pros can only be charged by cable. For the record, I have never charged my headphones with a wireless charger. So it is not something I miss at all. Your milage may vary.

If you think the AirPods Pros are worth their asking price, these are worth it even more. It is the best $200 an Apple product user can spend on earphones. That doesn’t mean they are perfect. ANC could be better. It’s good right now, but not great.

Beats is so shy about perpetuating the stereotype that they are only for bass heads that they tune the base down a bit too much for the taste of actual bass heads. Out of the box, they have a very balanced sound. But fear not, you can tip the scales in favor of more base through EQ settings. These ear buds can handle more bass than you can stand to hear.

It would have been worse to ship them the way I like the sound because most other people would have to find a way to tone it down. Sony often wins the sound prize because they crank the bass out of the box. They don’t really care about balance any more than TV makers when they set them up for viewing in a store.

For the record, on iOS, I usually set the EQ to Bass Boost. Just bear in mind that only works with music. It doesn’t work with anything else you listen to on the device. On the Mac, I have been playing with an app called Boom2 to adjust the Mac EQ settings system-wide. A long time ago, Apple used to have universal EQ settings. Today, you have to find third-party solutions. But don’t let any of this scare you. The sound is great without any fiddling. But I don’t care about true sound. I want it colored the way I like it. Sony’s real advantage is that they come with an app that allows you to set the EQ in the headphones, themselves. Apple needs to do this.

Still, if that is the only thing I have to complain about, then I have nothing really to complain about. These are a solid 9 out of 10, and maybe 95 out of 100. They are really good and you should go out and buy them right now.

David Johnson