Sennheiser MOMENTUM True Wireless Bluetooth Earbuds (Open Box)

I never really thought I'd be looking for a "true wireless" set of earbuds until I first heard about these late last year before they were released. They've been on my radar since. They don't look absolutely ridiculous like the Apple Airpods (although I still would feel obnoxious walking around with them), and they promised high-end sound quality.- I couldn't sleep a few nights ago and caved, I went ahead and ordered these. In my sleepless thought-loops, I reasoned that these would be perfect for using in the office. I probably spent maybe 8 hours a week already in office with my trusty pair of Shure SRH 440 cans that I got in 2009 for $95. These would have the advantage over those as being way more comfortable, and way more subtle, likely with better sound... But what really sold me on this style of headphone is the external sound pass-through option. I loved the idea of being able to toggle outside sound as needed through just a simple tap-tap. And it sounds very natural, like you're not even wearing earbuds. For user context, I've spent ~$100 here and there on earbuds like the 1MORE Triple Driver (which I've sadly lost) that have come and faded from my regular use, those and the Shure cans mentioned above have served as my benchmark for what good headphone sound is. I took an impulsive leap ordering this $300 pair, but holy crap am I glad I did. The sound quality blows away what my over-ear Shure headphones can do, the difference is absolutely noticeable. I'm constantly impressed by how great everything sounds on these, and like people say, am noticing parts of my favorite songs that I've never noticed as much before. I've been so inspired by it that I dug into my Spotify settings, discovered the "Very High" setting, and deleted a dozen apps from my phone to make room for redownloading my whole library. When wondering how a bluetooth headset could sound this good, I did some research on the AptX standard and got learnt. I checked to make sure my Pixel XL supported the standard, and heck yeah, it's got AptX HD! These Sennheisers only have AptX though. While that seems to be more than enough, why shouldn't this top-end product utilize the top-end standard? These are very comfortable to wear and very sturdy. I'm using the small eartip set, and I'm not worried at all about these falling out of my ears, despite their mild bulkiness. It sort of seems like it's shaped like a giant earplug -- I wouldn't ever think I looked "cool" walking about with these, same as any other headphones. With the sound passthrough though, I could probably just throw a beanie over them and no one may be the wiser! The case is more compact and convenient. The soft touch and look is nice, and it feels sturdy, all except for the hinge... It's not loose or anything, but I'm skeptical about it's long-term durability. There is just a touch of side-to-side wiggle, and a little give if I try to open it too wide. Feels like I could potentially snap this backwards easily. Hopefully a replacement case isn't too expensive if I ever have a stupid moment or if it wears out in the very-long-term (I hope to use these for a GOOD LONG WHILE, considering the cost -- will update if necessary). I like the build otherwise, though -- very nice how the buds snap magnetically in their cubbies. There is one LED and a button that you can use to check the status of the charging case's battery, straightfoward once you learn it once. The battery life of the buds has been perfectly adequate for my use, and the fact that these have nowhere to go but back in their chargey-case means they're always ready for me. The right earbud draining faster than left is sort of weird but not a big deal and kind of makes sense considering in a way, these are basically two independent devices. when you have two completely independent devices. The USB-C charge port is on this case is another feature that absolutely sold me. My pixel charges with USB-C, as does my Galaxy Book 12 laptop, and I love having one cable that I can use alternately for my daily devices. These buds are an other added to that list. I've seen some complaints about the touch controls, but personally I like them, at least I like the concept, especially. The combination of taps needed is easy to memorize as early as day 1, there's nothing really complicated about it. Timing the double-tap to activate pass-through sound is going to take me some practice though, I sometimes do it wrong and activate voice assistant instead (with 1 touch being registered). This is usually because I tapped too slow and deliberately. Two quick, solid-contact touches is the way to go and I'm sure I will master this with more practice. All this would be a non-issue if I could switch the 1-touch/2-touch functions on the right earbud via the app. This seems like it should be possible with a software update, so fingers crossed! I really love these earbuds and I'm so glad I pulled the trigger on them. It's been a long time since a new gadget has been so satisfying, or made me feel like I've really ascended to the next era in an area of technology. For sure I'm listening to my tunes even more than before, but more importantly, I've been kind of pumped to actually go into the office where it makes sense for me to use these (vs my whole-home Chromecast Audio speaker setup). Great motivator to get into work! Despite all that, a negative I should mention.. This buds can't connect to multiple devices simultaneously. I'm used to using a Plantronics Voyager 5200 bluetooth earpiece for my work calls, which coincidentally just happened to die a few days ago after just 15 months of service. That earpiece was able to connect to both my phone and laptop simultaneously, which was pretty handy and I took to take for granted. With these buds, I have to disconnect from one device before I can connect to the other. Not too big of a deal though, since I only ever used my buds in the office to listen to Spotify. Now I just stream from my phone instead of my laptop, and I can still control playback from my laptop client thanks to the way the Spotify client works, so it feels almost no different. I had a 15 minute work call from an upset customer come in while I was wearing the earbuds, by the way... At the beginning of the call I asked if he could hear me OK, he said it was fine, so there's that. Another small negative, the touch controls seem to function still when the buds are removed from the ear, so it's easy to trigger voice assistant or play/pause by accident when you're handling the buds. You quickly learn to hold them from the edges so as to not trigger the touch-controls, which I got used to quickly. But if the buds can detect when they're placed in the ear, wouldn't it be nice if they could detect when they are removed too (and disable touch controls)? Overall, I'm incredibly pleased with these. I was on the fence for a while, reading loads of reviews and experiences. I wanted to be as thorough as I could with my thoughts on this to hopefully help anyone else that over-thinks things like I do.