it all started with the original google pixel buds in their weirdly fitting string design that didn’t impress much or sell well google followed it up with the pixel buds too which had a far better fitting truly wireless design and some great touch and swipe gestures to interact with it unfortunately many users reported experiencing connectivity and sound dropouts on their pixel buds too resulting in google quietly discontinuing them well as the saying goes third time’s a charm right finally google would replace them with a true successor and true competitor to the airpods pro but for android users finally right no we get the pixel buds a series which had the design and fit of the pixel buds too but with all those great swipe features removed from it and no wireless charging well that’s not as exciting as what we’re all hoping for but at least it came at a lower price of 100 bucks and they actually sounded kind of decent well unfortunately google has fallen far behind what apple has been doing with their
multiple versions of airpods and especially the airpods pro until now these are the google pixel buds pro google’s latest truly wireless earbuds to compete with apple’s airpod pro with features worthy of the pro name wireless charging multi-device support transparency mode active noise cancellation and swipe gestures from the google pixel buds too and of course even better sound than the pixel buds a series right i mean surely they sound better right well it’s complicated well good thing that this is an experiential review and comparison of the google pixel buds pro with the pixel buds acers so maybe it’s best for you to hear it for yourself make sure to wear headphones or earbuds in both ears to fully experience this video and by the end you should be able to find out which one you should get or if it’s worth upgrading to the pixel buds pro from the a series based upon your preference of course if you want to purchase either of these there are links down below in the description to do so and they help support the channel now if you’re confused about what makes this video experiential let’s find out with this first song where
you can hear the comparative differences between each earbud this track is filled with a lot listen for the sub frequencies the high end from the snare and the hi-hat sounds in the mid-range from the sin so now one of the greatest benefits of audio products becoming more high-tech is the ability to make adjustments to retune or adjust their sound over time based on user feedback or a desire to refine the sound sought out by the engineer it’s quite similar to how i’ll create updated versions of the custom eq’s are great for various headphones and earbuds for channel members sometimes i just want to refine it or provide different options with the google pixel buds pro this experience has been interesting and complicated for you and reviewers you see when i initially listened to the google pixel buds pro i actually thought mine were defective i thought surely there’s no way the high end sounds this bad why does it sound like a really bad mp3 at the time i just got off
a plane so i thought maybe my ears were a bit messed up from the pressure but when i tried out other earbuds and even asked other trusted ears like l heifer reviews the answer is clear the high end sounded awful these were so bad that my custom eq looked insane with the highest frequency slider nearly pumped to max i wondered how any review could say that they sounded good because they seriously sounded defective and despite my opinion that one shouldn’t judge the sound of something purely off of a frequency chart the frequency chart referred that something was way off thankfully they do handle eq alright but there’s no way i could suggest these for those who care about sound quality unless they use my custom eq or know how to eq themselves to be frank i was really disappointed but something changed with the 2.14 update google changed the tuning of it which actually brought back some of that missing high end this certainly makes a way that you receive reviews from others and even this one a bit more complicated i have no idea if they’ll change the sound in the future and if it makes this video outdated so
being the curious type i wanted to capture the differences between each firmware version so i bought another pair of google pixelbuds pro with my own money with this one using the old firmware now admittedly it may be a little bit hard to hear the change in the high end or the air of the song depending on what you’re listening on but try to listen to the high end where the air the vocals or reverb linger along with the high end from the hi-hat on this song when are you did you hear the difference in the high end between them to make it even easier here is a live frequency graph to show you the difference pretty crazy right for the rest of this video we’ll use the updated firmware when we compare it with the pixelbuds a series i’ll give you more of my thoughts on the sound later on in the video for now i want to present the audio samples to you to form your own opinions before i share mine with you the google pixel buds pro continue their great design language with a clean soft design that i’ve come to really love the case continues the egg design they compare more to a soothing stone because of how calming and soft it is to hold and rub your fingers across the pro case is a little bit more rotund compared to the a series case but is still easily pocketable it does only come in a white color and it is a bit easy to get a bit dirty so there are some cases from nomad i like to use to add some extra color and
protection the buds pro come in four different colors fog lemongrass and i have both the charcoal and coral here they have the same clean disc design of previous versions but the pros gain a little bit more of an advanced look with the added ports on the other side the actual design between the buds do differ quite a bit while each person’s ear is different the a series has a more assured feel in the ear with its little wingtip and narrow stem that goes deep into your canal uh you think that sounds awkward get ready for more um uh tip talk the pros on the other hand are quite bulbous in comparison and rely nearly all on the ear tip to hold it in your ear this is similar to the way that the airpods pro work which ends up feeling quite comfortable and at times like there’s nothing in your ear and that’s normally a great thing unfortunately for my ears in particular whenever i was working out or a mist of water got into my ear and encountered the ipx4 water resistance i could feel the pros slowly slipping out and became an area of concern for me that they just fall out and i’d lose them i did get some comply foam ear tips that do an excellent job of keeping the earbuds in place and added some extra
passive noise cancellation but just a heads up though you can really feel these in your ears as it fills up the space and i know some people will find that uncomfortable as for being able to sleep with them in your ears i personally haven’t found any ear but that is as comfortable as the pixel buds a for that the pixel buds pro do manage to do better than most and you could manage to fall asleep with them in your ear if you were tired enough but i do still feel a little bit of pressure on my ear when i lay down with them in so yeah you could sleep with them in your ear but i wouldn’t prefer to use them while sleeping for this song pay attention to the clarity of the attack on the acoustic guitar strings and how forward the mid-range is on the body of the guitar and vocals the nights get cold sometimes when i look over i see you by a fire with your hands out in the open and i wonder if i must be singing on my own the pixel buds a series have the typical tap touch interactions for interacting with it to play pause move between tracks and activate the assistant the pros gain
the swipe gestures i miss so much from the pixel buds too so they gain a very easy and intuitive way of being able to increase and decrease the volume with a swipe surprisingly not a ton of earbuds offer the ability to change the volume while retaining other features like skipping tracks or activating the assistant so this is very nice to have and i think they work quite well as for connectivity both of them have android quick pair which is nice to have and because of their link with your google account it does make it very easy to pair with other google or android devices just by tapping on the toast notification on your other device this comes in particularly handy for the pros with multipoint as long as you’ve previously connected to both devices before you can play audio in one device pause it and then start playing audio on the other device seamlessly and for those out there like me that like to use one earbud at a time either to extend battery life or give you less of a congested feeling you can indeed use them one at a time however one thing that i’ve noticed a number of times when i do end up putting in the second earbud after using one at a time for a bit is that the two earbuds will be slightly off sync giving a bit of that coarse effect as if it’s off by
milliseconds not great but you can always alleviate that by putting them both in the case and then reconnecting them there’s also a button on the back of the case to manually put it into pairing mode in case you need to this is a much better option compared to others and yes that means you can easily connect it to your computer or even an iphone however there is an app for both earbuds but it’s only available on android and it may never expand beyond that so that’s worth considering both of them have a neat feature called volume eq which follows a fletcher munson curve or equal loudness curves which has to deal with how human ears perceive low and high frequencies at lower volumes compared to higher volumes i talked about a bit in my video about how to eq headphones and earbuds which you can check out in the card up here but essentially it compensates for this unique thing with our ears that makes them sound consistent in sound whether it’s at lower or higher volumes they do differ in areas like adaptive sound which adjusts the volumes up and down depending on external sounds and the pixel buds a series also give you
the option to adjust the amount of bass you want for this entire video i have it set to plus one which kind of fills it up a little bit more while still being tasteful now for this track it is a very mid-rangey warm and soulful track listen to her vocals electric guitar lines and the keyboard [Music] is [Music] [Applause] [Music] now let’s see how the microphones perform in various environments what you sound like on a zoom call on default settings and how it sounds to receive a phone call while doing that and to help financially support videos like these and to provide the value that you’re looking for while saving you time i’ll test out the mics while telling you about this video’s sponsor nordvpn i don’t know if you feel the same way i do but it seems like many things that internet are changing a lot and the need for privacy is even more important a vpn is a must and it needs to be fast easy and secure nordvpn is my go-to for that because it’s a vpn that isn’t slow and is as easy to use with one click i use it for streaming services which are becoming more fragmented daily it seems like shows that used to be on one platform are no longer there unless
you’re in another country having a vpn makes it easy and makes it appear that you’re in another country so you can keep watching that show that they just removed nord not only makes a vpn but also has bundle deals if you add in their nordpass software that’s a password manager that helps you easily do what you’re supposed to do instead of using fuzzykitty123 for all your passwords and nordlocker a secure encrypted cloud storage option to keep your files safe and private so if you’d like to sign up for nordvpn or their other services go to nordvpn.com tech today or click the link in the description to get a two year plan plus four additional months with a huge discount it’s risk-free with nord’s 30-day back guarantee thanks so much to nordvpn for sponsoring this portion of the video here’s what the pixel buds a series sound like next to a really loud fan on max speed and with when it blowing on the earbud and this is what the google pixel buds pro sound like when i’m next to you two really loud fans and the wind blowing at my ear yeah that’s pretty loud here’s what the pixel buds a series sound like in a simulated crowd environment
couldn’t find a rowdy enough group so we have to simulate here’s what the pixel buds pro sound like in a simulated crowd environment here’s what an hd phone call would sound like on the google pixel buds a series how do you think it sounds and here is what an hd phone call sounds like on the google pixel buds pro how do you think it sounds here’s what the pixel buds a series sound like next to a busy road here’s what the pixel buds pro sound like next to a busy road and here’s what the pixel buds a series sound like next to a water phone here’s what the pixel buds pro sound like next to a water fountain here’s what the pixel buds a series sound like if you’re getting a car wash and here’s what the pixel but pro set like if you’re getting a car wash i’m totally not doing this for taxes just kidding i’m totally doing this for taxes this next track is filled with a wide spectrum of frequencies and can really make the mid-range and high-end differences come out quite a bit so unfortunately neither of these are great for gaming on pc or mobile and do not offer a low latency mode so you’ll experience a bit of a delay in audio i wouldn’t suggest them if that is something you care about and honestly no bluetooth option i’ve tested out even gaming earbuds are sufficient for fps games or other reaction critical games so it’s best to find a wired option or headset with a wireless receiver on a pc compared to the five hours you can get on the
pixel buds a series the pixel buttons pro coming in an insane 11 hours on one charge and a total of 31 hours when recharging with the case but with ansi off when you turn anc on it’s still a phenomenal 7 hours on the earbuds alone and 20 hours when you include the charging case in my practical experience i’ve accidentally fallen asleep with the pros in my ears and woke up the next morning with it still playing audio with battery to spare so i think they’re quite stellar this track is quite revealing on how the mid range is handled between each earbud as well as how it handles some of the higher end for things like symbols and the snare pay attention to see if you hear one of them being a bit harsher than the other hey google’s approach to anc is actually really quite nice in my experience i find that they managed to cancel more the body of a human voice and a white noise from things like fans a bit better than apple airpods pro what you do still hear in a person’s voice is more around the cliche honky telephone sounding ranger frequencies but at a reduced level this is in comparison to the airpods pro that have more of an even and natural sound that still comes through but lowers the overall volume across the entire frequency spectrum i do think this does come down to preference on what you prefer and will have a bit more of an in-depth
comparison of anc performance where you can actually experience what it’s like to wear them and we’ll compare it with the galaxy butts 2 pro and the apple airpods pro as well that’s one of my insane in-depth reviews and comparisons if it’s out by the time you’re watching this it’ll be up in the card up here or link in the description one area that the pixel buds pro excel in is the reduction of that plugged ear cabin pressure that you typically experience in your ears when you have anc on this is something that my ears are extremely sensitive to in the pixel buds pro they have sensors and ports built into the earbuds that can detect the pressure and reduce it so that you don’t feel as much pressure and it really does work i can still feel it but i have to really pay attention to it compared to other earbuds where it’s really obvious one thing to note i do notice that the comply ear tips will actually reduce the performance of the anc a little bit which is actually a bit of a surprise as foam ear tips usually have the assumption that they’d block out more sound and that is indeed the case passively but not in the case here where it’s matched with google’s anc tuning also another little quirk i’ve noticed that if you put your finger on the ear tip or you don’t put it in your ear just right you actually will hear a little bit of a feedback on your earbud that sounds like this kind of quirky and weird i haven’t experienced this on any other ear butter headphone alright for this song listen to the low end in the high end from the snare and especially the hi-hat to hear how bright or sharp the high end is i cannot be going home one area that isn’t so great on
the google pixel buds pro is transparency mode it’s actually not that bad in terms of how things sound around you but not as good and clear as airpods pro which keeps that high-end air that makes it sound really natural no the issues i particularly run into comes from wind noise and sudden sound when you walk around fast enough have a guess of wind hit you or have a fan blow out your ears you’ll hear it blowing up against a microphone like this just walking through this room at a normal pace will be enough for me to hear the wishes of air in my ears just imagine how bad it is while running now to be fair there are many other earbuds that also struggle with this in transparency mode the other issue i have comes from sudden loud sounds i particularly noticed this when working out when i set down my weights the sudden clink is amplified in what feels like is even louder than real life and at a frequency that is especially painful in my ears and to be clear i’m not dropping my weights i’m not even setting down my weights hard so i really make sure to not use transparency mode while working out this is less than ideal for those who work out in a public gym now if someone from google is watching this i imagine they have their limiter tuned to have a very slow attack so the
sudden clink of weights is let through at an amplified volume before it has time to process and reduce the volume so it doesn’t blow out my ears hopefully this is something that they can address in a future update all right this next track is from my personal friend hannah apparent listen to how dynamic the trek sounds and if you can hear all the layers from the horns and the varus strings and melody percussion instruments and make sure you go follow her at himparrot.com as an audio engineer i typically avoid talking about how loud a pair of headphones or earbuds can get because most people want to crank things up as loud as possible and end up causing permanent hearing loss as someone that is a strong advocate for protecting the only pair of ears that you have i don’t like talking about which one is louder for the google pixel buds pro i’ll make an exception because i often find myself thinking that they’re too quiet for some pieces of content despite having them turn up to max and specifically on google pixel devices if you’re listening to something that is quieter like a part of a tv show or movie a youtube video or a podcast that’s particularly quite compared to most you don’t have the added
headroom for increasing the volume to make it a bit more normal and loud now it’s quite interesting because i normally have my earbuds six to eight clicks down from the top depending on the earbud but for these i have them almost always on max for anything that’s not music and with that said i’ll say that most music should be more than loud enough if they’re mixed to typical standards and this may not be as much of an issue if you’re using these on another device other than a google pixel my samsung galaxy s2 ultra was louder by notable amount in my tests hey so i forgot to film this initially but another really interesting thing about turning the volume all the way to max on the google pixel buds pro is that it compresses it it’ll actually have like a pumping kind of sound when you turn it all the way up so you actually get a poorer experience or the music sounds worse at max volume so you know it’s not really worth it save your ears alright for this song it has a killer bass line on it pay attention that the synth and the vocal reverb forever prior to the update i honestly couldn’t suggest the google pixel buds pro to anyone that strongly weighs sound quality for their buying decisions since the update though i really haven’t changed my mind but there are some caveats do i think they’re one of the top choices for sound quality definitely not the first generation of galaxy butts pro and the new galaxy buds 2 pro are
significantly better in sound quality the pixel buds pro have a bit too much bass boost that seems to really muddy up the sound a bit and there’s a weird spike in the highs where the attack of a snare drum tends to be on heavier rock or metal type songs that can be particularly painful at louder volumes and it pokes out a bit higher than the rest of the frequencies interestingly enough this happens to also be the painful frequency range produced when i set my weights down that i mentioned earlier when i talk about the transparency mode and unfortunately the mid-range also has a kind of papery sound to it that makes it sound really cheap at its default tuning i find that the sound is quite a few steps back compared to the pixel buds a series when you can adjust the bass up on the a series to fill it up a bit more it makes it closer to what the pixel buds pro are trying to do but it manages to have a cleaner and airier high end without an overly congested low end and that is as long as you set the base boost at a moderate level you might go with plus one and plus two at max in terms of what would be less painful to listen to the a series are
a much better option now i really want to emphasize that earbuds come down to your personal preference and the wing that you give to various things like sound features and the quality of those features and whatever else that comes into play but if audio is one of your main qualifiers it may be comforting to know that you are able to just eq on the pixel buds pro somewhat with something like wavelet this would allow you to balance out the frequencies around those spikes in the high end so they don’t stick out so unevenly while cleaning up the low end and when i do this i actually like the sound quite a bit more than a series the issue is that this process isn’t exactly the easiest thing for the average person to explore and wavelet is not without its quirks and limitations again i do have a beginner’s guide to eq’ing that you can watch but if you prefer not doing that on your own or wanted tuning based upon my own preferences i have spent a few days putting together a custom eq for channel members if you want to use it all you have to do is hit that little button next to the
subscribe button and it does help support the channel and the purchase of earbuds headphones and equipment for videos like this like this extra pair of google pixel butts pro to show the difference between firmware versions how about we listen to how my custom eq sounds compared to the stock tuning this song has a lot of great reverb going so kind of emphasize a bit that vocal forwardness and the airiness let me know what you notice and let me know what you think of the sound in the comments [Music] i need a west coast that’s like at a price of 199 the pixel buds pro are twice the price of the a series and like most things it is not twice as good but it does come down to your wants or preferences i never want to force my preferences on you but here are some things to consider as you figure out what is the best route for you if you’re the type of the person that honestly doesn’t care about active noise cancellation transparency mode multi-device support or swipe gestures i’d honestly suggest buying or keeping the pixel buds a series not only are they more comfortable and secure at least for my ears they’re also quite a bit cheaper if sound quality is the most important thing for you and you’re not the type that knows how to or feels comfortable adjusting the eq on your earbuds then again the pixel buds a series make the most sense now it is possible that google will continue to refine the audio over future
firmware updates or maybe the eq feature that soon account will be more than sufficient for adjusting the sound quality but it’s really hard for me to suggest something on possibilities in the future so i guess that comes down to your own comfort level also if you are the person that is comfortable adjusting things in wavelet or wants to use my custom eq then the pixel buzz pro can make some sense if you do care about active noise cancellation a lot and want to be in the google ecosystem i think the google pixel buds pro actually do a pretty good job here like i mentioned before its weak spot is how fast it compresses or limits audio and transparency mode so hopefully that can be fixed in a future firmware update and to be fair that’s only an issue in one setting mode the area that the pixelbots pros shine the most is the swipe gestures and the battery life if either of those are the main part of your buying decision then the pixel butts pro make a lot of sense now here’s another great song that covers a ton of the frequency range let’s compare both
earbuds and my custom eq mistake is now for those who really want to know my personal preference if i had to choose between the two i would actually pick the google pixel buds pro and that’s because i have the ability to adjust the eq to my taste if i couldn’t do that i definitely wouldn’t use the google pixel buds pro they have to listen to and they have a sound that really bums me out i was hoping for something far better than this especially when their nest speaker was tuned surprisingly well now if i had a choice of any earbud these wouldn’t even be considered as an option for me to choose from as there are many other options that sound way better than these trust me i really wanted to like these but the sound really bothers me but if they don’t bother you and you’re the type of person that would like to buy them you can do so by clicking the link in the description or right here let me know your thoughts on the sound test features and which one is for you or not for you full disclosure google did not send these to me they were purchased with my own money and google has no editorial control of this review and they are seeing it at the same time as you thanks for watching this is tech today until next time
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