JBL presented its Live Flex, wireless headphones without silicone tips, but with active noise reduction and multipoint Bluetooth.
Although the majority of wireless headphones available on the market now offer an in-ear format, with silicone tips that are inserted into or at the entrance to the ear canal, some users are not comfortable with this design to say the least intrusive. Only, in front of the AirPods 3 or the Nothing ear (Stick), few are the manufacturers to offer headphones in an open format and with suitable sound quality. Not to mention the limits on sound insulation.
However, this is the bet that JBL has set itself with its new JBL Live Flex, announced on Tuesday. Like Nothing’s or Apple’s headphones, these are headphones in the “open fit», without silicone tips, which are therefore positioned at the entrance to the ear canal without entering it. However, unlike AirPods 3 or ear (Stick) – and like Samsung Galaxy Buds Live or Huawei FreeBuds 4 – JBL headphones offer active noise reduction.
Multipoint Bluetooth compatible headphones
JBL announces a function “True Adaptive Noise Cancellation“Able, according to the American manufacturer, to automatically adjust the level of noise reduction between 17 integrated filters according to the surrounding noise. To do this, the JBL Live Flex are equipped with ten microphones – three per earphone – responsible for both analyzing ambient noise and picking up the voice during phone calls thanks to the formation of beams.
The JBL Live Flex are also equipped with large transducers of 12 mm in diameter. If the manufacturer does not communicate on the compatible Bluetooth audio codecs, one can easily imagine that the Live Flex only offer support for AAC and SBC, as is generally the case with JBL. The true wireless headphones are however compatible with Bluetooth 5.3 and JBL indicates that they will benefit, thanks to a later update, from Bluetooth LE Audio. Sufficiently rare to point out, like the JBL Tour Pro 2, the JBL Live Flex are multipoint Bluetooth compatible and can therefore be used at the same time with a PC and a smartphone.
Spatial audio from any source
The JBL Live Flex also benefit from a spatial audio function, called “JBL Spatial Sound», announced as functional from any audio source.
Regarding autonomy, JBL announces that its Live Flex can operate for 6 hours with noise reduction (30 hours with the case) or 8 hours of autonomy without ANC (40 hours with the case). The case is also compatible with Qi wireless charging and IPX2 certified against splashes – IP54 for the headphones themselves.
The JBL Live Flex will be available during the month of February in France in four colors: black, blue, silver or pink. They will be offered at a price of 149 euros.
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