Design and features:This Bluetooth wireless noise-canceling home/studio-style over-ear model provides acceptable sound and excellent active noise reduction. Although it lacks active noise reduction, the closed design helps to reduce both outside noise and sound leaking out into your environment. Additional features include - a detachable audio cable, ear cups swivel for ease of carrying and storage. Has button controls for play/pause/skip forward and call connect/disconnect (default), volume control, digital voice assistant activation. Has adaptive volume level function that increases and decreases the earphone volume as the ambient sound increases or decreases. Has power on/off alert tone and voice announcements, Bluetooth connect/disconnect/battery level voice announcements. Supports Amazon Alexa, Apple Siri, and Google Assistant digital voice assistants when used with mobile devices that have those features. Has quick charge feature: 3 min of Headphone charging will provide 1.5hrs. of playtime, 10 min of charging will provide 5 hrs. of playtime. Headphones are compatible with Sony's 360 Reality Audio virtual surround sound on several streaming services (Deezer, Tidal, Nugs.net). Bluetooth connected Apple mobile devices using iOS Version 5 and above will show the battery level. Free Sony Headphones Connect app download for Apple and Android mobile devices can act as a audio program player and can provide tonal balance presets and equalization, provide earphone control customization, optimize the Sony 360 Reality Audio feature, disable the voice announcements, enable/disable the auto-pause function, enable/disable the adaptive volume level function, and update the earphone's firmware. Supports Multipoint pairing between two devices. Supports Google Fast Pair for android devices and Swift Pair for Windows 10 and 11 computers.
Sound quality:We found the ULT WEAR Wireless Noise Canceling Headphones delivers sound quality that falls in the acceptable range - it reproduces music and voice reasonably well despite the obvious shortcomings in its sound and excellent active noise reduction. With the noise cancelling mode engaged and the Sony Headphones Connect app set with the Equalizer and ULT off and clear bass set to 0 (as received state of the earphone) the bass (as in bass drums, bass guitars, stand-up bass, etc.) has good impact and goes deep, but is prominent and boomy. The midrange (voices, guitars, horns, etc.) is fairly even, but is hazy, somewhat grainy and congested (think sonic traffic jam) and a touch muffled and plasticky. The treble (cymbals, the upper range of violins, etc.) is fairly extended but is a bit subdued, sizzly (sounds that should have a delicate shimmer have a sound reminiscent of bacon frying) and smeared. While the sound has a decent sense of liveliness, it is closed (sound-wise it's obvious you have something plugging your ears) and does a decent job of recovering room ambience. Warmish character. The overall sound can best be summarized as boomy and hazy. The tone settings of the app do have a noticeable effect on the sound of these headphones. Noise Canceling: Excellent noise reduction across the entire frequency range with the low frequencies reduced the most. Orientation changes the noise reduction characteristic - when the noise is coming from the front a bit more high-frequency noise can be heard relative to when it's coming from the side or rear. A very faint rushing sound can be heard in quiet environments when there is no audio program to drown it out.
Comfort and Fit:There is a sense of moderate pressure around the ears. As typical of over-ear models the ear pads might feel hot and/or sticky after prolonged use.
Large
Users with larger heads might find that the headband does not have enough adjustment range to allow the ear cups to rest properly over the ears and/or that the headband presses uncomfortably on the top of the head.
Users with larger ears might find that the over-the-ear fit of the ear pads feel cramped, or that the ear pads sit on, rather than around their ears; in that case the less-than-ideal fit around the ears might interfere with the ear pad seal and reduce the bass response and/or noise reduction capabilities of the headphone.
Incidental contact with the touch controls on the left/right/either ear cup can cause unintentional playing, pausing, or track skipping. When wearing this model while walking the muffled vibrations from each foot step can be heard slightly through the headphones regardless of whether or not the headphones are in noise cancelling mode.
Stability
Some users may find that when they lean far forward the headphones feel unstable and shift forward.
Other noise
When the audio cord is used the sound of it rubbing on clothing may be faintly heard through the headphones.
