28 Points

Rank 2

I work in radio. I’ve done it for 30+ years and one of the curses/blessings of working with audio is I have grown to understand intimately what really good audio sounds like. I have used countless number of headphones and earbuds (and there 𝙄𝙎 a difference between the two) and there are a few names which stand above the rest, and I’m not going to get into a debate because so-called, ‘Audiophiles’ will claim they know better (Which begs the question, how does one actually 𝙗𝙚𝙘𝙤𝙢𝙚 an Audiophile in the first place? Is there a course you can take, or does one simply give themselves that title? But I digress…) when Beats first hit the scene, they were unquestionably an astonishing waste of money. Their audio quality was maybe a shade above average at best. But, that didn’t stop millions of people from buying them at outrageous prices. Well, the uncontested King of over-priced products (apple) got wind of this and did a takeover of their products and an interesting thing happened: their quality got BETTER.

Did they become as good as most “professional” headphones out there…? Probably not. However, their earbuds did become notably better. I feel it necessary to point out that while Beats headphones were nowhere as good as many claimed, their earbuds from the beginning seemed to be pretty good from the get-go. Their unique “hook” style which wrapped around your ear for a secure fit (you either love this style or not – but you cannot argue that they did not fit and stay in place better than almost any other brand out there). Some of their other wired earbuds were still decent as well, if not priced at the upper end of what most people were willing to pay, but at least the earbuds could be counted on to give you an above average experience.

Apple buys them out and reorganizes the entire company. Suddenly they are no longer all over the place like they used to be. Famous people were no longer wearing them everywhere you looked. Then apple releases their Beats branded earbuds, the Powerbeats Pro. Love them or hate them, they made an impact.
They were also equipped with apple tech like their H1 chip which made them instantly compatible with iPhones (a pretty smart move, actually) and the audio was excellent, especially for working out. Then they release the Beats Fit Pro.

A radically different design. But – a welcome one, especially for someone who loved the Powerbeats great audio quality, but not the hook design. Again, it’s hard to please everyone when it comes to something that fits inside your ears that have so many different possible sizes and an almost infinite number of differences from one person to the next…like the apple airpods, one size fit 𝙢𝙤𝙨𝙩…and if you were one of the people they did not fit, well you were kind of SOL. At least with the Fit Pro they opened up better fitting to a much larger segment than the airpods and with the included wing-tip design, they immediately caught the eye of many athletes who need earbuds which stay put while sometimes being fairly aggressive in their workouts. If you were not a fan of the Powerbeats hook style, the Fit Pro’s must have looked like a gift from On High.

FIrst off, they really DO sound great. Good bass without going too deep. Music NEEDS good bass, but if it thumps too hard, it will ruin audio in more ways than I can describe here. Mids and Highs were also both pretty crisp and not overly isolated. The blend just works. Whoever tuned the Fit Pro should be commended for doing such a great job.

ANC was…disappointing. To be fair, to get great ANC into such a tiny device really IS a challenge and oftentimes going all-in on this feature usually means you sacrifice audio quality. In this case, Beats chose to put more into the audio than into the ANC. I had a difficult time even recognizing that it was even turned on at all. Maybe my pair simply isn’t doing it’s job. However, the OnePlus buds Z2 has ANC that is actually pretty good and still has really impressive audio as well, so I’m not exactly sure why the Fit Pro’s is so difficult to even tell if ANC is on or off, but I can only review what I have and that seems to be the case with my particular pair.

The wing-tip design really works well – for me at least. They provide a pretty good fit and they stay put incredibly well. My biggest problem with earbuds is exactly that. Either they’ll fit well, or almost not at all. It doesn’t seem to fall anywhere in between. My OnePlus buds Z2 sound great, but I constantly find myself adjusting them in my ears – which honestly is annoying. The Fit Pro’s (at least in my case) I set them in, twist to secure the wing-tip and they just stay put. This is going to be subjective since everyone is slightly different, so keep in mind my experience with how they fit in my ear may not mirror your own.

You can do a little customizing with the app. I do have an iPhone but I primarily use an android, so I downloaded the app and you can to a bit of customizing, however, not as much as I would have liked to have seen given what these earbuds are capable of. I believe the iPhone integration has quite a bit more options than the android counterpart. This seems to be more the norm these days as apple and Samsung work hard to reward you for buying products that are more in line with their products than the competition. I wish they’d both put an end to this childish bickering and open up all their products that can be used on other platforms to include all the options that they would have if you paired it with an iPhone or a Samsung. Either you want your customers to get the best bang for their buck or not.

I like the physical buttons the Fit Pro uses. You’ll know by touch that you’ve pressed it instead of simply the “touch” controls which in my experience can be hit or miss. When they work great, it’s awesome. But do they all work perfectly every time? Of course not. With buttons, they seem to work pretty much 100% of the time and that’s something I appreciate.

No wireless charging. At this point, especially for the cost, that really is something they should have included. Is it a deal breaker? For some it very well could be. It wasn’t for me, but I love wireless charging and think every pair of wireless earbuds over $100 really ought to include it. I know earbuds that cost under $40 that do, so to not include it here seems to be almost an insult. They use USB-C charging which IS convenient however. Beats claims they have fast charging however, in fact they call it “Fast Fuel” where just 5 minutes of charging will net you an hour of listening…I haven’t been able to check this, but I CAN state that they do seem to charge pretty quick, so that may negate some of the disappointment of not having wireless ability, but necessarily so.

The case is pretty nice, too. It is quite a bit smaller than the case for the Powerbeats, but still larger than what you get with the airpods. I honestly didn’t mind the size at all, so this one is also going to be pretty subjective.

For the most part, these are the first apple made earbuds that I can recommend even if you own an android device. The audio is stellar and they seem to hold a charge for about an average length of time for earbuds of this size. I rarely listen for more than about an hour, maybe 2 at the most, so I’m not the guy to look for with advice on listening at length (unless it’s for headphones, then I can make a LOT of recommendations). Honestly, I’m happy with mine. Are they perfect? No. But are they worth it? I sure think so.

***UPDATE***

I purchased some memory foam eartips…not sure that this was a wise decision. Not because they don’t work or fit well, but because they are slightly larger, it means fitting them back into the charging case either they won’t charge or they’ll be problematic to fit properly. Now, in all fairness, this wasn’t an issue with the smallest foam eartips, but the medium and larger ones did not like to fit back into the case. They also did not really make any noticeable difference is audio quality, so I switched back to the original tips they came with. Lesson learned.

Product Link
https://www.amazon.com/Beats-Fit-Pro-Cancelling-Built/dp/B09JL41N9C?ref=dlx_deals_dg_dcl_B09JL41N9C_dt_sl14_ec&th=1

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