Sony XB950N1 Extra Bass Review

The Sony XB950N1 Extra Bass are good all-around headphones that are often on sale for far below their list price. If you can find them on the cheap they're a great choice, but if you're going to pay list price you might want to check out some other options.

Performance Comparison

The Sony XB950N1 Extra Bass sat in the midrange of our overall scores, as can be seen in the table above. We used five different test to establish our headphone hierarchy. You can read more about how the Sony XB950N1 Extra Bass fared in those tests below.

Sound Quality

The Sony XB950N1 Extra Bass earned an above average score in our sound quality testing. It definitely does deliver on its name with deep resonant bass that is on par with that of the top models. It does have a bass boosting feature that increases the bass power. However, while this made the bass boomier, it also made the rest of the music sound very hollow and echoey. Overall we thought the music sounded much better with the bass boosting feature turned off.

The Extra Bass does suffer a bit when it comes to clarity. In our testing the clarity was decent, maybe a small step above that of a cheap pair of earbuds, but was no match for the crystal sound of the Bose models and the higher end Sony WH1000XM2. In fact, even the budget-priced TaoTronics TT-BH060 produced clearer sound than the Extra Bass. Bottom line, if you like your bass thumpy the Extra Bass offers a fairly good value per dollar. But, if you tend to listen to a lot of acoustic music or podcasts, you may appreciate the extra clarity you can get by spending a bit more on one of the Bose models, or even by spending less on the TaoTronics TT-BH060.

Noise Isolation

The Extra Bass earns the lowest score we awarded to any model that offers active noise cancellation. The Extra Bass was able to drown out most of the din of our office, but voices and even some aggressive typing noises did make their way through, even when we had music playing.

Comfort

The Extra Bass' thick padding earned it a score of 7 out of 10 in our comfort testing. It missed out on a higher score because it opts for perfectly circular ear cups. There are very few people with perfectly circular ears, so if your auditory appendages tend towards the larger side the Extra Bass may feel like a tight fit. This is an issue shared with the TaoTronics TT-BH060. If you've got large ears Bose's more anatomically designed ear cups are the way to go, though they do cost more.

User Friendliness

The Extra Bass shared the top score of 8 out of 10 in our user friendliness testing, mostly due to its intuitive button layout. It is one of the few models that uses dedicated buttons for all of its various functions: play/pause, volume control, track skipping, noise cancellation, and the bass effect. This feels much more intuitive than models that use multifunction buttons that must be pressed twice quickly to do one thing and three times to do another.

Portability

The Extra Bass was one of the lowest scorers in our portability testing, picking up a score of just 5 out of 10. This is mostly due to the headphones relatively heavy weight of 10.25 ounces, and the fact that the only included case is a drawstring pouch. Most competing headphones are slightly lighter and come with sturdier travel cases.

Value

The value of the Sony XB950N1 Extra Bass is somewhat hard to pinpoint. This is partially because, like many wireless headphones, the Extra Bass is often available for significantly less than its $250 list price. If you like bass and can find the Extra Bass in the sub $200 range, it's a great value. If you're more concerned about clarity than bass the TaoTronics TT-BH060 is a better value. If you're going to pay list price for the Extra Bass, you might consider checking out the superior sound of the Bose SoundLink Wireless II before you make a purchase decision (just remember those headphones don't have active noise cancellation).

Conclusion