Bose Headphones 700, Noise Cancelling Bluetooth Over-Ear Wireless Headphones with Built-In Microphone for Clear Calls and Alexa Voice Control, Black

I’ve owned a pair of Bose QuietComfort 15 headphones for the last seven years, I chose them as I preferred the over ear design and I liked having a replaceable battery which I could change on the move without the hassle of recharging. The noise cancellation of those was class leading, when new, but has since been left a little behind as newer models have been released.Since 2012, bluetooth wireless has become mainstream. My daily phone (Oneplus 6T) doesn’t even have a headphone jack and I had to use an adapter to connect my old headphones. This wasn’t a major concern, neither was the wire, as I only really use my headphones with my Google Pixel C tablet when sat still on the train. When moving around I usually use a set of Plantronic earphones, which are more suited to walking and running than a heavy pair of cans.By 2018 I’d worn out one of the two included headphone cables and had ordered my third paid or earpad cushions – I use these headphones every working day a couple of hours. The headphones were visibly as new and fully functional, but some parts simply worn out after some 3500+ hours of use and I suspected the noise cancellation wasn’t as good as it used to be.So I started looking around at options. I liked some functions of the Microsoft Surface headphones, but they didn’t quite tick all the boxes for me. The Sony headphones were getting great reviews, but would only connect to one device over Bluetooth – given the entry cost of these devices I wanted to make sure I was somewhat “future proof” and a single device seemed a bit limited. I also wanted USB-C charging, which the older Bose headphones didn’t have. My phone and tablet are both USB-C so I wasn’t going back there.Enter the Bose 700 Noise Cancelling headphones which appeared to tick all the boxes for me:- Bluetooth wireless including “HD Audio: AAC” support.- Touch controls for volume, track skip etc- Class leading noise cancellation including a button to disable temporarily if somebody like cabin crew or train guard need to talk to you momentarily.- 20 hour battery life – well in excess of my tablet and enough to get me over a week between charging.- Google assistant (and Alexa) support. Don’t expect to use this much but it’s there should be usage change.- High quality phone call options – again, not expecting to use much but a nice to have for many.- Can connect to multiple (two) bluetooth sources concurrently.So I ordered the NC 700 and eagerly awaited delivery.On arrival I took them out of the box and they were exactly how I expected. My old QC-15 only had one switch but these looked much cleaner, especially in the black finish vs the old silver. The new band design is pretty stylish and works well. The size adjustment is different but works well and I find the 700s sit on my head nicely for hours without any discomfort. If you have a larger head, the headphones won’t fit back in the case without sliding the band back first – this is fairly easy but I guess could get annoying if you used a lot and were at the larger end of the adjustment. The mechanism is also a little “loose” which, while they won’t change size in use at all, may rattle a little if you were walking in them. I don’t plan to move around so no concern for me however.I’d read about a LOT of problems with the app needed to set the headphones, but these were largely from early adopters and the app has since been updated, fixing a lot of the issues. Also most of the problems were from Apple iPhone uses, I’m an Android guy. I expect I’ll be fine…Seems I spoke too soon. Bose didn’t quite get this right. I downloaded the “Bose Music” app easily enough and registered to use – something that shouldn’t be necessary. I used my Facebook login to activate the app, rather than having a dedicated username/password for Bose.App fully activated, I turned on the headphone and they were detected right away by the app. So far, so good. Then the app tries to automatically pair the device with your phone. It didn’t work. Not much troubleshooting, just said it had failed. Tried again, failed. Being a techie, I then decided to go to my phone’s bluetooth settings and pair them manually. I had to turn the headphones off and on again, to get them back into pairing mode and visible on the phone’s bluetooth interface, but pairing worked first time. I could then use the Connect button in the app and view all the settings. OK, we’re good to go.I put the headphones on and pressed play on some music in Spotify. Worked first time, all good and audio quality (whilst subjective) as good as I expected and no major concern when compared to my old QC-15. I’d heard some concerns about bass levels etc but these are just fine for me – they aren’t going to give Beats levels of thumping bass though, thankfully.My phone prompted to finish completion of the Google Assistant function, I tested that and it worked well. You press a dedicated physical button on the headphones for this although I understand you can just say “Alexa” and it will trigger without a button push – may not be useful in public! I was surprised how quietly I could speak and be heard though.I tested different noise cancellation levels and the ability to hold the NC button down when somebody walked up to my desk. This function is great, but a little slow. Somebody walks up and starts to talk, you reach for the button, can’t find it right away as they are new, and then when you finally hold down the button it takes about 1.5 secs to mute the music and switch off the noise cancellation. It’s quicker to take them off so the feature just misses the mark for me – I may look at reprogramming the button so I can just kill it in one click, but this won’t pause the music. Turning the headphones off also won’t work as then the external sound will remain muffled, and turning off also takes a second – playing a shutdown chime as it does so. So it’s great if you want to talk to somebody else and press the button before doing so, but a bit of hassle if somebody taps you on the shoulder before you see them coming. Maybe this will improve with a future update. The noise cancellation overall is superb though, and a marked improvement on the QC-15. I put this down to newer tech with more microphones and better foam cushioning that works better around my glasses.The touch controls are working very well. Double tap to play/pause, swipe for volume or track skip. So far they work well for me and I haven’t had any failed or phantom touches, despite hot, sweaty hands in a heatwave – will update the review if this happens.Battery life is what it said on the box, they arrived with about 4 hours of charge – the battery meter in the app doesn’t refresh immediately though which confused me after they’d been on charge a while and it didn’t appear to have gone up. I understand a 15 minute charge will give you three hours of listening time, which is good if you forget to charge them and only have a little while before running for your train. I haven’t validated the 20 hours of life but I don’t expect to be disappointed here. No, you can’t use them while connected to the charger, I tried.While testing the music, my phone rang and the headphones immediately alerted me by not only ringing but also telling me who was calling without having to look at my phone. Handy. I answered the call with a double tap and began to talk. The caller had no idea I was on my headphones and I could hear them clearly in a “centre stage” position with noise cancellation meaning I couldn’t hear the office noise around me. It led to a very clear, comfortable phone call and it made me realise I’d use them a lot more for this function than expected. I can watch videos on my tablet and, should my phone ring halfway through, I’ll be able to take the call without taking off my headphones. Perfect.Which leads me onto the multiple device support. I installed the Bose Music app on my tablet and signed in using the Facebook credentials I’d used last time. It saw my headphones and tried to pair with them, again badly. Being familiar with the process I turned on the headphone, then held down the power button for a second or so until I heard a voice prompt “ready to pair another device”. All paired up, I played a video on my tablet. I heard audio, but bad, choppy broken up audio. Like interference you would get with a bad signal, but the devices were next to each other. I tried music on my phone again, all good. Back to my tablet – broken. Totally unusable. I turned everything off and on again. Hold on it’s working. Perhaps it was a fluke problem. Then I noticed I hadn’t entered my pin code on my phone, when I did it completed booting and the Bose NC 700 announced “Oneplus 6T connected” and the tablet audio died again. I could use one, or the other, but not both – pretty useless given the multiple device support I’d bought them for.A Google search revealed I wasn’t alone with this issue and it wasn’t limited to Android to tablets. I found a couple of people trying to connect a Macbook as a second device without success. All suffered from the same broken, stuttering audio. I searched some more and found a reference to a firmware update for these headphones. What version was I using? I looked in the app for a reference to it.Open the Bose Music app, find your headphones, turn them on, then use the “Connect” button. Randomly at this point the app will make you go through the “ready to connect another device” function again. I just had to when reproducing the steps for this review. It’s now showing battery life as 20hrs 14mins and hadn’t finished charging when I turned them on. Once connected tab the picture to go through to the device details and then click the “settings” button”. Scroll down the list and towards the bottom is “Technical Info”. Tapping this will show the firmware version, manufacturing date etc. I was running 1.0.9.863.47372cb but then it displayed that it was downloading an update. No prompt, no “do you want to update?”, it just did it. Music carried on playing during the process but I couldn’t stop it.I have no idea where it downloaded the update from but it was sloooow. It took around one hour to complete. Don’t turn the headphones off, it will stop and you may have to start again. Don’t try it on another device to see if it will go quicker, you’ll just have to start again – I did. Just wait.After the wait I had been updated to version 1.1.4.1144.be3bf4b – the headphones had to reboot for this, so music was stopped momentarily. I’n now on the latest version, but did it fix my problem?I tried music from my phone, all good. I tried video on my tablet, audio still broken. I turned off bluetooth on my phone, tablet audio fixed. Phone back on, tablet audio broken. It was better in that I didn’t have to reboot to fix the fault each time it happened, but I still couldn’t connect two devices at the same time. Should I send them back?One last Google around, I found similar problems people were having with the old Bose QC35 headphones. These had suggested updating the software and then performing a factory reset on the headphones – a process which required a button that doesn’t exist on the NC 700. So I searched for a reset procedure for the NC 700 and found one that would clear the Bluetooth settings. Process as follows:Turn the headphones off.On your phone, go into Bluetooth settings and delete the NC 700 headphones.On your tablet and any other devices, go into Bluetooth settings and delete the NC700 headphones.Turn the headphones on, while wearing.Press and hold down the power button for 10+ settings, ignoring other prompts, until you hear “bluetooth device list cleared”.Now open the Bose Music App on your phone. Try to connect to your headphones, it will try to pair them again. Mine failed like it did the first time but I tried and tried until is succeeded. DO NOT pair them using your phone settings. Let the app do it. Once successful, do the same on your other device. Now test.Since doing this, my set-up has been flawless. But it took far too long to get to the this point, using the combined knowledge or myself, some forum posts about these headphones, some posts about older headphone and some guess work. But we’re working, finally.So, on to the scoring…For £349 these should be five star headphones. In fairness, they probably are, but the software lets them down. I only got these working as I’m a real techie and I refuse to give up – they’ll get a lot of faulty returns and rightly so.I’ve taken a whole star off for the bad app that won’t even run in landscape mode on my tablet. The pairing process is a joke and should have been easier – most headphone manufacturers get you to use the device native pairing on your phone or tablet, this would likely have been easier for most owners.The other star I’ve taken off for a combination of the following:1) Bluetooth audio isn’t as high quality as that with a wire. Other wireless technologies exist but aren’t supported by this device. The HD audio support also seems to be a bit hit and miss, sometimes the option doesn’t appear on my phone/tablet after connecting. The headphones are capable of better quality than the bluetooth connection allows.2) The headphones can’t be charged while laying flat in the case.3) You can’t use the headphones while connected to the charger – rare use care, but why not?4) The noise cancelling override function takes a little too long to engage.5) The case zipper is too long and it’s hard to fully open whilst holding them. Hard to explain, but you’ll know the first time you try to open them. The case folds open like a book and the spine isn’t long enough.6) Compulsory registration with Bose – should not be needed.7) Software update wasn’t automatic and would fix many issues if this happened during first time set-up.8) Switching playback source devices could be easier. If I want to go from music on my phone, to video audio on my tablet, the process is a bit of a fiddle.So, five star headphones with 1.5 stars of niggles. I’d have given these 3.5 stars but, without that option, I gave them a 3 rather than a 4. I’ll update this review if any of these things improve. I’m also happy to answer any questions posted to this page if I’ve missed anything – although can’t answer Apple issues.I’m happy with the headphones now, with no plans to return, but they don’t justify the entry price until some of these niggles are fixed.

Quiet the world without sacrificing the Music’s quality! Amazing sound, features & Alexa enabled. The noise cancellation is exceptional on these headphones. With 10 levels I can block out most of what is going on around me, when it is safe to do so. If you are someone that startles easily, like myself, you will probably get scared a lot because you will not hear what or who is walking up behind you. My husband finds this very humorous.The sound quality was every bit of what I expected from Bose. Crisp, rich audio, with an amazing range of clarity, from your treble to mid tones and excellent bass. It’s easy to slip into your own little oasis with these on.They are also quite comfortable, their padded band and ear cups are soft and do not apple much pressure against your head. They are very light weight and I can wear them for hours without issue.The included case is well made, sturdy and not overly bulky allowing my to pack it and take it with me anywhere. It has a storage compartment for your cables so you always know where they are.The battery life is excellent! I can go days without charging, but if I do need to charge, they replenish quite quickly and I am right back in business. I have easily gotten a full 20 hour charge out of these. I like that when you turn them on they immediately tell you how many hours they have left on their current charge and what devices they are connected to. This makes it easy to check how long you can use them on their current charge, before you head out somewhere where you might not have access to a plug. I found the time they tell me I have left on my charge to be quite accurate. I am able to connect to more than one device (like my iPhone and iPad) and they intuitively play the sound from the device I am using at the moment. I love that feature it’s easy to switch from watching something on my iPad to listening to music from my phone. Bose also includes a cable so you can plug directly to your device and go wired. I have not used this feature because the battery life is so long, I have not run into a situation where it was necessary.The buttons and touch features of these headphones are wonderful. I can turn Alexa (Siri or Google) on or off depending on my needs. I can control the volume sliding my finger up or down on the surface of one ear and can tap to pause and swipe to change songs. With one button I can rotate between 3 levels of noise cancellation that I can set within my app. I have not had the chance to utilize some of the AR on these yet but cannot wait to try it on our next vacation, it will be like bringing along our own tour guide.I love that Alexa is built in. I’m an artist and when I’m painting in my studio it is very nice to be able to use Alexa to change my music without needing to touch my device or my headphones.I saved and waited to get these after trying them and comparing to the Sony competitive model and I am so glad I did. I found the bass of the Sony WH1000 series to be a little scratchy sounding and the overall sound just wasn’t as crisp as the Bose 700 series. I had a pair of Cowin E-7s and those, while they were great at their price point and did the job while I was saving up for these, they just weren’t even in the same class as the Bose 700. These, in my opinion (and I spent a lot of time putting headphones on and off, listening to how everything sounded on each), set the bar and everything else is just trying to measure up. Only the Sony WH1000 series could come close, but for me their sound quality still fell short. The only way to describe it was, you knew you were listening to a recording, whereas the sound from the Bose 700, you could close your eyes and it sounded like you were listening to it actually being played by the artist live the sound is just that crisp and clear no echo or scratch it’s clear vibrant and rich, everything I expected from Bose.I am very happy with my purchase, they were worth the wait and I would certainly recommend them to everyone!One Note I have very sensitive sinuses and when I put on noise canceling headphones, I can actually feel a pressure in my ears and sinus cavities, this does happen with the Bose as well (it happens with every brand I have tried if the cancellation is of any really quality). That said it does not deter me, nor do I feel it’s would be a reason I wouldn’t recommend them or give them a lower star rating. I can feel it when I activate the noise cancellation at its max level but everyone else I have asked to try them, can’t. So chances are very likely this will not be something that the average person even realizes. I can still use the noise cancellation and can block out enough that I never hear my husband walk into my studio until he taps me on the shoulder and scared the heck out of me. I only include this info in case there are others out there that also experience this, with the Bose 700 you can control the levels and it’s easy to step your way up through 10 levels of cancellation and find one that blocks the noise out, while still being comfortable to your sinuses. That is why I would recommend to everyone! Other headphones are cancellation on or off and if you are sensitive to it that can render the feature useless. Again not the case with the Bose 700 series. I use this feature all the time, have found the level that is perfect for me and the noise cancellation is amazing. It is so nice to finally be able to use this feature.I will also add that unlike other headphones the noise cancellation does not affect the quality of the sound I am listening to either! I have tried many where the sound completely changes the moment you turn it on, not with these. The sound remains crisp and rich and clear as it did without the noise cancellation. The only difference is the world around you gets quieter and the music sounds amazing! If you read this whole review Thank You if you are considering these headphones and trying to compare, in my opinion there is no comparison and I don’t think you will be disappointed choosing the Bose 700 series. I hope this info helped.

Non-Biased Review of Beats vs Sony WH-1000MX3 / WH-1000MX4 vs Bose Noise Cancelling Headphones 700. This review is my personal experience using both headphones. I recently lost my Sony Headphones and decided to buy Bose Headphones. Here are some differences I have found between all three, and how I feel currently using Bose Headphones.Make sure you update any headphones firmware, some issues you may experience could be fixed (with any electronic). Understand that headphones in a warehouse are likely from the year they were manufactured, and first versions of anything tend to be buggy.PERSONAL USAGEI use these headphones primarily for work. I’ve been full time remote for over two years doing software development. I have ADHD and having noise cancelling headphones is a must to keep my attention on work. We use mostly Slack and Zoom as our means of communication. Otherwise, I’m listening to music or the occasional YouTube TV.PERSONAL PREFERENCESI really don’t like using in the ear headphones. They hurt my ears after an hour or so and never were a long-term solution. Over the ear headphones was what I liked the best since that’s what works for me. This has been throughout my life, and they tend to fall out.BEATS – NOT FOR ME OR MY HEADMy first pair of headphones were Beats Solo. I was really impressed with wireless headphones in general. Eventually after the Solos started to fall apart, I decided to get Beats Studio 3. These worked much better for my head, as these were truly over my year, which I prefer.The functionality is about the same between the two. With a lot of usage, the earpieces came worn out and unglued and I had to buy replacements. Compatible quality replacements are about $30 from different manufacturers.• Pros – Lots of colors. Foldable, and buttons are more clicks than touch sensitivity. Useful when sweating or outdoor use.• Cons – Quality. Wore down quickly and were not a long-term solution. Paying more for royalties to Dr. Dre than quality assurance in general. Feel cheap.FIRST DECISION – Sony WH-1000MX3I was fortunate to try out both headphones from a family member. I was skeptical about Sony since it wasn’t the name brand Bose was for what I wanted. I really like how they felt on my head, and they didn’t hurt after wearing them for hours.There wasn’t a noticeable difference in sound quality. Features needed matched what I needed at the time and figured there was no point in spending more. My work-at-home situation was different, and I was at home around 40% of the time. The case was useful when transporting in my backpack back and forth to work.Once I transitioned to full time work-at-home, some of the features that I found useful weren’t available on the Sony’s. One big thing I would like to see is app integration. Mute / Unmute for Slack and Zoom would really be a great feature. Understandably, these are headphones, and are limited to what Bluetooth has to offer.The app is useful, and more powerful with customization than the other two. I found I used it a couple of times.Over the three years I’ve used these, the product quality and sound we’re just like day 1. These headphones seem to be built better than the other two.• Pros –Very durable and well built. Sound quality is great and felt good after a day’s work. Slept with these on a bus trip. That was my last memory. Cheaper than the Bose. Foldable, smaller case.• Cons – Less features than the Bose. Misses on some sweet spots. Harder to see which is left and right when putting them on, but not really a big deal.SECOND DECISION – Bose Noise Cancelling Headphones 700Once I realized I may never see my beloved Sony Headphones again, I needed something right away since work call quality was terrible. Before I pulled the trigger on the same Sony’s, I wanted to look at to what Bose offered that Sony didn’t. The biggest was a feature to mute / unmute. When pouring over reviews like this one, that feature was worth paying up. Since these are new headphones, I am still getting used to the controls.I’ve only had these for a month. Was it worth paying up for it? Honestly, I don’t know yet. There are more controls on the headphones which I’m figuring out.So based on a month, here’s what I found• Pros – Seems like better sound quality. More features and possible mute integration.• Cons – Price and unproven personal durability experience.TLDR / OVERALL REVIEWI won’t even compare the Beats headphones. Sony and Bose are a step way above Beats.METRICS• Sound Quality – Bose slightly. My ears are bad, I’m not an audiophobia as others may be. Spotify is what I listen to primarily. The slight edge goes to Bose, only because it’s a small enough difference.• Mute / Unmute – Bose. The main reason for choosing Bose instead of Sony for my current headphones.• Noise Cancelling – Leaning towards Bose. There is customization of three different settings within the Bose app to set up preferences from 0-10. Sony sort of has the same thing, but not directly.• Microphone – Sony. Never had any issues of cutting out or “robo voice”. Initially I am “cutting out” and “in a wind tunnel” from peers.• Bose – Multiple Device Connectivity (multiple Bluetooth Connections) was a feature I didn’t even think about. Bose allows for multiple connections which comes in handy. I found myself unpairing and pairing devices with Sony. It was sort of a hassle that seemed unnecessary. If the Bluetooth source device is off, it should default to another.• Headset Features, Bose wins. Although I haven’t had the time to get into what the buttons do, there are more of them. The buttons themselves seem a little better than the Sony’s.• Headset Quality – Sony. I really don’t care for the artsy plastic that goes over the top of your head. Sony also folds up where Bose doesn’t. An argument can be made that the Bose are lighter than the Sony’s, but that didn’t matter to me.• In the box – Sony slightly. Sony included an airplane adapter where Bose did not. I prefer the case from Sony than I do from Bose.• Daily Use – Too Early to determine, likely Sony. Sony’s headphones were excellent, as of now I haven’t used the Bose headphones.• Bluetooth Range – Bose decisively. Bluetooth location hasn’t changed. Dead spots where I wore my Sony’s didn’t exist with the Bose. There is a little bit of breakup in the headphones in dead spots, but nearly not as much as the Sony’s.• Companion Application – Bose. Much more customization of buttons versus Sony.WINNER – SonyI’m going to put a disclaimer on this, so take this for what it is.With my new set of Bose Headphones, there is a problem with the microphone. Assuming that this was just a fluke, I returned them since they were defective. So, my review is irrelevant of that from that aspect.Both are great, I lean Sony just because of the price difference.I wanted to give the Bose Headphones a little more time before getting a refund and getting the Sony’s again. Right now, they’re cutting out where Sony rarely did that. Even in that case, my computer was slow, or the application used went haywire. That’s something that’s a no-go for me. I ended up contacting Bose support, went through the normal stuff, is your battery charged, are you far away to a point they created a return ticket for a replacement. Once sent in, they would give me a new pair within 5 business days.Fortunately, after writing this review, I ended up finding my missing Sony headphones, which would be what I would have bought instead of a Bose replacement.As with any review, only you can decide if the extra money for Bose is worth it. I can see it both ways. For me, these headphones are for basic usage. The extra money wasn’t worth the upgrade. Defective products happen. I just hoped that their flagship headphones would have worked better. Regardless, spending hundreds of dollars to replace something missing is an instant return anyway.I hope this helped someone. Sorry for too much text.