These are the MPow M30s, and these are the Samsung Galaxy Buds Plus. The Samsungs cost
$149, and the MPows, just 40 bucks. Are they worth your money? … Let’s find out.
First, let’s crack open the box. Immediately, we’re greeted with the earbuds and their
smooth, black charging case. Underneath that, we get some extra eartips and wingtips for
different sized ears, some paperwork, and a short USB-C charging cable (surprise!).
Starting with the design, it’s clear Mpow drew some inspiration from Samsung for these
buds, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. They use the same compact, in-ear bud style
as those earbuds as opposed to the stem design of the Airpods. They also have small wingtips
that hang off the sides that twist to secure the buds in your ears.
Like the Galaxy Buds, the case they come with is smooth and compact. It’s noticeably smaller
than the case for the similarly-priced SoundPEATS TrueCapsule that I reviewed a little while
ago, but it still can’t touch the champion of the AirPods case when it comes to size.
This case doesn’t have wireless charging, but it does have USB-C, an impressive first,
at least for me, for earbuds in this price range. Thanks to that USB-C connection, the
case also supports quick charging, gaining a full charge in only an hour and a half,
according to Mpow. The buds have three little gold connection pins on their undersive, so
all you have to do is drop them in, and they latch in magnetically, light up, and start
charging. The indicator light up front will also light up to show how much battery you
have left in the case.
Speaking of battery, when it comes to battery life, the good news doesn’t stop there.
These earbuds offer up to 5 hours of continuous listing time, and in my testing, I found that
to be pretty accurate, they’ve yet to die on me once. What’s better yet is that a
fully charged case can recharge the buds up to 4 times. Combine that with earbuds’ 5
hours of battery life for a total of up to 25 hours of listening time from a single charge.
Getting the earbuds paired to your phone is super simple. They don’t offer any fancy
NFC or Fast Pair, but they paired right away to my Pixel 3 in the Bluetooth menu, and after
the initial pair, they connect to your phone as soon as you open the case. Another great
feature of these earbuds is that each bud works independently of the other, which is
pretty rare for these cheap earbuds. That means you can grab just the left or right
earbud and even switch them on the fly.
The buds don't have any fancy software, like an app or a custom EQ, but their out of the
box sound is pretty good. They definitely sound better than the SoundPEATS I reviewed
a little while ago, and are the best sounding wireless earbuds I’ve heard for under $50
to date. I compared them to Apple’s Earpods, and the two sound very similar. The MPows
sound a bit fuller and have better bass than the Earpods for an overall more punchy and
enjoyable sound, but they’re less comfortable in my opinion.
They have a weird plugged-up feeling when you put them in, because they go into your
ears and essentially act as earplugs. The advantage to the in-ear design is that they
have solid bass, you can even feel them vibrating in your skull a bit. It also means they have
pretty good noise isolation isolation, too. *on screen note about noise cancellation*
Everything around you gets washed away a bit when you put them in. You can still hear voices
but most sound fades away completely when the music starts playing. This does make it
awkward to have a conversation with an earbud in, though, if that's your kind of thing.
Back to the good news. These buds offer the best touch controls I’ve ever used on earbuds,
and they’re pretty intuitive. A single tap on either earbud will play or pause your music.
You can double tap on the right earbud to skip the current track and on the left earbud
to go to the previous track. You can also use that double tap to answer or end a phone
call. Unlike many other true wireless models (I’m looking at you Airpods), these buds
allow you to adjust the volume by holding your finger on the left, to go down, and the
right to go up. It’s not super precise, but it’s better than nothing. Finally, triple
tapping on either bud will call up your phone’s personal assistant, that’s Google Assistant
in my case or Siri if you’re on an iPhone. As you probably noticed, they light up in
white whenever you tap them so you know your touches are being registered.
Finally, to test the microphone on these guys, I recorded an actual phone call, and I’ll
let you be the judge of that one. *microphone test*
So where does that leave us? Well, for only $40, you’re getting some truly wireless
buds that are super reliable and easy to use, have a nice design, great touch controls,
and good battery life. They’re not the most comfortable, and as you just heard, the microphone
is pretty bad, but if don’t have much to spend on some solid competition to the likes
of the Galaxy Buds and Airpods and you don’t take too many phone calls, you won’t be
disappointed with the MPow M30s.
So that was my review of the MPow M30s, thank you for watching. If you liked the video,
please hit that thumbs up and subscribe for more videos like this one. The link to where
you can buy these and all the other earbuds I talked about are in the description down
below, so be sure to check them out. And for the record, I received these buds as a review
sample from MPow, but I have not been compensated in any way to make this video. The opinions
here are entirely my own, and I’d love to hear yours in the comments down below.