- Soundcore is back with another banger.
The Soundcore Life P3 are bringing big bass,
full app support, active noise cancellation
along with a dedicated gaming mode.
And all of this for well under 100 bucks.
In this video, I'll be giving you my complete review along
with comparison to some of the top true wireless earbuds
under 100 bucks.
Soundcore's owned Liberty Air 2 Pro and Life A2 NC,
the 1more ComfoBuds pro and lastly, the EarFun Free Pro.
Now, for both transparency and disclosure,
the Soundcore Life P3 were sent to me for testing
and review purposes.
The means by which I receive all
of the earbuds does not color my comparison in any way.
There was no compensation involved from any of these brands
and no one was able to see this video
prior to it being published.
So in other words, all the brands will be seeing this video
at the same time that you are.
So now let's not waste any more time.
So first up, let's talk about the connection.
So these are feature and Bluetooth 5.0 along with SBC
and AAC as their connection codex.
When it comes to Bluetooth range,
I manage to get right run 11 meters or 36 feet.
Now this is obviously gonna vary depending
on how many obstructions you put in between the earbuds
and the device that they're connected to.
Now, these earbuds are also featuring dual connect
which means that you can use each earbud individually
while the other one is charging in the case.
There's some people who like to listen
to one earbud halfway through the day at work
and then maybe swap out at a certain point
maybe after lunch.
They've got you covered if you're that person.
Now, when it comes to watching videos, Netflix,
Hulu, YouTube, any of that sort of stuff,
there is minimal to no latency when watching videos.
And that's both on Android and on iOS devices.
Now that's gonna bring us over
to the after mentioned gaming mode.
So this is the first time
that I've seen a dedicated gaming mode
on a set of Soundcore true wireless earbuds.
Now this gaming mode, it reduces latency,
so it's already helping you there with that.
But it also enhances details.
So it does a little bit of an IQ switch,
and it's gonna give you a bit more detailed clarity,
a little more treble so you can hear footsteps,
things like that on first person shooter games.
It also adds a little bit of bass to make those explosions
and gunshots pop a little bit more.
When I tested this out, I was playing Call of Duty
and it came in clutch, works very, very well,
makes it feel more lively,
more like you're in the game, a bit more immersive.
So I really enjoyed myself playing the game.
Now, much like every other gaming mode on the market
on any set of earbuds or headphones,
it will affect your battery a bit
so just be mindful of that.
If you wanna get the most out of the battery
on these earbuds, you're probably gonna wanna leave
that gaming mode turned off unless you're actually gaming.
Now the topic of the battery and the case,
they were claiming seven hours plus 28
on the case bringing the total to 35 hours.
Pretty good overall.
Now, in my actual testing,
I managed to get six hours in three minutes
with noise cancellation turned on and seven hours
and 20 minutes with noise cancellation turned off.
So overall battery life is excellent on these earbuds.
Now, if you do manage to drain them out all the way,
they do feature fast charging
so you can drop the earbuds back into the case
for 10 minutes,
that'll give you an additional two hours worth
of playback time.
And then when it comes to charging the case itself,
they do have a USB type C port on the back,
along with wireless charging.
So if you have a wireless charger on your power bank,
maybe on your phone or something on your desk,
they've got you covered for that as well.
Now, when it comes to the case,
the shape of it is very similar to the case
for the Liberty Air 2 Pro.
Except with these it's a little bit smaller
and it does have a clamshell design.
So it doesn't have that sliding mechanism,
but it just pops open
so you can pull the ear buds out nice and easy.
And then as far as the earbuds themselves,
they do come in a stem design that is extremely similar
to the Liberty Air 2 Pro.
There are some subtle differences here and there,
but overall it is the same basic shape.
They are a tad bit smaller on the head of the earbud itself.
So I think it makes them slightly more comfortable
when being worn.
Also for those that are interested,
they are available in five different colors,
you've got black, you've got navy, you've got white,
you've got blue and you've got red.
So five different options to kinda suit your style.
Now, thankfully these do come with a standard size stem
for the ear tips themselves so you can use a stockier tips
and the stockier tips that are included
from Soundcore are actually very good.
But if you wanna swap them out for something different,
say something from spin fit, something along those lines,
you can go with a different one if you're interested.
And as always I'll be leaving links
to those additional ear tips
in the description box right down below.
As far as comfort overall for me,
they have been very comfortable,
no issues with ear fatigue or anything of that nature.
I'm getting a good seal, no problems with any of that.
Now, if you're looking for an earbud to kinda sleep with
when you're kinda laying on your side,
probably not a good idea,
stem style earbuds don't really seem to do very well
for that if you're a side sleeper,
back sleeper is not gonna be a problem.
So let's move over to the controls.
Now these are featuring full touch control
and right out of the box, you get single touch,
double touch and long press.
And they are fully customizable within these Soundcore app.
So you can set them up for volume control,
answer and calls, play, pause, active noise cancellation,
whichever you wanna do, they've got you covered.
The controls themselves are actually quite responsive,
so one thing you do have to be careful
when you set up that single touch is that it could lead
to some accidental touches, so just be aware of that.
So now let's segue over to the Soundcore app
and this app is available for both Android and iOS.
When you open it up,
it's gonna show you the earbuds themselves
along with the battery life.
It doesn't give you a percentage
but it just kinda shows you these bars,
so let you know the battery life of both the right
and the left earbud.
There's gonna be a gear right in the top corner
and right up there, you can have controls
for the touchstones.
So that's basically when you do a touch
is gonna give you a tone, you can turn that on or off.
You've got the firmware updates,
you've even got a Find my Device where they'll play a sound
so that you can find them in case you've lost them.
Kinda cool of you asked me.
They also have the help section and the quick start guide
if you ever need it.
Now, backing out of there,
you're back on the homepage and right up front,
you get the ambient sound controls.
So you click on that, and that's where you'll see
that you can either have normal mode,
which is just no noise cancellation, no transparency mode.
Then you have your transparency mode
where you have two options fully transparent
which brings in all sounds and the vocal mode
which is gonna concentrate itself on people's voices,
things like that.
Next up you've got the noise cancellation mode
which comes with three different options,
Transport, Indoor, and Outdoor.
With indoor being the strongest one or at least
in my opinion, the strongest one
because it does a better job at attempting to drown
out people's voices inside of a room that you're in.
So overall pretty good and it's nice
to have these multimode options built straight in
to a set of budget true wireless earbuds.
Now backing out one more time,
you've got the gaming mode.
And this is where you can activate it
where it produces latency, changes the EQ
to give you a better gaming experience.
Below that you've got the EQ and that is the full EQ suite.
This is where you can create your own EQ,
you can use one of the presets in there
and you also have the bass up feature.
So you can turn off the bass if that's what you wanna do.
After that, you've got these superior sleep,
and in superior sleep, this is where you can mix a bunch
of different ambient sounds to help you fall asleep.
Pretty cool if you asked me, I don't personally use it,
but it is something nice to have.
After that you've got the touch control customization,
you've got single tap, double tap and long press,
so you can customize all of those.
In that last one at least you've also got the tip fit test.
And this is where you can determine whether you're getting
a proper seal from the earbuds.
So overall, a pretty robust set of features built straight
into this app.
So now let's talk about some performance.
So first up the transparency mode.
Now, this is dual mode as I said before,
you've got the fully transparent which brings in all sounds
and then you've got the one that's called vocal,
where it focuses on people's voices.
And you can hear the difference
and it does work fairly well.
Not the best that I've heard out there,
I think that title's going to go to Sony,
but overall still very, very good
for a set of earbuds coming in at this price.
Overall, the transparency mode on this,
it has a bit of process type of a sound to it,
it isn't the greatest that I've ever heard,
it's nothing along the lines of the Apple AirPods Pro,
nothing like that.
But still very good for what you're getting here.
So now let's move over to the active noise cancellation.
The active noise cancellation as I said before comes
in three modes, Transport, Indoor and Outdoor.
Transport is gonna be for low frequency noises
like engines, things of that nature for like
when you're commuting or maybe you're on a plane,
they've got you covered.
Indoors for like being inside of a cafe
or a library or something like that
where you kinda wanna lower people's voices
in the ambient sound of the room, kinda helps with that.
Outdoor is the weakest of the settings
because it does cut down some of the wind noise
and external noise,
but it doesn't block out everything so you still maintain
at least a bit of situational awareness.
Overall, the noise cancellation is strong and easily one
of the best under 100 bucks.
Definitely Soundcore level stuff coming in
for this price range.
Now I know you're asking yourself,
are these better than this or this?
Just wait for the comparison section, coming up soon.
Next, let's talk about the volume.
So volume on these is solid.
These are coming in at a solid strong nine out of 10.
So very good volume on these and a noticeable improvement
over some of the other Soundcore earbuds
in this price range.
Comfortable listening for me comes
in about 65 to 80% on these guys.
So very good and you still got plenty of overhead
if you have any quiet dialogue in a video
or an audio book that you might be listening to.
Now moving over to the sound quality itself.
For the sound quality, you've got the Soundcore sound,
you've got the Soundcore signature sound so it's dynamic,
these are packing some bass,
like they have a strong bass punch.
These are a bass heads earbuds like all my bass heads unite
because they are bringing it for you with these earbuds.
So let's talk about the bass real quick, strong bass impact,
you've got good sub-bass as well.
So if you've got some little tracks that really bring
that rumble, that bass that you can feel,
you're gonna feel them with these earbuds, believe you me.
Now, these earbuds can definitely benefit from some
of the EQing that you can do within their app.
That's exactly what I did,
I actually dialed it back just a bit
so that it didn't muddy up the mids or anything.
But overall it comes in really nicely.
Now, one of the tracks that I was using
to test out the bass,
is a song called Nocturnal by The Midnight.
Now you gotta check out this song,
the bass really kicks in right around
that minute and 15, minute and 22nd mark.
But once you hear that and the way
that it comes in and just hits
and you're getting all the different sense sounds,
dude, you really gotta check out that song.
Now, moving over to the mid range.
Now the mid range is a bit on the neutral to recess side.
So it's not forward or anything like that in your face.
Like I said, this is a V-shape type of sound.
Now, this can be improved greatly with the EQ.
If you go in and use the piano tune,
and then you adjust the bass to your liking,
you can pull out a lot of clarity
while maintaining a strong bass punch.
So overall it can sound very, very good.
The song that I used the test out to mid range was
a song called Slightly Hung Over by Blue Delight.
Now, this is just kind of some like whiskey blues,
but I mean it's excellent listening to that live band
and the vocals and the guy's husky voice, very, very good,
you gotta check that one out as well.
Now moving over to the tremble.
Now, the tremble is rolled off a bit in the signature mode
so not as open as I would like it to be.
But like I said before, with EQ, using that piano EQ,
it really makes it brighter, clear,
and really opens up the sound.
Are you noticing a pattern here, EQing,
these really respond well to some EQing.
Now, as far as one of the songs
that I use for treble testing,
I use September by Earth Wind & Fire.
And all the different band instruments
and everything coming through the vocalist and everything,
the whole thing just came together very nicely.
Once the sound is opened up,
you can really enjoy the full orchestra effect
of the band behind Earth, Wind and Fire.
So definitely something that you should check out.
Now, if I had to speak any negatives about the Life P3,
it wouldn't really be much
about their performance if anything.
Yeah, the ANC could be a little stronger but I'm sure
that they don't want to cut in to their top dogs.
I'm sure that's what's going on here.
But because the performance of these is so good coming in
at 80 bucks, it almost kind of doesn't...
It kinda confuses me a little bit
because it really undercuts some
of their own other products.
It kinda cuts the knees out.
So when you get these, it kinda begs the question,
why should I get the Liberty Air 2 Pro?
Why should I pay 120 for the Liberty Air 2 Pro
when I could pay 80 bucks for the Life P3?
I honestly can't say why you should.
If somebody asks me between those two
which would you go with more nine times out of 10,
I'ma tell them, go ahead and pick the P3s.
So that's the only thing I could say
is I'm just kinda not sure what's happening here.
Very, very odd choices but you know what?
Either way you as a consumer are gonna win,
because now you're getting excellent performance,
improved performance over the Liberty Air 2 Pro
in certain departments and for a lower price.
So, let's get into the comparison portion here.
So, the comparison portion,
we're gonna have the Liberty Air 2 Pro,
the Life A2 NC, the 1more ComfoBuds Pro,
and the Earphone Free Pro.
Now when it comes to comparing the Life P3
to the Liberty Air 2 Pro,
the Liberty Air 2 Pro gonna have a better ANC,
they're also gonna have better transparency mode.
But where they lack is gonna be on the volume.
They're about one click below the Life P3
on the volume level.
Kinda surprised me a little bit here,
but it's good for all the people who didn't think
that Liberty Air 2 Pro were loud enough,
got a little bit more volume for you.
Overall, the Liberty Air 2 Pro has a bit of a cleaner sound
because they're not as bass heavy.
If you're into bass though, that's not really a problem.
Now versus the life A2 NC, the noise cancellation
between the Life P3 and the Life A2 NC is equivalent.
I could barely hear any bit of a difference between the two,
testing them out against crowd noise
and against cabin air noise from a jet.
So, almost no difference there,
pretty equivalent in my opinion.
The Life A2 NCs transparency mode is slightly better,
a little bit cleaner, a little bit crisper,
slightly less processed.
So they do win for that transparency mode.
Now, the Life A2 NC has slightly lower volume
than the Life P3.
So Life P3 are winning for volume
as far as that's concerned.
And then the Life A2 NC are not as bass heavy,
a bit, just more dialed back than what you're getting
with the Life P3.
If you're into that,
then Life A2 NC might be the better choice here.
Now we move over to the 1more ComfoBuds Pro.
The 1more ComfoBuds Pro, their ANC is a strongest
out of all of these on this comparison.
It's an easy win for the 1more ComfoBuds Pro.
The ambient is also the best out of this list.
The ComfoBuds Pro are also louder than the other four.
And they have a more flatter, more neutral sound profile
that uses one more signature tuning and overall,
to me it sounds really, really good.
So the 1more ComfoBuds Pro coming in
at a similar price point,
maybe a couple bucks more than Life P3,
this is a really, really tough choice.
The one thing that the ComfoBuds we're lacking
is that Soundcore app.
The 1more app is okay but it's nowhere near
as fully fleshed out as a Soundcore app.
Last not least, we've got the Earphone Free Pro.
Now these are gonna have the weakest ANC
and the quietest ambient mode out of the bunch.
But they're louder than the two Soundcore earbuds,
and they have overall better sound tuning
than the Soundcore earbuds as well.
So overall, they're actually pretty good.
So now let's move over to the rankings.
So first up active noise cancellation.
Number one, it's gonna be the 1more ComfoBuds Pro.
Number two, you've got the Liberty Air 2 Pro.
Number three, you've got the Life P3.
Number four, the Life A2 NC.
Number five, the EarFun Free Pro.
Now for the transparency or ambient mode.
Number one, you've got the 1more ComfoBuds Pro.
Number two, Liberty Air 2 Pro.
Number three, the Soundcore Life P3.
Number four, the Life A2 NC.
Number five, the EarFun Free Pro.
So now let's switch over to the volume.
So for volume, you've got the 1more ComfoBuds Pro.
Number two, you've got the EarFun Free Pro.
Number three, the Soundcore Life P3,
followed by the Life A2 NC,
then the Liberty Air 2 Pro.
And then last but not least,
let's give them the overall sound quality.
So for me overall sound quality number one,
it's gonna be the ComfoBuds Pro.
One more tuning here is really gonna be the winner overall
for that sound quality.
Number two, you've got the EarFun Free Pro bringing
a little bit more bass,
but definitely some excellent sound quality.
Number three, the Liberty Air 2 Pro.
Number four, the Life A2 NC, and number five, the Life P3.
Now to be clear, all of these sound awesome.
They just have different flavors of sound where
the ComfoBuds Pro are much more balanced than the rest,
and the rest kinda come in more dynamic
with a bit more bass, a bit more troubled depending
on the kind of sound that you like.
Overall with any of these, it's a win either way.
So now let's get into some call quality tests.
We're gonna put them all back to Mac,
this way you can hear what the call quality sounds
like for yourself.
So here we have the call quality test
for the Soundcore Life P3.
So, testing, testing, 1, 2, 3.
This is the kinda call quality you can expect
any semi quiet indoor environment.
So, testing, testing, 1, 2, 3.
So here we have the call quality test
for the Soundcore Liberty Air 2 Pro.
So, testing, testing, one, two, three,
kinda call quality you can expect
from the Soundcore Liberty Air 2 Pro
in a semi quiet indoor environment.
Testing, testing, 1, 2, 3.
So here we have a call quality tests
for the Soundcore Life A2 NC.
So, testing, testing, 1, 2, 3.
This as you can expect from the Soundcore Life A2 NC
in a semi quiet indoor environment.
So, testing, testing, 1, 2, 3.
So here we have the call quality test
for the 1more ComfoBuds Pro.
So testing, testing 1, 2, 3.
This is what you can expect from the 1more ComfoBuds Pro
in a semi quiet indoor environment.
So, testing, testing, 1, 2, 3.
See, see that, I almost forgot where I was.
So here we have the call quality tests
for the EarFun Free Pro.
So, testing, testing 1, 2, 3.
This is what you can expect from the EarFun Free Pro
in a semi quiet indoor environment.
Testing testing 1, 2, 3, and.
And here we have the Soundcore Life P3
in a simulated crowd noise environment,
similar to a crowded cafeteria, maybe a busy train station,
something along those lines.
So, testing, testing, 1, 2, 3.
So and here we have the Soundcore Liberty Air 2 Pro
in a simulator crowd noise environment like crowd cafe,
maybe a busy bus stop, something along those lines.
So, testing, testing, 1, 2, 3.
So here we have the Soundcore Life A2 NC
in a simulator crowd noise environment
like a busy coffee shop or maybe a crowded train station.
So, testing, testing, 1, 2, 3.
So here we have 1more ComfoBuds Pro
in a simulated crowd noise environment.
So, testing, testing, 1, 2, 3,
similar to a busy train station or maybe a crowded cafe.
So, testing, testing, 1, 2, 3.
And here we have the EarFun free Pro
in a simulated crowd noise environment,
similar to a crowded bus stop or maybe a busy cafe.
Testing, testing, 1, 2, 3.
As always, you're gonna have to be the judge
of the call quality down in the comment section.
Now, with all of that out of the way,
if you're interested in checking out
some other true wireless earbuds under 100 bucks,
check out the video I'ma leave right up here.
If you wanna see some options for you for under 50 bucks,
check out the other video right up there.
With all that said, I'm out of here, peace.