Back at CES 2019 JBL announced that they would be releasing a whole bunch of Sport truly
wireless earbuds.
But the ones that caught my eye the most were the Under Armour True Wireless Flash.
Now even though I still personally prefer to use wired bluetooth earbuds at the gym
like the Powerbeats 3 or Jaybird Tarah Pro…
These actually aren’t half bad.
Now the UA Flash are a new contender in the already highly saturated Sports Truly Wireless
earbuds… these earbuds are going up against the likes of the Jaybird RUN XT, the Jabra
Elite 65T, the Bose Soundsport Free, Sony’s truly wireless earbuds, and the list just
goes on and on.
But the UA Flash have a retail price of $170 which is average for this product category,
and if you want to pick them up I’ll have a link down below.
Now the biggest defining characteristic of the UA flash has got to be its charging case.
Its big, the outer shell is brushed aluminum, and the earbuds slide right out of the bottom.
Personally, I really like the design and feel of this charging case.
Now even though yeah its big compared to the AirPods or Galaxy Bud’s charging case…
I like it cause these earbuds have a combined battery life of 25 hours.
The Buds themselves can play for 5 straight hours and the case can supply an additional
20 hours of playback time.
Having a combined battery life of 25 hours on a pair of sports truly wireless earbuds
is above average, cause right now most truly wireless earbuds have an average of 15 hours
of total playback time.
And since the UA flash are a pair of sports wireless earbuds, I don’t mind their larger
case cause I just throw them into my gym bag.
The Only draw backs of these charging case is that it charges via a micro USB port, and
if you drop the earbuds into their case they don’t have any fast charging like AirPods
galaxy buds do.
The earbuds themselves are in ear earbuds which is the case with most other Sport truly
wireless earbuds out there.
Theres rubber gnarling on the earbuds which give you a lot of grip when you’re handling
the earbuds and just like the Jaybird RUN XT, the UA flash have an ear tip and Ear Fin
fitting system.
So you can mix and match these ear tips and ear fins until you find your perfect match.
And just like the Run XT, the UA Flash are fully water and sweat proof thanks to their
IPX7 certification.
Now I think its important to keep in mind that these earbuds only come included with
round silicon ear tips… but after I got my earbuds properly fitted I found that they
stay in place very well cause they’re very light weight and low profile, and they do
a very good job of blocking out ambient noise.
But something that has always plagued a lot of truly wireless earbuds minus AirPods and
Galaxy Buds is their bluetooth connection stability.
A lot of truly wireless earbuds, including these have a master and slave set up where
one earbud actually connects to your phone and then relays the audio to the other earbud.
This set up can sometimes lead to random connection drops if you move your head too much, syncing
issues, or a whole lot of latency if you’re trying to watch videos on your phone.
But after using these earbuds for a few weeks I found that their bluetooth connection is
very stable, so they never cut out and I haven’t had any syncing issues.
They do how ever have a lot of latency whether you’re using an iPhone or Android device
so they aren’t suitable for watching videos while you’re walking on the treadmill.
So these earbuds are strictly for listening to music, but since they don’t have any
rampant connection drop issues they’re ok in my book.
Now when it comes to actually listening to music with the UA flash I found that they
have a bright punchy sound signature.
So mids and vocals on these earbuds are very prominent but when the bass comes in it does
have a good kick to it.
But the most important thing to consider is that these are a pair of good sounding earbuds,
the highs don’t get tinny and the bass doesn’t muddle out.
But unlike a lot of wireless earbuds these days the UA flash don’t have a companion
App, so you can’t directly change the EQ on these earbuds… you’re going to have
to use a third party app.
However, the UA flash have both a Talk Thru and Ambient aware feature that you can activate
by pressing on the Under Armour logo on the left ear bud which is actually a button.
A single press will activate talk though were the earbuds will drastically lower the volume
of your music and pump in all of the ambient sound.
So this way you can quickly talk to someone without having to take your earbuds out of
your ear.
Or if you double press on the left button then you’ll activate Ambient aware, so the
ear buds will pump in all of the ambient sound around you so you can hear whats going on
while also listening to your music.
This feature is very useful, specifically for out door runners… but keep in mind while
ambient aware is turned on these earbuds won’t get as loud.
The right earbud also has a button.
If you press it once you can play or pause your music, or if you double press it you
can skip forward.
Unfortunately triple pressing won’t go back a track and there’s no way to adjust the
volume with these earbuds… which means you’re going to have to use your phone more often.
And finally here’s the microphone test.
The good news is that phone calls actually come in through ear buds instead of just one
like with a lot of other truly wireless earbuds.
But the microphone isn’t the best but this audio clip is being recorded with the microphone
found on the Under Armour Flash so you can be the judge of that.
But over all, like I mentioned at the beginning of these video I still personally prefer to
use wired bluetooth earbuds like the Powerbeats 3 and Jaybird Tarah Pro at the gym and I like
to use AirPods and Galaxy Buds for casual uses like watching videos or taking phone
calls.
But if you’re dead set on picking up the Under Armour True Wireless Flash, then I say
go ahead they’re not bad.
Their rugged aluminum case is going to be right at home in your gym bag and the Flash
have a combined total battery life of 25 hours which is currently above average for truly
wireless earbuds.
They have a stable bluetooth connection that doesn’t cut out but remember these are strictly
for listening to music.
And the Talk Though and Ambient Aware features are both very welcomed bonuses that I know
out door runners are really going to enjoy.