Noise canceling headphones are one of those must-have products for office workers,
travelers, and yes even parents trying to get some peace and quiet at home.
They allow you to block out surrounding noise so you can focus on the task at hand or listen
to some music or a podcast. Bose has been a leader in this space for decades and the Bose
700 noise canceling headphones represent the next generation of noise cancellation in headphones.
The Bose 700 headphones retail for $379 us dollars but you can often find them on sale throughout the
year and especially in the run-up to the holidays. So let's dive into the main features of these
headphones, what sets them apart, any downsides that we've run into while using them, and then
ultimately i'll give you my recommendation on whether or not you should pick up a pair.
When i first took out my bow 700 headphones i immediately noticed how striking these things are.
For a pair of over-the-ear headphones Bose managed to slim down the headband and make the overall
design look thinner than previous generations, giving them a more modern take on the classic
over-the-ear design the company has been using for the past couple of years. They're probably the
best looking pair of noise cancelling headphones out there today. When i put them on for the first
time they felt comfortable just like the previous pairs of Bose headphones i've had in the past.
When you put them on you can pretty much leave them there for hours. So typically during the work
day when i want to block out noise in the office or take work calls i can leave these things on for
hours and still have them feel comfortable. Part of the reason for this is the material that Bose
uses for the headband as well as the ear cups. They're super comfortable and the headphones don't
weigh too much so they don't strain your neck or anything when wearing them for hours on end.
When you set up your headphones you'll need to use the Bose Music app available for both
Android and iOS there you'll be able to download the latest software for your headphones as well as
easily update settings. Over the past six months i haven't found the need to use the Bose Music
app all that much only going in on occasion to change or adjust a couple of settings.
Another interesting thing about the design with these headphones is that Bose changed
up the buttons a bit. The power button is the top button on the back of the right ear cup.
Click it once to turn on the headphones and you'll hear this nice string cord letting you know that
the headphones have turned on. Click it again to turn the headphones off while the headphones are
on you can hold down the power button until you hear the bluetooth pairing mode sound
which will allow you to pair them with your other devices. You can also pair them to two devices
at a time and can easily toggle which device you would like to pair to from the Bose Music app. The
next button to talk about on them is the bottom button on the back of the right ear cup. This
is the assistant button you can install either the Amazon assistant or the Google Assistant on
the headphones directly as opposed to just using that button to trigger the assistant on the phone
that's connected to the headphones, although you do have the option to do that in the Bose
Music app settings. Now i primarily use the Google Assistant and it works great on the Bose 700s. You
can get the Google Assistant on them either using an android or an ios device and i've tested it on
both and they both work well although primarily over the six months of use that we've had with
these Bose 700 headphones i've been using an Android device. Now the right ear cup does have
a few more controls that you can do on it. You can raise and lower the volume on it by swiping
your finger up and down on the surface of the cup. Double tap to play and pause music and media and
swipe forward to skip ahead a track and swipe back to skip back. All of these gestures actually work
quite well and over the past six months of using the headphones, i haven't run into any issues
with the headphones misinterpreting my inputs. Now the last button that's really interesting
on these headphones is the bottom left ear cup button. This button allows you to switch between
three different noise cancellation presets. The noise cancellation on these headphones are amazing
you have 10 different levels of noise cancellation you can set the headphones to through the app. You
can select your three favorite settings and these can be changed from the Bose Music app
under the favorites section. Now a word of warning if you've never used a noise cancellation feature
on a set of headphones before, my recommendation would be to keep the level of noise cancellation
low the first time you put on the headphones. You may experience a feeling of eardrum suck if you
have a higher setting to start off. Now if you do feel an odd sensation like that don't worry your
eardrums are actually going to be okay, as long as you don't have the volume up too high of course.
For whatever reason would you use higher amounts of noise cancellation and higher intensity
that increases the likelihood that some people are going to feel effects from it. I actually
experienced a bit of that when i first used them and turned the noise cancellation all the way up
but i found that i've gotten used to them after a while and when i lowered the noise cancellation
intensity just a bit, which helped. Now let's say you're listening to music at your desk and
someone walks over to come and talk with you or you're on an airplane and you want to hear the
pilot's announcement, Bose has actually built in a conversation mode for these scenarios.
If you hold down the button on the left ear cup your music will stop and the sound from
the surrounding environment will fade in. When you're done listening to the outside environment
long press that button again and the sound in your environment will fade out and your music
will begin playing again. Alright next let's talk sound. Overall i'd say these are a fantastic set
of headphones for sound, the audio is crisp, clear, you'll hear detail that you'll often
miss in cheaper headphones and overall i what can i say they just sound great.
For some they might not sport enough bass with their default setting, however, in the six months
i've owned my pair, Bose has rolled out an update that adds an EQ setting in the Bose Music app that
allows you to adjust the eq of your headphones. So if you want to up the bass now you can. Alright
so what are some other things i like about these headphones? One is range, i can connect
my headphones to my phone leave my phone here on the desk and then walk to a couple of other rooms
in my residence and still hear the audio playing without any distortion or disruptions. Probably
the best and most unexpected use i've found for these headphones is for work calls while working
remotely during the pandemic. They're perfect for blocking out any sounds from neighbors
etc but they also have a fantastic microphone so the audio quality is quite good. Bose uses a total
of 10 microphones to block out sound around you and also isolate your voice from background noise,
here's a test of what they sound like compared to some earbuds.Alright, so here's a quick test
of how the Bose 700 headphones sound when recording them through quicktime on my iMac.
Alright, and here's how the AirPods just the regular AirPods second generation this is how
they sound when you record them through quicktime on an iMac. Alright so here's a quick test of how
the pixel buds second generation released in 2020 sound when recording them through quicktime on my
iMac. The battery life of these headphones is also quite good they have a 20 hour battery and that's
about what i've gotten on a full charge. You can charge them with USB-C which is great and a 15
minute quick charge will give you about 3.5 hours of listening time. To fully charge the headphones
will take about 2.5 hours. Alright well those are pretty much all of the things i really like about
these headphones and the features that i think make them stand out now let's take a look at
some of the downsides i've experienced while using the Bose 700 headphones. One occasional issue that
i've run into with these headphones is when i'm on a call on my computer and my phone starts ringing
it's easy to forget that my phone is also connected to my headphones at the same time
and the work call audio will cut out and i'll hear my phone ringing on the headphones
it takes a second to get the headphones to start playing the work call again, which means i'll miss
out on some part of it. Now the only major issue i've run into with these headphones is with the
original pair i bought that was refurbished by Bose they had this popping, bubbling noise coming
from the right ear cup that was just constantly there. The noise occurred regardless if the
headphones were connected to a device or if noise cancellation was on or off. Now thankfully Bose
did send me a replacement pair when i shipped the original pair i bought back to them and the
replacement pair they gave me was actually a brand new pair of the Bose 700s headphones as opposed to
just giving me another pair of refurbished ones, which was pretty nice and i hadn't had any issues
with that pair for months until the week we filmed the review for the Bose 700 headphones,
the problem showed up again except this time the bubbling crackling noise is now
in the left ear cup, where on the refurbished pair i originally bought it was in the right ear cup.
So i contacted Bose again they are going to ship me out a third pair when i ship this pair back and
fingers crossed that that pair doesn't develop the issue that this pair did but this all brings me to
whether or not i recommend the Bose 700 headphones, and unfortunately i just can't
given the issues i've run into over the past six months with multiple pairs of these headphones,
i can't recommend them. Now it is possible i may just have been unlucky i just got two
bad pairs of headphones and this third pair is going to be really good but
i don't know at this point and it's weird because i've been a Bose customer for
10 years now, at least 10 years, i bought speakers computer speakers and another previous pair
of noise canceling headphones from them i have the QC15s and none of the other Bose products
i've bought i've run into any issues with. So this is definitely a weird thing to be going through
and i do have to say that Bose customer service throughout this experience has been fantastic,
they've been very easy to work with and one nice thing when you get a replacement product
sent out to you from Bose for a faulty one the warranty for that replacement product does start
when you get it, as opposed to that product just kind of being under the original warranty
of the original product i bought six months ago. So at least that's nice but
yeah, it sucks, I really like everything else about these headphones but I ultimately can't
recommend them given the issues i've had with them. I will continue to update the progress
when we get our third pair and i'll leave that in the comment below in the coming months to give
you an update on if those are better and if i'm running into any more issues with them. Alright
well i hope you found this video informative and helpful and if you like this video make sure you
hit that thumbs up button below and subscribe to the channel to see more six months later reviews
of tech products like this one. For 6 Months Later, I'm Josh Teder, thanks for watching.