After a few releases of earphones and speakers, Huawei has finally released a wireless headphones – the Huawei FreeBuds Studio. The FreeBuds Studio comes with active noise cancelling capabilities (ANC), and retails for S$398.
Unboxing
Inside the box, you will find the following items:
- Huawei FreeBuds Studio ANC headphones
- Carrying case
- USB-C to USB-A cable
- User manual
Tech specs
| Driver Size | 40mm dynamic |
| Frequency Response | 4Hz – 48kHz |
| Battery Life | 20 hours per full charge (with ANC on) 24 hours per full charge (with ANC off) 5 hours playback on 10 minutes of fast charge (with ANC enabled) 8 hours playback on 10 minutes of fast charge (with ANC disabled) |
| Weight | 260 g |
| Bluetooth Version | 5.2 |
| Audio Codecs | AAC, SBC, L2Hc (Huawei only) |
Build quality and features
The design of the Huawei FreeBuds Studio is modern and stylish. It reminds me a little of the Bose 700 ANC headphones because of the visible arms. Build quality is also superb. There is no signs of creaking when flexing the headphones. Buttons are tactile and responsive, and everything else is put together well. The Huawei FreeBuds Studio however, is not foldable so you do lose some portability when bringing it around.
Because of that, Huawei supplied a hard shell case so that you can protect the headphones when bringing it around. The hard shell case has a small magnetic closure compartment inside to store the USB-C cable – pretty handy.
Controls
Huawei FreeBuds Studio uses a mix of touch and physical controls. For general media and call controls, the touch controls on the right ear cup is generally responsive and rather easy to use and get used to. The touch controls allow you to do almost everything from adjusting volume, play/pause, and skipping of tracks.
For the physical buttons, you can find the ANC button on the left ear cup, power and bluetooth button on the right ear cup. The ANC button lets you cycle through 3 different sound modes – ANC, Awareness mode, and normal mode.
Do note that the Huawei FreeBuds Studio is purely a wireless headphones as there is no 3.5mm jack for you to use it wired. So if you’re intending to use this on an airplane, you might have to purchase a bluetooth flight adapter separately.
AI Life App
There is an accompanying app for the Huawei FreeBuds Studio called the AI Life app. However, it is not available on the Apple App store. It is only available on the Huawei AppGallery and Google Play Store. However, I was unable to get the headphones to connect the with app on Android during my time of testing as the app on Android is not the latest version.
Update:
I was told by the Huawei that there is a workaround for Android users to get the latest version of the AI Life app. You can follow the instructions below if you are interested:
- Go to the AI Life app page on AppGallery
- After tapping on ‘Install’, you will be prompted to download the AppGallery apk file to your phone. Install AppGallery on your phone.
- Launch AppGallery and install AI Life app.
Battery life
You should get about 20 hours of music playback with ANC turned on. With ANC turned off, you can get about 4 hours more. Huawei FreeBuds Studio supports fast charging, so a quick charge of 10 minutes will give you about 5 hours of use with ANC turned on. Charging is done via USB-C.
Fit and comfort
Huawei FreeBuds Studio is quite comfortable to wear for extended periods of listening. The ear cups have enough room for my average-sized ears and the clamping pressure is just right. The protein leather on the ear cups are soft and do provide enough comfort. The cushioning on the headband could be a little plushier for better comfort.
Comparing the comfort level to similarly priced Harman Kardon FLY ANC, the Huawei FreeBuds Studio is more comfortable because of its roomier ear cups and looser clamping pressure. And when comparing Huawei FreeBuds Studio to the pricier Sony WH-1000XM3, they are actually not too far off in terms of comfort. The Sony WH-1000XM3 edges it for me because it has slightly roomier ear cups and the headband has more cushion to provide greater comfort on the top of my head.
Pairing, connectivity, and latency
Huawei FreeBuds Studio comes with the latest Bluetooth 5.2 and also supports multi-point connection. For those who connects their headphones to multiple devices at once, the multi would be very helpful. As for latency, there is no audio video lag when watching YouTube videos from the YouTube app on my iPhone 11.
Sound quality
Huawei FreeBuds Studio has an audio tuning that places emphasis on bass. Bass is punchy, deep and has enough to generate the enjoyable sub-bass reverb. It’s comparable with the bass on the Sony WH-1000XM3. When it comes to midrange and treble, there is enough clarity and presence in the overall mix. But when it comes to song that has constant bass output, the bass can overshadow the instrument and vocals. Sound imaging and soundstage on the Huawei FreeBuds Studio is average. On complicated tracks, it can start to sound too close together. Overall, the Huawei FreeBuds Studio offers a comfortable warm sounding sound signature that I believe bass lovers will enjoy.
If you’re comparing this to the Harman Kardon FLY ANC, the FLY ANC will sound more clean with emphasis on vocals. And when compared to the Sony WH-1000XM3, the WH-1000XM3 brings similar bass impact, but it manages to retain more of its upper-mid frequencies to sound more balanced.
ANC performance
Huawei FreeBuds Studio‘s ANC capabilities is pretty good. It comes very close to the Sony WH-1000XM3’s ANC abilities. Getting such ANC performance from S$398 pair of headphones is quite impressive. However, that is only when it works. Don’t get me wrong, the ANC works well most of the time, but there are some instances where it just ruins the experience. I tested the Huawei FreeBuds Studio mainly on my iPhone 11.
So let’s talk about the ANC when it works. The ANC is very effective at reducing the low rumbling noise such as the bus engine noise. Testing it on the bus, the bus engine noise is almost completely removed. Whooshing sounds in the MRT train tunnels and traffic are also eradicated to a large extent. To illustrate Huawei FreeBuds Studio ANC, I prepared a pretty amateur recording using airplane noise audio and tested it against the Sony WH-1000XM3. The Sony is the clear winner, but Huawei FreeBuds Studio is also rather effective. You can check out the recording below:
However, I have experienced certain instances where the ANC will glitch or hiccup. What happens is that the ANC will fade back and forth between Awareness mode and into ANC mode. This hiccups usually occur on buses if the noises come from a bumpy ride in the bus instead of the engine. I believe this issue is largely due to the ‘Intelligent Dynamic ANC’. When I turned off on the Dynamic ANC on the FreeBuds Pro, this issue was largely fixed. Hence, I believe the said issue would likely be fixed by turning off the Dynamic ANC mode. I am unable to fully confirm this hypothesis as i do not have the headphones with me anymore.
Having said that, the ANC on the Huawei FreeBuds Studio is still rather impressive when using it in the MRT or a noisy cafe.
Microphone quality
The microphone is surprisingly good for a pair of headphones. In room-like environment, the Huawei FreeBuds Studio is able capture my voice really clearly with good amounts of detail, along with some bass in my voice. When background noise is introduced, the microphone tries to isolate my voice against the background noise. But at the same time it also reduces the volume of my voice making my voice to sound slightly distant in the overall audio. Having said, the microphone still does well in cutting out the overall volume of the background noise while keeping my voice clear enough to hold a conversation.
Conclusion
Huawei FreeBuds Studio rocks a really modern and premium design and is comfortable to wear for extended periods of listening. It also offers multi-point connectivity which can be helpful if you require it. The ANC is very capable and gets close to the performance of the premium Sony WH-1000XM3, but there are some hiccups I have experienced as well. Another thing to note is that the AI Life app that accompanies the overall experience of the Huawei FreeBuds Studio is not available on the Apple App store. For Huawei’s first foray into ANC headphones, they’ve done a rather great job, and for S$398 – I think is a pretty reasonable price.