Shokz Openfit 2 – Open Ear Earbuds have never sounded this loud, or lasted this long!

Design & Fit

The Shokz Openfit 2’s are predominantly covered in a rubberized finish which, combined with the ergonomic design on the earbuds., help these earbuds stay in place on your ears. So whether you’re going out for a run, or simply out walking the dog, these are going to stay in place. And thanks to their slim hook-over design these are also comfortable to wear even when wearing glasses.

There is a lot of tech crammed into these earbuds, which will be covered shortly, weighing in at 9.4g each. However, thanks to the well-fitting design of the earbuds it’s not a weight that you typically notice. I happily wore these for hours without any discomfort.

Shokz are no strangers to making sports oriented headphones that fit well, and it’s no different here. 

The Shokz Openfit 2’s case is a good compact size that makes it easy to fit in your bag or pocket The matte finish does make the case easy to grip, although it can be a bit of a fingerprint magnet.

The case also comes with a USB-C charging port on the rear to charge these earbuds when you need to.

Controls

Whilst most companies opt for touch controls on earbuds, Shokz have gone a different route and added a physical button to these earbuds. A single, double, triple, or long press of that button then performs various actions such as play/pause, skip tracks, change volume and more.  The physical button works well on a pair of fitness focused earbuds as touch controls, especially when your hands are sweaty, or it’s raining, can become unusable. So this is a welcome update compared to the original Openfit’s.

The Openfit 2’s do also retain a single long press touch control on the outside of the earbuds, if you wanted to use it.

With so many controls at your fingertips it’s useful that you can also configure what each of those actions does in the accompanying Shokz mobile app. This allows you to enable those controls that you actually want.

The Shokz Openfit 2’s are also IP55 rated. This makes them not only waterproof but dustproof as well. So whether you’re wearing these down the gym, get caught out in the rain, or are down the beach, these are going to be protected.

Bluetooth 5.4 on these earbuds then ensures a solid connection to your mobile phone. Multipoint support also allows these to be connected to two devices at the same time.

Battery Life

The Shokz Openfit 2’s come with an impressive 11 hours of battery life on a single charge. This increases to 48 hours if you include the case. That is a significant increase over the 7 hours of battery life on the original Openfit earbuds. These are also equipped with fast charging where a 10-minute charge provides 2 hours of playback enabling these earbuds to always be ready for use.

Mic Test

There are four mics inside the Shokz Openfit 2’s to help your voice sound clear when taking a call. In windier conditions it does struggle somewhat in picking up your voice, but then again most other earbuds do as well. It certainly performed better than some other open ear earbuds that I have tested. So in all but the windiest of conditions it’s going to be serviceable for taking a call on these.

The Sound

There are two drivers inside the Shokz Openfit 2 earbuds. One is a 21 x 11 mm low frequency driver, the other, a high frequency driver. So with two drivers dedicated to different frequencies, sound is much clearer on these than single driver alternatives.

Those dedicated drivers help to produce some of the loudest, and bassiest sound, that I’ve heard in any pair of open ear earbuds. They actually sound bassier than some in-ear earbuds I’ve tested. The additional driver focused on the higher frequencies also ensures that the highs and detail are not lost either. The result is a balanced sound, but with a punch that doesn’t drown out vocals or instruments. This is sound done incredibly well on a pair of open ear earbuds.

There are four different EQ presets, as well as a 5-band custom EQ, in the Shokz mobile app, should you feel the need to change how these sound. You can however only set up 2 custom EQ profiles. I didn’t find the restriction limiting though as I found the ‘Standard’ EQ preset suitable for most music genres. The preset ‘Bass Boost’ EQ is also on hand for providing a bit of extra bass boost, if you need it.

Verdict

So should you buy the Shokz Openfit 2 open ear earbuds?

Well at a price of $179.95 they’re not cheap. You can certainly buy other open ear earbuds for less. However, there are none that I have heard that have sounded this good. Go this loud, and have battery life that lasts this long.

So if you want the best open ear earbuds then the Shokz Openfit 2 are definitely worth checking out.