I’ve used the WH-1000XM4’s for years as my go-to pair of ANC headphones, especially when travelling. So I was really interested to see whether the Soundcore Q45’s, at half the price, could match, or even dethrone, the XM4’s.
soundcore Space Q45 ANC Headphones
Sony WH-1000XM4 ANC Headhphones
Keep your headphones safe
Both of these headphones come with a nice hard case to keep your headphones safe when you’re not using them. It’s not too hard to see where Soundcore got the inspiration for their case. It pretty much looks identical to the case of the XM4’s. Both headphones also come with a USB-C charging cable, and a 3.5mm audio cable if you want to listen over a wired connection. The XM4’s also come with a plane adapter though makes them more useful if travelling with them. The Q45’s don’t come with them. Not that they’re expensive to buy seperately ofcourse.
Design and Build Quality
Looking at these headphones side by side, it is difficult to know which one is $200 more expensive than the other.
The Q45 comes with a padded metal reinforced headband which is comfortable to wear. The padding on the headband of the Sony XM4’s however does feel thicker. This makes it more comfortable for longer listening sessions. Both are easily adjustable though and so would easily suit a range of head sizes.
Faux leather covers the memory foam on both earpads. The foam on the earpads of the Q45’s though are thicker as I noticed that my ears touched the insides of the XM4’s. The earcups on the Q45’s were also bigger. So if you have larger ears you are likely to find the Q45’s more comfortable. If you wear glasses whilst listening to music then you’ll likely also find the Q45’s a better option too.
Controls
The Q45’s come with physical buttons on the ear pads that function well at controlling the basics such as volume, playback, and skipping tracks. It can be hard to distinguish one button from the next as the buttons aren’t particularly well defined though and quite often resulted in a bit of trial and error to find the right one.
The Sony’s on the other hand comes with a single large touch panel on the right ear cup. With this you can swipe your finger up/ down, forwards/backwards, or tap, to perform actions such as volume up/down, skip track forwards/backwards and play/pause music. It is a really intuitive touch interface and worked well for me.
The Extras
The XM4 does have some extra features also. Firstly is “speak-to-chat”. This automatically pauses your music when you start talking to someone and starts playing it again when you’re finished talking. It will trigger even if you’re singing or humming along to your music though so it wasn’t a feature I found particularly useful.
Connectivity
Both headphones offer strong and stable bluetooth connections. They also both support multi-point so you can be connected to two devices at the same time. This is useful if you want to be connected to both your laptop and mobile phone at the same time, and not worrying about having to constantly switch connections every time you need to take a call.
Both headphones also support listening to music using the provided 3.5mm audio cable. Noise canceling will also still work on both. Even if the battery runs out on both headphones, you will still be able to use them with the audio cable,. Although ANC obviously won’t work in that case. Not many pair of headphones do that.
Battery life
When first released, the Sony XM4’s were class leading, providing 30 hours of battery life with ANC turned on. They also get 5 hours of playback after a quick 10 minute fast charge. Although they take 3 hours to charge up to full.
The Q45’s however provide 50 hours of battery life on a single charge, with ANC turned on! They fast charge faster too. A 5 minute charge gives you 4 hours of playback, and they’ll charge up to full in 100 minutes.
So in terms of battery life the Q45’s are clearly excelling.
The Sound
Both headphones come equipped with 40mm drivers. They also both support AAC, SBC and hi-res LDAC audio codecs.
The XM4’s were better in the mid to high frequency than the Q45’s out of the box. Both come with a custom EQ courtesy of their respective mobile apps though so you can adjust these to your listening preference. Even after EQ teaking though the XM4’s were still slightly better in the mid and the high frequencies. The Q45’s are pretty good in the bass department area. You can turn them up pretty loud without the bass distorting.
Switching ANC on and off on the Q45’s does impact the sound though. There is a noticeable emphasis on the bass when you turn ANC on, and a noticeable lack of it when you turn it off. You can counter and adjust for that in the EQ settings. You would need a different EQ for each setting though, and that’s just annoying. When you turn ANC on or off on the Sony WH-1000XM4’s though there is no noticeable change on the quality of the sound.
So The XM4’s do sound better, and their sound is more consistent. However, for something that costs half the price, I wouldn’t say that the Q45’s were that far behind.
ANC
Both the XM4’s and Q45’s come with variable ANC and transparency modes so you can control how much sound you want to cancel out, or let in.
In ANC tests the Q45’s trimmed the higher frequencies out slightly better than the XM4’s, but the XM4’s were slightly better at trimming out the lower frequencies. It really is a hairs breadth distance between the two though and both have good ANC.
The Mic
Sony has never been praised for their mic performance on their previous headphones. Fortunately they seem to have upped their game this time around.
The Sony does do a better job than previous versions of it’s headphones in making your voice well heard on a call. However, it doesn’t do as good a job as the Q45’s in canceling out the background noise. So in a noisy environment, I’d pick the soundcore over the Sony.
Which to buy?
So, do a $150 pair of headphones beat a $350 pair of headphones? Well, in some cases, yes! So which one you buy I think depends on what you need from a pair of headphones.
If you want a pair that sound great and have tons of features, then the Sony WH-1000XM4’s are a really great pair of headphones to get. However you do have to pay a premium for them at $350.
If however you’re after a pair that are just comfortable to wear, have great battery life, still sound ok, have good ANC, and are great to take a call, then the Soundcore Space Q45’s are a really good choice, and at $150 they’re a great buy.