Sony WF-1000XM6 Review: My New Favorite Earbuds

The small black buds (also silver) have two microphones visible on the outer shell, simple Sony logos on the side, and memory-foam eartips in four sizes.

A word to the equally astute: Once you’ve figured out what size ear tips you want (I stuck with the factory-fitted Medium, because I have surprisingly average ears), you actually have to twist and compress the foam before inserting the earbuds. This is the main reason why these particular earbuds feel so natural to me, and the main reason why the sound is so good.

Full noise cancellation is impossible due to the physics of sound, but the geniuses at Sony and Bose (and even Apple) are getting pretty close. Adding foam is a great way to passively cut out external noise, with ANC software that can work harder in addition to better isolation. The more you can remove the outside world from the listener’s physical world, like foam earplugs, the better you can determine what’s actually getting through. Foam ear tips are not new; many high-end over-ear headphones have come with it as an option in the past, and the latest AirPods Pro also use less foam in their ear cups for similar reasons.

Pair the Pack-tier’s best separation and cancellation algorithms with Sony’s sound processing, and you get an experience that’s almost unmatched in the world of portable listening. It feels like I have a light switch on the outside sounds. Is the neighbor who mows the lawn bothering you? That’s not the case anymore. I can’t hear the clicks and squeals of my mechanical keyboard, and I can physically feel in my chest—rather than actually hear—the 75 decibels (a true measure of sound level) of the cabin sound of the simulated flight I enter to test headphones when I’m not planning personal flights. This type of isolation makes these headphones a pleasure to use at work or other activities where you really want to focus.

When I do Wanting to hear the world around me, the WF-1000XM6 does a great job of achieving what many have tried before: true sound clarity. The two microphones on the outside of each bud are large and very good at capturing everything that happens around you. The sound these mics deliver when you want them to sound like earbuds isn’t even better than any I’ve tested.

As I said in the introduction to this review, I spent hours with them and forgot they were there. I was even listening to music through my usual desktop speakers—a pair of Genelec 8040Bs, for the wise—at the time. I’ve tested the transparent mode on many Zoom calls over the speakers, and chatting with my wife in person, and no one ever complained that I was doing that “yelling to talk” thing that most headphones cause.

Additional Listening

Sound Connect by Parker Hall

Sony’s Sound Connect app features a ton of customization, and comes with a few cool Sony-exclusive features that people might want to check out. There’s a quiet mode, for example, that lets you make it sound like your music is coming from a pair of rear speakers, like in a coffee shop. When this is paired with transparent mode, you too, can make every moment of your life happen with your supermarket speakers playing whatever you want. Who said listening to inappropriate ’90s hip-hop while walking your dog past your neighbors couldn’t be fun. If you get the right Seinfeld Theme song playlist, you can live like Jerry. Who Said Augmented Reality Doesn’t Work?

I even set up a friendly, Sony-provided female voice to greet me when I put on the earbuds: “Hello, today is Tuesday, March 3,” and tell me the time every hour so I can track it while checking battery life. “*dang* It’s 8 o’clock in the morning.”

Sound Connect by Parker Hall

While you’re listening, the controls are simple touch controls on the side of each earbud, and you can adjust what’s happening in the app to your heart’s content. It may seem easy to conflict with the touch controls on the headphones this little, and it can be at first, but I am very familiar with how to hold them (I think up and down, like you are about to throw a paper plane aside, it works very well) to adjust them.

I especially liked that these headphones lasted all day at work. Gone are the days of four hours of active audio playback (ANC) on earbuds. I got about eight hours out of this with ANC enabled all the time, which is what is advertised. It shortened a bit when I enabled LDAC—an advanced streaming codec for even better audio quality (but shorter range). The high-end Bluetooth codec soaks up an hour or two of juice, while the total time with the case and headphones (advertised at 24 hours on a charge) is shortened to around 20 hours. To be fair, I also used various amounts of volume and other features this time (to test what it is), so most normal people will probably see better than me while eating headphones. Actually, when was the last time you had earbuds in your ears for eight hours straight, without interruption? I review headphones, and it’s rare for me too. This conveys resentment and reaches the point of “who cares?”

Fantastic Sound

Photo: Parker Hall

Sony has tended towards drab and clinical sound profiles in recent years, but the WF-1000XM6 is actually a lot of fun to listen to, especially in the bass. There’s a sort of gentle M shape to the frequency response that cleans up the guitars, vocals, and rhythm instruments in the mids but still gives you plenty of kick drums and bass. High quality is appreciated with more sparkle, but without making the music feel like it’s too bright it hurts your ears.