Sony ULT Wear review: Great sound, long battery life and lightweight design

Long battery life, good ANC, and quick charge options make the Sony ULT Wear perfect companions for a commute. With their strong thump, ULT Wear is likely to be really popular with younger users

If you were to walk into your nearest electronics store to buy a Sony TV, chances are you would get confused by how different models are named. Take the X90 or X95, for example. Don’t confuse them with the A95 or A90, please. The X series are LED televisions, while the A series are higher-end OLED televisions. So you can buy a Sony A95L or Sony X95 or some other such TV. Doesn’t quite roll off the tongue, does it?

Well, over the decades, Japanese electronics companies have adopted rather strange nomenclature systems. There have been exceptions of course. Sony does that even when it comes to its headphone or earphone ranges. Take its flagship wireless headphones, for example, the WH-1000XM5. The M5 is said to stand for Mark 5. The previous generation was an M4, for example. These are Sony’s top-of-the-line personal headphones in the market these days, retailing for somewhere around Rs 30,000 (MRP is Rs 34,990). While the world raves about the sound they deliver, the name isn’t really a branding success. Well, not quite like the AirPods Max from the house of Apple. Or even the AirPods Pro.

Not that Sony hasn’t tried to change things. It has a series of smart TVs under the Bravia brand name. Simpler naming conventions. Like a series of smartphones. Or its latest range of personal audio products in the ULT series. The series includes some speakers and a pair of headphones. Sony ULT lineup has three speakers and a pair of headphones, the ULT Wear. You can read our review of ULT Field 1, the smallest speaker in the series here. 

The Sony ULT Wear is the focus of this review, and here is what Sony promises:

• 40 mm drivers (allowing for deeper bass)
• Ear detection sensors (the audio automatically gets paused if you take the headphones off)
• 30 hours of battery life with noise cancellation, 50 hours without it
• 1.5 hours of playback with a charge of just 3 minutes
• 5 hours of playback with a charge of just 10 minutes
• 360 reality audio
• Multi-device pairing (lets you pair both your mobile phone and laptop to the headphones)
• Quick attention mode

The Sony ULT Wear retail for around Rs 16,500 (MRP Rs 24,990). Even the ULT Wear carries an MRP Rs 10,000 lower than the flagship XM5s, the street prices are much lower. This is a good bargain price for a new product that tries to bridge the gap between the XB and the XM series. Till now the XB series promised extra bass, something the ULT Wear delivers with ease too.

Active noise cancellation (ANC) is now a necessary feature, even in budget headphones or earphones. Like other premium Sony headphones, the ULT Wear doesn’t disappoint when it comes to this feature. You could be in the middle of a loud crowd, and the headphones would make you feel as if you are on an island alone, immersed in your favourite music. How easy is it to switch between the ANC mode and the non-ANC mode? Just put your hand on the right ear cup, and the headphones switch from the noise cancelling mode to ambient noise mode while lowering the playback volume simultaneously. Sony calls it the Quick Attention Mode.

You can get them in three colours: Off white, black, and forest gray. They come with Sony 360 Reality Audio, Sony’s version of spatial audio, and it works well. Even without pressing the ULT button on the headphones, they deliver deep bass thanks to the 40 mm drivers (in comparison, the XM5 have 30 mm drivers). If you still feel the need for more bass, just press the ULT button and they will deliver it. We, however, found the sound to be a bit muddy with ULT on.

There isn’t much to choose between the XB910, ULT Wear, and the XM5s when it comes to weight. At 255 gm, ULT Wear is comfortable for walking or sitting, but it may not be the most comfortable if you are lying in bed, listening to your favourite music.

We checked out old Hindi film classics, classic rock numbers, and the latest pop sensations, and the headphones sounded good.

The long battery backup, good ANC, and quick charge options make these headphones perfect companions for a commute. There is no sound leakage, either, so the person sitting next to you in the metro is unlikely to be disturbed. With their easy thump, ULT Wear is likely to be really popular with younger users, even as those who prefer a more balanced sound veer towards the XM5s.