We're finally starting to see some wire-free earphones that are worth the hype. The Beoplay E8 from B&O Play joins the Bose SoundSport Free and JLab Epic Air in advancing the nascent category beyond its early pitfalls. At $299, however, the Beoplay E8 is one of the most expensive pairs we've seen. Audio quality is quite good, and the app allows you to sculpt it to your personal tastes. But the price still feels high compared with other leading models in the category.
Available in black or gray models, the E8's earpieces look quite similar to many of the true wireless pairs we've tested. Other than the B&O logo on the outside panel, there's little to differentiate them from several other options we've tested, though they are slightly smaller. The in-ear fit is exceptionally secure and lightweight—B&O Play includes four pairs of eartips in various sizes, and one pair of foam tips. When they need to be stored or charged, the earpieces snap in to the included charging case magnetically.
In terms of battery life, the E8 is pretty standard for a true wireless pair, which is to say, pretty mediocre. All wire-free pairs out now have limited battery life—B&O Play says the E8 last for four hours hours on a full charge. The charging case carries two full additional charges, or an extra eight hours of battery life, when fully charged. That's solid, but we have seen better stats from Bose and JLab recently.
The E8's charging case is not only one of the classier designs we've seen thus far, it's also notably small. The black case has a leather patina and a built-in cloth lanyard loop. Two status LEDs on the back panel tell you when you how many full charges the case is holding—next to these LEDs, there's a port for the micro USB-to-USB charging cable, which is refreshingly longer than many of the short cables that ship with Bluetooth earphones. On the front of the case, where the shell pops open, there's an LED to show that it's charging.
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Pairing the E8 with an iPhone 6s was exceptionally easy in testing. You simply need to power up (by touching the capacitive touch panel on the right earpiece), go into pairing mode (hold a finger on both earpieces outer panels for a few seconds), and select the E8 from your device's bluetooth menu. Placing the earpieces in the case automatically kills the Bluetooth connection and begins the charging process. After the initial pairing, powering them up will automatically pair them with your device, assuming it's in range.
Overall, the sensitivity of the touch panels on the earpieces is solid. The right earpiece is the main one in terms of basic controls. Play/Pause is controlled by tapping on the right earpiece, but after this, B&O Play goes a very different route than most of the competition. For instance, to skip forward a track, you tap twice on the right earpiece—to skip backward, you tap twice on the left. Volume up and down is also divided between the two earpieces—you touch and hold for this control, which works in conjunction with your mobile device's master levels. We like this division for the most part.
Three taps on the right earpiece summons voice controls, but three taps on the left earpiece does nothing. A single tap on the right controls playback, but on the left, it places the earphones in transparency mode—in which the mics lightly amplify your surroundings. If you go into transparency mode, then try to resume playback by tapping on the right earpiece, things can get a little confusing. This is because by default, transparency mode doesn't pause the music, but mutes it. Adjusting the volume while in transparency mode to a higher volume will fix this issue, but until you do (in the app), tapping the right earpiece to resume play will take the earphones out of transparency mode.
The Beoplay app makes it easy to toggle these adjustments. You can choose between the default Ambient mode described above; or Social, which plays music at a low level; or Commuting, which plays music at a higher level but allows you to hear announcements, nearby conversation, and the like.
The app also allows you to adjust the EQ. You drag a dot around on a graph rather than adjusting several bands, but the results are similar—you quickly figure out how to boost both bass and treble, or only one. There are also presets for podcasts, workouts, and two marked Clear Commute. The app isn't required for the earphones to properly function, and you'll probably find little need for it after initially setting the transparency mode levels and perhaps tweaking the EQ.
The built-in mic offers excellent intelligibility. Using the Voice Memos app on an iPhone 6s, we were able to understand every word recorded, and the recording was crisp and clear with very few audio artifacts typically associated with wireless earphone mics.
For our tests, we left the EQ off, but it's possible to drastically change the E8's sound signature, including creating more thump in the sub-bass realm. With the EQ off, the earphones can still deliver quite a bass punch, however. On tracks with intense sub-bass content, like The Knife's "Silent Shout," the lows are delivered with power, and never distort at top (unwise) listening levels. At moderate levels, the bass still feels strong.
Bill Callahan's "Drover," a track with far less deep bass in the mix, gives us a better sense of the E8's general sound signature. The drums on this track get some added bass heft, for certain—they don't sound unnatural, but they have a rounder, fuller quality than they often do. Callahan's vocals get some added low-mid richness and high-mid treble edge in equal measure. The result is a crisp but full sound signature that can be described as bass forward, but also clear in the highs.
On Jay-Z and Kanye West's "No Church in the Wild," the kick drum loop gets enough high-mid presence to retain the sharpness of its attack, though we've heard it sound snappier and sharper, with more high-mids, on other pairs. The sub-bass synth hits that punctuate the beat here are delivered with power and gusto, while the vocals maintain solid clarity and never feel like they're doing battle with the more boosted lows. This is, even with the EQ off, a very sculpted sound signature—boosted sub-bass, prominent lows and low-mids, boosted high-mids and highs, with some dips and cuts here and there. We'd probably prefer slightly more definition in the high-mids, but then again, the EQ makes it possible to get just about whatever you're looking for.
Orchestral tracks, like the opening scene in John Adams' The Gospel According to the Other Mary, get some added bass depth, pushing the lower register instrumentation forward in the mix, but the spotlight still belongs to the higher register brass, strings, and vocals. This isn't a sound signature for purists, it's safe to say, but you can always dial back the bass and brighten the highs a tad.
Sonically, the Beoplay E8 is capable of many sound signatures, but its baseline will please plenty of listeners. Functionally, the design fits securely and is easy to use. Generally speaking, this is a very good pair of earphones, but there is the issue of price to consider. Is this pair $50 better than our Editors' Choice, the Bose SoundSport Free? It would be hard to make that argument convincingly, as $50 is a lot to ask when the Bose model is already quite pricey. We're also fans of the aforementioned JLab Epic Air, and the Jaybird Run is another solid option. B&O Play's Beoplay E8 is unlikely to disappoint, but the price is a bit too high.
The wire-free B&O Play Beoplay E8 earphones deliver high-quality Bluetooth audio and an app that allows you to set your EQ preferences, but feel a bit overpriced.
About Our Expert
I've been a contributing editor for PCMag since 2011. Before that, I was PCMag's lead audio analyst from 2006 to 2011. Even though I'm a freelancer now, PCMag has been my home for well over a decade, and audio gear reviews are still my primary focus. Prior to my career in reviewing tech, I worked as an audio engineer—my love of recording audio eventually led me to writing about audio gear.
Headphones and earphones
Wireless and computer speakers
USB mics
Bluetooth headsets
Probably because of their prevalence in the recording studios I worked in a long time ago, I am most comfortable on Macs—I'm writing this on the 2019 iMac I use for testing. I also have a MacBook Pro that gets plenty of similar use.
My workspace has a mini recording studio setup, and the the gear I work with there is a mix of items I've used forever (Paradigm Mini Monitors and a McIntosh stereo receiver) and newer gear I use for recording and review testing (such as the Universal Audio Apollo x16).
I'm obsessed with modern boutique analog synths—some of my favorites instruments in this realm are the Landscape Audio Stereo Field and HC-TT, the Soma Enner, the Koma Field Kit, and the Lorre Mill Keyed Mosstone.
From my studio days, I'm comfortable using Pro Tools, and in recent years have branched out to other realms of creative software, like Adobe Premiere and After Effects.
I stream music, but I also still buy albums, digitally or on vinyl, and encourage anyone who wants fair compensation for musicians and engineers to do the same.
I also play lots of Wordle.
