The Soundpeats Air4 Pro add ANC, a Transparent mode, and silicone ear tips to the older Air4, making for a nice budget AirPods Pro analog.
For years, Soundpeats has been known for two things: generally good budget earbuds and headphones, and incremental updates. The Soundpeats Air4 Pro are both, as they’re an upgrade to the earlier Soundpeats Air4 and also quite good sounding and full-featured for the price.
The Soundpeats Air4 Pro are to the Air4 model as the AirPods Pro are to the AirPods. These are more expensive than the previous model but offer more and better features. At $80, the Air4 Pro are effectively a solid budget alternative to Apple’s AirPods Pro, though not without a few tradeoffs.
Soundpeats Air4 Pro
The Soundpeats Air4 Pro are an ultra-affordable alternative to earbuds like the Apple AirPods Pro. With ANC and up to 26 hours of battery life, you can easily block out the outside world at work, your commute, or on a run.
- Battery Life
- 26 hours
- Charging Case Included?
- Yes
- Brand
- Soundpeats
- Supported codecs
- SBC, aptX Adaptive Lossless, aptX Voice
- Bluetooth
- 5.3
- IP Rating
- IPX4
- Driver Size
- 13mm
- Colors
- White, Black, Beige
- Charging Port
- USB-C
- Noise Cancellation
- ANC
- Charging time
- 1.5 hours
Pros
- Great sound quality for the price
- Good comfort and an easy fit
- Up to 26 hours of battery life
- Charges in 1.5 hours
Cons
- No wireless charging
- Transparent mode has a significant hiss
- Microphone for voice calls didn?t sound great
Design and Fit of an AirPods Pro Competitor
The original Air4 earbuds didn’t exactly look like straight copies of Apple’s AirPods, but they did certainly look inspired by them. This is largely the same for the Air4 Pro. While they don’t quite look like a direct copy of the AirPods Pro, there is no mistaking the inspiration behind the design.
Unlike the Air4, which simply sat in your ear, the Air4 Pro earbuds use silicone tips for a better fit. You get the standard small, medium, and large tip sizes. I typically opt for the medium tips, and this worked well for me here. The earbuds aren’t ultra-light, but they weren’t heavy enough that I noticed them too much while wearing them.
The case is larger and bulkier than the case for the AirPods Pro, which may have you imagining that it’s heavier. This isn’t the case, as it actually feels significantly lighter than the AirPods Pro case, possibly because it doesn’t support wireless charging so doesn’t have the additional electronics for this.
Sound and Voice Quality of Mid-Range Earbuds
While many earbuds are trending toward smaller drivers these days, the ones in the Air4 Pro are fairly large at 13mm. Theoretically, this should make for better bass response, and the earbuds do deliver some fairly powerful bass. In addition to the usual SBC Bluetooth codec, you also get aptX Adaptive Lossless, which makes for better sound quality if you’re using a supported phone or other device.
Listening to Fugitive’s “Standoff,” I was impressed by the sound quality. Metal can be harsh-sounding on earbuds, particularly cheaper earbuds, but that was not the case listening on the Air4 Pro using the default Soundpeats Classic EQ preset. The kick drum in particular had plenty of thump thanks to how the Air4 Pros handle the low end.
Moving on to “Set” by King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, the Air4 Pros showed their versatility. The earbuds handled the airy vocals well, and despite the synths all over the track, it never sounded cluttered.
I’m used to ANC not being especially useful in sub-$100 earbuds, so I was pleasantly surprised by how effective the Air4 Pro’s ANC was. While not up to the level of flagship earbuds, it did a good job of blocking out background noise, even without music playing.
The Transparent mode isn’t quite as impressive, but it does work. It let sound through well enough, but either the microphone or the software doing the processing let through quite a bit of background hiss.
Voice quality was passable for calls using the microphones, but otherwise pretty poor. This is common in budget earbuds, so I wasn’t surprised. You shouldn’t be using these to record a podcast with their microphone.
Software and Touch Controls
The media controls come in the form of a touch-sensitive area on each earbud. Tapping the right or left earbuds once will raise or lower the volume, respectively, while double tapping either pauses or resumes playback. These controls can be fiddly and easy to accidentally activate, but fortunately, you can turn them off completely in the Soundpeats app, available for Android as well as iPhone.
In addition to disabling the onboard controls, the app lets you switch between normal, ANC, and Transparent modes. You can also enable adaptive EQ, which uses a short series of tones to map your ears with less-than-impressive results. One handy option here is the Game Mode toggle which shortens the latency—ideal for gaming or watching videos.
Decent Battery Life
Soundpeats claims that the Air4 Pro lasts up to 6.5 hours on a single charge. In my testing, this seemed to be accurate, though my overall listening time was routinely extended when I would tuck the earbuds into the case. The case will charge the earbuds up to three times, for a total of around 26 hours of total playtime.
Unlike the AirPods Pro, the case that comes with the Air4 Pro doesn’t support wireless charging. The good news is that the USB-C port on the bottom of the case charges quite quickly, so they shouldn’t need to spend more than two hours to fully charge the case.
Price and Availability
The SoundPEATS Air4 Pro retail for $79.99, which is impressive considering the quality of music playback. You get your choice of three colors: white (reviewed color), beige, or black.
Should You Buy the Soundpeats Air4 Pro
The Soundpeats Air4 Pro have plenty to offer without thinking about the price, but they’re especially good for how comparatively little they cost. For $80, they offer good sound, adaptive noise cancellation, and impressive battery life. On the other hand, the Transparent mode isn’t the best, and the lack of wireless charging is less than ideal.
While they don’t offer the same sound quality or impressive noise cancellation as more expensive earbuds, the Air4 Pro certainly aren’t lacking. As long as you’re willing to put up with a few issues, they’re a great set of budget wireless earbuds.
Soundpeats Air4 Pro
The Soundpeats Air4 Pro are an ultra-affordable alternative to earbuds like the Apple AirPods Pro. With ANC and up to 26 hours of battery life, you can easily block out the outside world at work, your commute, or on a run.