Samsung Galaxy Buds Pro review – the best wireless earbuds from the South Korean smartphone maker so far

• Samsung Galaxy Buds Pro are the latest pair of wireless earbuds from the company, launched alongside the Galaxy S21 series.
  
• Priced at ₹15,990, the Galaxy Buds Pro come with several hardware upgrades as well as design tweaks.
  
• The Galaxy Buds Pro’s greatest strength is not the design, but the combination of active noise cancellation and ambient sound.
  
• While that sounds great on paper, how do the Galaxy Buds Pro actually perform in real life? Read our review to find out more.
  

Truly wireless earbuds have quickly become an essential part of many smartphone users’ lives. They’ve gone from being a luxury purchase to somewhat necessary, especially if you are on calls throughout the day.

Products with the ‘Pro’ moniker, often, do not justify their names. Samsung has been consistently refining and upgrading its truly wireless earbuds, and this time, it’s calling them the Galaxy Buds Pro.

Well then, do they justify the ‘Pro’ tag? I’ve been testing the Galaxy Buds Pro for a while now. Read on to find out how Samsung’s latest earbuds fare in real life.

Samsung Galaxy Buds Pro price and availability

The Samsung Galaxy Buds Pro are priced at ₹15,990 and come in three colours – black, violet and silver. They are available for purchase on Samsung India online store and other retail partners.

Samsung Galaxy Buds Pro – design and comfort

Design is one of the more important aspects of truly wireless earbuds, primarily because not only do they need to look good, they also need to be comfortable and offer a snug fit.

Samsung has experimented with the design of its earbuds, going from the traditional style of the Galaxy Buds Plus to the unconventional bean design with the Galaxy Buds Live.

With the Galaxy Buds Pro, Samsung has tweaked the design of the Galaxy Buds Plus to offer an ever better fit. There are two advantages of the new design – the earbuds offer the most perfect fit I’ve experienced so far, and as a result of this, they’re very comfortable.

The second advantage is improved noise cancellation. While the Galaxy Buds Pro offers active noise cancellation, the snug fit enhances the experience further.

Samsung Galaxy Buds Pro – build quality

The Galaxy Buds Pro not only comes with improved design, even the case looks and feels as premium as the buds inside. There are no squeaky noises, which is reassuring for a pair of earbuds that cost a lot.

The earbuds themselves are sturdy, and they can take a few falls.

Samsung Galaxy Buds Pro – performance and ease of use

Samsung’s earbuds are best used with Samsung smartphones, but I faced no issues or gaps in experience when I tested the Galaxy Buds Pro with other smartphones. You will have to download and use the Galaxy Wearable app during the initial setup, but once that is done, the pairing is seamless.

Talking about performance, the Galaxy Buds Pro come with two-way speakers which offer clear, crisp sound with great bass and treble. You can also use the Galaxy Wearable app to tweak the EQ to your liking.

There are two features that stand out – Active Noise Cancellation (ANC) and Advanced Ambient Sound. ANC works really well when you’re at home or office, cancelling out almost all the sound nearby. While outdoors, though, I was able to hear vehicles zipping past me.

The Advanced Ambient Sound mode amplifies nearby voices so you don’t end up ignoring someone talking to you. What makes this even better is that it can work in combination with ANC – the buds detect when you’re talking and switch to Ambient Sound, and back to ANC when you stop talking.

Overall, the Galaxy Buds Pro left me impressed with the audio quality, ANC and Ambient Sound.

Samsung Galaxy Buds Pro – call quality

Call quality is perhaps the most important aspect of truly wireless earbuds. In this regard, the Galaxy Buds Pro offers better performance compared to its predecessors. However, like most wireless earbuds, they also let in some ambient sound. This is a limitation in all wireless earbuds.

Samsung has used two external and one internal mic to overcome this to an extent. When indoors, the call quality is excellent. When outdoors, though, there’s some amount of noise that is picked up and transmitted to the other person on the call.

Samsung Galaxy Buds Pro – battery life

The Galaxy Buds Pro lasted me around 15-16 hours with ANC turned on – this includes the charging capacity of the case. Without ANC, they lasted me for over four days with almost 25 hours of listening time.

The case supports quick charging, which is a bonus. It has a USB Type-C port, so it should be compatible with most modern phone cables.

Verdict

The Samsung Galaxy Buds Pro are Samsung’s finest truly wireless earbuds so far. The build quality, design, performance all justify the ‘Pro’ branding. If you’re envious of the AirPods Pro and want something that offers a similar level of performance on Android smartphones, the Galaxy Buds Pro is what you are looking for.

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