I Bought these Sony WF-C500 green earbuds two weeks ago to replace a pair of Cambridge Audio Melomania 1+ earbuds that started behaving erratically after a firmware update. After that experience, I was reluctant to spend a lot on replacements. These are absolutely amazing for the price. Well balanced sound, plenty of bass, (not overblown) very good dynamics, (plenty of “slam”) fairly smooth top end & surprisingly detailed midrange. Even classical sounds reasonable. They seem well built, with long battery life, good control ergonomics & they are paired before I can get them in my ears! They fitted me perfectly without needing to change the tips. I didn’t want ANC as I prefer to be somewhat aware of my surroundings, but these provide a fair degree of isolation anyway. The app is well designed, although the app icon is rather large, so I relegated it to a secondary page on my phone & it’s only a swipe away. I find leaving the EQ flat works for me across all musical genres. Only slight negative is phone conversations could sound a bit clearer. OK, so they’re not quite perfect, but they are uncannily involving to listen to & at this price, they’re more than good enough for the moment & an improvement on my previous buds.

Always find the sound quality from Sony earphones and headphones so good especially when it comes to price against other more fashionable brands such as Beats. These certainly don’t disappoint. Also note that any other people like me who find Apples EarPods don’t fit them these are a much better alternative

UPDATE: 2 months later, the buds started working unreliably, had to return them.

I bought these to replace a pair of Bose Sport earbuds, that finally died out of warranty. I felt aggrieved of buying another set of Bose earbuds, having had two sets of earbuds fail on me in 4 years (in contrast to their over ear headphones which seemingly last forever). Unfortunately, the earbud market seems to have moved on, so that every bud offers noise cancelling (which hurts my ears and isn’t great for running), so I was limited in choice for earbuds without cancelling. Fortunately, after a bit of research, I found these old Sony buds.

The first things I noticed were the lack of wing tips to keep the buds securely in your ears (concerning), the small size of the case (fantastic), and when I put them in my ears, the rubbish sound quality (disappointing). I thought that I may have made a mistake. Fortunately, after a bit of learning to trust the earbuds, I found that they never fell out of my ears, even when running. The case size meant that I got even more use out of the buds, they now go everywhere with me. And most importantly, when I got myself set up on the Sony app for the earbuds, there was an excellent tool (a bit like an optician test where they say, do you prefer sound style 1, 2, or 3, then keep narrowing it down) that allows you to fine tune how the earbuds sound. They now sound great.

There are still compromises, especially as (on sale at 45) these buds cost about a quarter of the Bose buds. But I can take things like poorer call quality, microphones, etc.