I love having a variety of headphones to choose from. As soon as the sun starts shining here in Toronto, I rub my old sore knees and get outside to smell the roses. And sure, I could take in the sounds of the concrete jungle around me, but I’d much rather fire up some of today’s hottest pop music or a book on Audible. When browsing for earbuds I look for ones that are sleek, have a good battery life and of course decent enough sound. I’m not listening to Pink Floyd when I walk (unless it’s a special mushroom walk) so I don’t need the world’s best sound, but I need something adequate. The 1MORE ComfoBuds are exactly that, adequate. For the price they aren’t half bad, but they sure won’t help you develop a better appreciation for music.
There are so many wireless earbuds on the market it’s getting incredibly hard to figure out what to get. Sure you can grab the Apple Airpods if you’re an iPhone user for convenience but frankly, they aren’t great for how expensive they are. I’d say they are borderline OK with their high cost and mediocre audio being a huge red flag. The 1MORE Comfobuds are far cheaper, at only $49.99USD and are what my father would have called, “cheap and cheerful”. They aren’t AirPod killers but they should convince Apple to step it up.
The Comfobuds aren’t the worst sounding earbuds I’ve ever put in my ears, but they sure won’t be my go-to sound device. They operate via Bluetooth 5.0 and support the high-quality Bluetooth codec, AAC. They wow me in comfort and their small, compact design but everything else is subpar. 1More must have known how comfy these tiny bad boys were when making them to justify adding “comfo” to their name. They truly do fit well in my ears. Now, I’m sure not everyone will feel the same, but these earbuds truly feel great living in between the sides of my eyes. These earbuds are one size fits all and do fit quite similarly to the AirPods.
Unfortunately, the comfort is really all that wowed me. That’s not to say they are a total write off as they still do shine for the price. The unboxing experience is nice, and they truly do feel like higher end earbuds. The case that holds the earbuds is incredibly small and compact and can easily be stored in any pocket. Even my girlfriend’s incredibly tiny pockets. Of all the earbuds on my desk currently (5) they are by far the slimmest.
The Comfobuds also feature a great automatic wear detection as well as IPX5 water and sweat resistance. The IPX5 rating is actually a step higher than the Airpods Pro, which are IPX4. Again, not terrible for 50 bucks. Unfortunately, when it comes to sound, the audio quality is very flat. It makes listening to music sound like it’s coming from a bad Bluetooth speaker from across the room. It made everything I’m listening to just incredibly average. Hard to get pumped to go on a run in the freezing cold when the music quality is this mundane. I sometimes found the bass ok, but never enough for my head to bop like I am hanging with my friends recreating that scene from a Night and the Roxbury.
On top of the middle of the road audio experience the battery life is not great. These earbuds die incredibly quick, usually lasting only 3 to 4 hours. There also isn’t wireless charging which is something I’m pretty used to on all my other devices at this point in 2021.
They will take you about 80 minutes to charge to full via USB-C, while the charging case they come in should give you an additional 18 hours.
For those that foresee themselves taking calls with these in, might want to reconsider. Through testing I found call quality was acceptable at best. They work when indoors but out for a walk with some slight wind you can go ahead and forget that call and stick to texting. I don’t feel like there’s any noise-neutralizing capabilities on these earbuds and going for a walk on a Zoom call was a bust.
The ComfoBuds have a few touch controls that allow you to Tap R or L twice to play or pause music or Tap L three times to activate the voice assistant. The Comfobuds automatically pause music or videos when you take an earbud out. I have a hate/love relationship with this feature and thankfully you can toggle off. With the 1More app you can adjust the touch settings, but I found the app incredibly buggy and would shut down on me quite often. The app is where you can find things like battery life and Smart Burn-in.
If you are looking for earbuds under 50 bucks, they are an OK option, though I’d highly suggest saving up for a better pair. Overall, they actually aren’t that much worse than the AirPods and at 1/4th the price. For me personally, comfort aside it’s just not worth buying earbuds that sound this lacklustre. I demand more from my earbuds. You and your ears deserve better.
