Headphones and earbuds have been an influential piece of hardware in my life—from saving me from enduring awkward situations in Toronto’s bustling public transit to listening to my favourite gaming podcasts. But there have been situations when my audio saviours turned into my betrayers when they failed to perform optimally when I really needed them. It happens, but some only lasted about a month. The latest SuperEQ Q2 Pro wireless earbuds are not the latter and have really impressed me with their performance.
The pair of earbuds came with a charging case that is said to extend the earbuds’ 8-hour playtime up to 28 hours of extra playtime. The case is super compact and very light, so it is very easy to pop into a bag or a pocket for quick stowing while travelling around. It is quite similar in size to the charging case for other earbuds like Apple’s AirPods or Huawei’s latest FreeBuds Lipstick.
I think the Q2 Pro stands out among the rest as it broke the more recently prominent, conventional shape with the earpiece and the antenna-like piece jutting down from the wearer’s ear canal to the side of their cheeks. It is shaped similarly to the Sony WF-1000XM4 or the Samsung Galaxy Buds 2, which offer a lower profile design. The Q2 Pro came with two more pairs of ear grips for various ear hole sizes—I was surprised the standard size it came shipped with fit my ears nice and snug for once!
While the Q2 Pro earbuds did not bring anything revolutionary, it had strengths in areas I felt previous earbuds I have used could have bolstered. Some features include the Q2 Pro’s Transparency mode and hybrid active noise-cancelling technology. The Transparency mode has been a convenient feature for someone who hates putting in and taking out my earbuds just to hear one of my coworkers who is trying to get my attention for a quick joke or discussion about the latest episode of DC’s Peacemaker or Euphoria.
This wonderful feature essentially lets the wearer pick up ambient sounds while continuing to listen to what they love and stay aware of their surroundings. However, the controls to activate these two different sound profiles from the standard one were difficult to use in half the times I used them. There are numerous variations of tapping on each earbud that the combinations I wanted to use were sometimes not what I intended or when I tapped them, nothing happened.
“While the Q2 Pro earbuds did not bring anything revolutionary, it had strengths in areas I felt previous earbuds I have used could have bolstered.”
I would have also liked to see an app from SuperEQ to adjust different audio levels or even choose between audio profiles for movies or genres like Rock or Hip-Hop. Many other notable audio-involved companies like Samsung and Sennheiser have dedicated apps for users to customize their audio levels for their earbuds. I believe this would take the Q2 Pro’s to the next level. This may have made the premiere of Kan(Ye) West’s Donda 2 album a bit more dynamic.
One of the Q2 Pro’s redeemable traits was the battery life. I found it rare the pair would not be charged for my daily tasks. I’m a fairly busy-body and I also enjoy using them in bed when binging on the latest shows and movies like LOL: Last One Laughing Canada or Kimi. The creators boasted a 28-hour battery life and I think it held true for the most part, since I never truly let my devices run out of juice. However, I did it for test purposes and found it died between 20-24 hours but may have been caused by me using it at max volume all the time.
One of the last special traits the Q2 Pro exhibited was its ability to withstand my workouts. One of my greatest pet peeves is my earbuds falling on the gym floor (before the pandemic) and then having to go sanitize them, interrupting my workout. While dropping a pair of earbuds in my home gym would be fine, these pair of buds held strong. I would probably have to push them in after a couple circuits of exercises, but it really managed to impress me by not having to adjust them too much from bench pressing to sit-ups.
Overall, I believe the user will get more than what they paid for with the SuperEQ Q2 Pro with its $59.99 price. I would have loved to see a setting to increase the volume threshold for those that want to jam out a little louder, but this may not be a bad option for children and those who value their ears. I am not trying to blow out my eardrums, I just want to experience the point where an ear-bleed may occur but not quite to the point of pain. This was a safe pair of buds.
