ONESONIC BXS-HD1 earphones review: Budget beats for workouts
Cheap and cheerful, even if nothing remarkable.
Image: ONESONIC
Review Overview
Our rating
7
Our verdict
⊕ Comfortable fit
⊕ Reasonable sound for the price
⊖ Plasticky finish
⊖ Average battery life
⊖ Limited features
ONESONIC is an Irish audio technology company that is likely unknown amongst many audiophiles. Its range of products are fairly inexpensive but still promise the key features you might need. In the case of the ONESONIC BXS-HD1 Earphones, they’re dependable and provide you with reasonable audio, even if they do feel a bit cheap elsewhere.
They are affordable, though, so their plastic design and average battery life feel like adequate trade-offs for sound that won’t set your world on fire but can keep you moving during a quick workout.
The ONESONIC BXS-HD1 earphones are remarkably comfortable to wear. They stick with an AirPods-style appearance with tips hanging down and resting neatly alongside your ear. In addition, they don’t feel liable to fall out either – just what you need while working out. There may be no silicone tips to adjust but we found they weren’t really needed.
There’s no promise of noise cancellation – either passive or active – and no app to tweak the sound. What you see is what you get and it’s pretty basic, but again, the ONESONIC BXS-HD1 earphones sound decent for the price. If you’re prone to losing your earbuds or you simply don’t want to spend a fortune on a pair for working out, these do the job but nothing more.
Setting up
The advantage to the ONESONIC BXS-HD1 being fairly basic is that setup takes moments. As is now conventional for wireless earbuds, take them out of their case for the first time and they are automatically placed into pairing mode. Within seconds, you’re listening to music.
There’s no app for the ONESONIC BXS-HD1 so you don’t need to worry about installing one. The downside here is that you can’t tweak the equaliser or change any settings other than what your smartphone offers. You might be restricted to volume adjustment so the ONESONIC BXS-HD1 are distinctly basic.
You can charge the earbuds via the case’s USB-C connection. There’s no way of charging wirelessly, unfortunately, but there is USB-C fast charging support. Expect about three to four hours of playback and a total of 16 hours with the charging case. Although we found sometimes it dipped a little lower than four hours, depending on how loudly we played music.
Touch controls are available on the earbuds and they’re reasonably easy to use. We only experienced a couple of temperamental moments, usually while we were on the move. Playback, volume, and skipping tracks are all possible through them, along with taking calls or activating the Voice Assistant. Support for both Google Assistant and Siri are options here.
Much like the rest of the earbuds, the buttons and general finish feels a little cheap but they line up with the pricing of the earphones. Don’t count on them being particularly stylish, however. They’re supremely functional and not much more.
IPX4 splash and sweet resistance adds to the sense that these earbuds are best suited for workouts, but certainly not for the pool.
Sound quality
Temper your expectations with the ONESONIC BXS-HD1 and appreciate their price tag. True Wireless earbuds that cost this little rarely sound exceptional and that’s certainly the case here. Compare them with even the cheapest Apple AirPods and you’ll be disappointed.
Their 13mm speaker drivers do their best, offering some mellow mids but far from powerful bass. However, it’s all a bit flat and soulless. There’s no excitement to any of the music we listened to, even when we tested them out with the ever vibrant Feels Like Summer by Childish Gambino. There’s no liveliness here.
Similarly, switching over to the Foo Fighters’ greatest hits, Best of You lacks punch. There’s no distortion when you increase the volume, at least, but that’s because there was never much oomph at the best of times. Listening to Under Pressure, you miss out on the finer nuances of the music and the soundstage feels pretty weak.
That’s a lot of negativity but, honestly, these are still fine when working out or going for a run. Lack of noise cancellation is unfortunate if you want a quiet time at the gym but, when working out, you aren’t really going to be listening out for the crispest of sounds. Instead, volume is where it’s at, and the lack of distortion is convenient.
Conclusion
The ONESONIC BXS-HD1 aren’t there for you to take in the latest music. Instead, these are the simple earbuds you reach for when you’re going for a quick run and your priorities lie with ease of use over all else.
Wireless charging would have made them easier to maintain and some kind of passive noisex cancellation would have been useful, but the ONESONIC BXS-HD1 do the job at this price.
Cheap yet convenient means you’ll find them to be a useful backup option that require little input from you.
