Bowers & Wilkins Px8 wireless headphones review – quality and luxury listening

95%

• Design

The Bowers & Wilkins Px8 wireless active noise cancelling headphones deliver a true and uncompromised audio experience for those want to get every ounce of quality from their music. These are one of the best headphones money can buy.

The Bowers & Wilkins Px8 wireless noise cancelling headphones are designed for audio lovers who don’t want to make any compromises when it comes to listening to their music.

These headphones have set a new reference standard for not only sound quality but also build quality in the active noise cancelling wireless headphone market.

The Bowers & Wilkins Px8 headphones are made from quality premium materials including diecast aluminium and feature diamond cut bright metal detailing along with Napa leather on the ear cups and headband.

These are extremely comfortable headphones and we wore them for entire international flights without any issue.

Under the hood, the Px8 headphones have an all-new bespoke, ultra-high resolution carbon cones that are angled in such a way within each year cup to offer the lowest possible distortion and reference quality audio resolution.

And Bowers and Wilkins know a thing or two about those audio cones.

The ones aboard the Px8 headphones were inspired by the units used in the Bowers & Wilkins 700 Series loudspeaker range.

They’ve shrunk them down for these headphones to offer the ultimate combination of ultra-fast response plus low distortion throughout the entire frequency range.

For our review, we were blown away by the quality and the detail that the Px8 offered.

We thought the Px7 S2 set a new standard but our appreciation of audio reached even greater heights as we listened to the true sound through the Px8 which would be just as the artist intended.

Listening to hi-res audio on services like Tidal and Qubuz and lossless audio on Apple Music with the Px8 gives you an even greater appreciation of audio quality and what’s possible with a pair of headphones.

Part of the secret sauce with the Px8 is the Qualcomm aptX adaptive wireless technology which creates the best possible connection and quality from the latest smartphones, tablets and computers.

On the noise cancelling front, the Bowers &Wilkins Px8 have the same active noise cancelling wireless platform as the PX7 S2 headphones but, thanks to the 40mm carbon cone drive units, they hit new heights of detail, resolution and scale.

Audio purists are not always the biggest fans of wireless connections and the Px8 headphones come with the USB to 3.5mm cable so you’re able to plug into your traditional sources like high resolution players and audio systems.

There are some physical controls on the ear-cup so it makes it easy to navigate your music without the need to touch your device.

These are conveniently located and have different textures allowing you to find the right button and adjust the controls without looking or taking off the headphones.

There are six high performance microphones that work together to measure the output of each driver unit.

Two are used to react to the ambient noise and two are used to supply voice clarity with enhanced noise suppression.

We found the active noise cancellation to be among the best we’ve ever experienced.

And that ANC also came into play when we were making phone calls – not only was the call reasonably clear but any background noise was also reduced.

The companion Bowers & Wilkins Music app offers a few features and settings including switching between ANC and pass through to hear your surroundings. There’s a shortcut button for this on the headphones as well.

It also lets you set streaming quality limits if you need to reduce the amount of data you use on cellular networks and on wi-fi networks.

For the record, we set these at the highest possible settings – we had plenty of data and didn’t want to reduce the quality one bit.

Within the app you can even dabble with the treble and bass equalisers to tailor the sound more to your taste.

On the battery side, the Bowers & Wilkins Px8 headphones provided an amazing 30 hours of playback which is more than enough to last an entire international flight or a week’s worth of commutes.

There’s even a quick recharge feature where you can plug in for 15 minutes to get another seven hours of playtime.

Priced at $1,149, the Bowers & Wilkins Px8 wireless noise cancelling headphones are not for everyone.

The customer who will purchase these headphones is someone who has a deep appreciation for music and the quality which it should be played.

These audiophiles are seeking to hear the music exactly as it was meant to be heard by the artist and the Px8 easily delivers that quality.

And they are more than willing to pay for that quality.

VERDICT

The Bowers & Wilkins Px8 wireless active noise cancelling headphones deliver a true and uncompromised audio experience for those want to get every ounce of quality from their music. These are one of the best headphones money can buy.