Audio-Technica ATH-M50xBT Bluetooth Headphones Review & Comparison vs ATH-M50x

what's going on guys my name is Wade with tech daily so I'm obviously very fortunate in getting the chance to check out all of the latest and greatest tech products and more often than not I'm probably upgrading and swapping things out just about every month but for the last few years now I've actually had just one pair of over ear headphones for day-to-day use and they've been these my white audio technica ath M 50 X's I purchased them in May of 2016 according to my Amazon account and over that time span they've served me well

I use them primarily for video editing and casual music listening while I'm sitting at my desk and for around 150 bucks I think there's still some of the best headphones you can buy at that price range even though they are sort of getting up there in age as far as how well they've held up they definitely do show some wear and tear but I like to think I've been pretty gentle with them all things considered the ear pads have definitely gotten a little flaky and worn along the sides and edges where the material is a

bit thinner sure I could replace the ear pads if I want to but I think they still have a bit of life left and then the headband also shows a bit of wear too but it's not so bad overall which is nice and even though the headphones are all white they do wipe clean pretty well too obviously I do really like my M 50 X's and since their studio monitor headphones I pair them with my Focusrite Scarlett audio interface and this setup allows me to hear all the little details want to edit my voiceovers and

it produces a great sound when listening to music too but in a world of smartphones with no headphone jack and my general disinterest in having to rely on dongles my headphones spend their life on a stand on my desk and I generally don't get to travel with them or use them with my phone on the go they're stuck being my at-home headphones which is why I'm pretty excited about audio Technica's new m50x BTS these aim to essentially be the same m50x headphones a lot of us have come to know and love but now with an

option to go wireless via bluetooth now I know audio technica makes a ton of great headphones and they've offered a big selection of bluetooth products in the past so I wasn't really concerned with these being bad or anything like that I fully expected them to be another excellent audio technica product my biggest question obviously was how these would compare to what I already know and have used for the last few years in my mind I sort of wanted them to be exactly the same with the same look and feel and the same sound - which

is the most important part and fortunately audio-technica did just that and really hit it out of the park with these inside the box you of course get the headphones themselves which offer a very familiar look and feel and beyond that you also get a nice carrying bag to store the headphones in when you're on the go and there's also two included cables a 3.5 millimeter auxiliary cable for going wired if you need to and the micro USB cable for charging which I know going with micro USB is kind of a disappointment for some people but

I guess I can live with it if you couldn't tell already the design and build is exactly the same as a standard M 50 s as far as I can tell they didn't modify a thing and I don't think that was a bad decision at all the wireless ones only come in black right now so this isn't gonna be a perfectly even comparison but you'll at least be able to get the idea the bottom line though is that if you like the look and the feel and the design of the m50 X's if they fit

well for you and you're comfortable with them you're getting the exact same experience on the other hand if you had any complaints with the original m50 X's don't look for these to be any different you've got the same amount of cushion on the earpads which for me is totally fine I find them pretty comfortable and have definitely gotten used to them over the years now and it's the same story along the headband up top - there's identical cushion material to keep the top of your head comfortable they flex and Bend without creaking or cracking which

is great and I personally always felt these were well-built and relatively high quality headphones with a metal headband and hard plastic construction speaking of the headband you've got the same notched adjustment setup on the sides for stretching things out or keeping them tight depending on how big your head is and there's plenty of space and also a good number of notches to get the right fit for just about everybody and of course you can also fold the headphones up to make them easier to travel with and I've always liked that about these they really don't

take up much space at all in a backpack or bag and if you do want to take them with you you're working with a pretty compact pair of headphones when they are all folded up of course because these are Wireless you're gonna get some buttons and controls built into the side of the headphones including the power button the micro USB charging port the 3.5 millimeter jack volume up and down and the play and pause buttons what's also interesting is that Audio Technica included touch controls on these too so tapping and holding your finger on the

left earphone actually launches your virtual assistant like Siri I like the addition there even though I personally don't use Siri all that much but I will talk about all the button controls in just a minute because I think that is one area where Audio Technica sort of dropped the ball I do want to take a second to talk about the wired option on these here because audio technica did make some changes to the cable they ship which ended up sort of being both a positive and a negative if you guys remember with the standard M

50 X's the cord that ships with those is audio Technica's proprietary locking cable and that's fine for the most part but if it breaks or stops working or if you want a longer or shorter cable you're sort of out of luck with the wireless m 50s now Audio Technica ships a more standard 3.5 millimeter cable but it's still sort of proprietary in the sense that the actual jack itself is recessed a bit there's no locking mechanism though so if you can find a cable that works with it it can be replaced the cable is also

really short 1.2 meters which is a little annoying and it's also a right angled plug on the end again just kind of annoying more than anything there are inline controls on the cable but just one button though because the rest of your controls are on the headphones it's got a mic too but there's also a mic on the headphones directly so you can take phone calls wirelessly if you want to do that as far as the fit like I said earlier you're getting the exact same feel as the standard M 50s nothing has changed here

at all so if you found these comfortable you'll enjoy wearing the wireless ones of course if you ever need to swap out the ear pads on either of these headphones you can do that pretty easily and I know that's what a lot of people end up doing and all in all for me personally I've never had any complaints with how these feel on my ears or around my head I tend to wear mine for three or four hours every single day and they'll stretch out a bit as time goes on and get more comfortable but

they've been a good pair of headphones for me as far as how they feel my only gripe though with the design of the new ones is the fact that the built-in controls on the headphones are kind of difficult to feel for and use I'm sure as time goes on we'll get more familiar with them the volume and play and pause buttons are almost sort of like behind your ear which doesn't make a lot of sense I wish audio technica actually went the route of allowing you to use the touch controls for playing and pausing music

instead by default I think that would have made a bit more sense but honestly I can live with it and the controls being a little awkward isn't at all a deciding factor with these okay so let's talk about the listening experience since that's probably why most of you are here I want to divide this up a bit because there's a couple different points that are really important the Wireless M 50s and I want to make sure I hit everything as just your standard bluetooth headphones these sound fantastic in my opinion they're definitely on the higher

of sound quality for wireless headphones overall and they deliver that sort of signature audio technica sound that I've come to enjoy over the last couple of years but I do realize it isn't necessarily for everyone with that being said a handful of people have remarked that audio technica changed the sound profile just a bit with these compared to the standard wired em 50s with a slightly reduced bass and treble I personally didn't hear a noticeable difference but your ears might be better than mine and that could be something you notice there's also the matter of

a wired versus wireless sound experience - from what I've been able to tell there is just an ever so slight difference in sound when listening to them over Bluetooth versus when they're plugged in music is just a tiny bit more muffled when you're Wireless which i think is expected but the difference is negligible for all intents and purposes the m50x BTS sound nearly identical whether you're plugged in or on the go and I think audio technica did an amazing job making sure your listening experience is basically identical I know one thing that sort of hit-or-miss

about Bluetooth headphones is the latency which is that little delay or like lag you might experience with the audio coming from your phone or computer to your ears with some pairs of bluetooth headphones and earbuds there's a noticeable amount of disconnects and the audio that's being delivered doesn't match up with what's playing and that can be pretty annoying and sort of ruin the whole experience fortunately though with these the latency I think is at a bare minimum you'll still notice a delay in the audio against the video just ever so slightly but I don't think

it's enough to really negatively impact your viewing or listening experience and overall it rivals any of the other higher quality Bluetooth earbuds and headphones on the market right now there's also the matter of comparing the wireless em 50s to the standard ones and what you might experience going from one to the other and surprisingly once again across all three scenarios the standard older M 50s a wired connection with a new M 50 BTS or going completely wireless with the new ones the sound that's delivered is just about identical which really impressed me again some people

might be able to pick up a slight difference with an updated sound profile on the new wireless ones but I sat here and went back and forth between them probably a hundred times and I could hardly tell the difference and honestly I think that's really impressive for someone like me who's really enjoyed using the M 50s for a while now I was a little hesitant in giving the wireless ones a try because I genuinely didn't expect them to sound the same especially over Bluetooth but I can say with confidence that with the m50 BTS the

addition of bluetooth is not only a big plus but in my opinion it also doesn't affect or impact the listening experience at all and that's exactly what I was hoping for these are absolutely going to be my new permanent pair of headphones just on the fact that they are exactly the same as my old ones but now with the option to go wireless and with 40 hours of playback time on a single charge they'll be able to make it through long flights and car rides and anything else and I'll basically never have to worry the

only thing these headphones are lacking is active noise cancellation but I think if you're looking for that you're looking for the bose qc25 s because nothing else compares all in all for about 50 dollars more than the standard M 50 s if you've been an audio-technica fan for a while and hoped they would go wireless your prayers have been answered here and they are well worth the money I would easily take these over the standard wired M 50 s and be more than happy with a decision so hopefully you guys enjoyed this video definitely let

me know what you think of these new wireless M 50 s in the comments below also be sure to follow tech daily on Twitter and subscribe to the tech daily YouTube channel if you haven't already and I'll see you guys later