Hands-on: Honor Earbuds Open sound way better than you would think
Honor's newest earbuds keep your ears free to hear the sounds around you, and I got to go hands-on with them at Mobile World Congress 2025.
🎧 Honor recently announced the Earbuds Open, and they were reintroduced at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona
🦻 The buds take a sleek, conventional approach to design that makes sense
🔊 Honor focused a lot on sound quality that won’t interfere with the bud’s open nature
👀 I went hands-on with them at MWC 2025, and they did not disappoint
In my backpack for Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, I brought four pairs of headphones: the Sony WH-1000XM5, Apple AirPods Pro 2, Bose QuietComfort Ultra earbuds, and the new Honor Earbuds Open.
The first three pairs of headphones all sound great thanks to their audio quality and active noise cancellation, which blocks out external noise to help seclude you in your music. But the Earbuds Open aim to keep your ears open (hence the name) when listening to music, yet still block out noise you don’t want to hear. Combined with some neat features like live translation and AI that’s part of the company’s renewed Alpha Plan for its future,
The Earbuds Open are similar to the Nothing Ear Open that I reviewed with a design that hooks onto your ear and fires a driver into your ear without having to insert anything. It’s like having a pair of miniature speakers hanging from your ears, a concept that’s taken off among folks who still want to hear the world around them while consuming content. I’ve met plenty of runners and bicyclists who use open-style earbuds for that reason, and if you also find open earbuds handy, you’ll enjoy what these Honor buds come with.
Hands-on with Honor Earbuds Open
🦻 A secure, comfortable design. Open earbuds can be tough to get right, but Honor seems to have nailed the design of the Earbuds Open. I hooked them onto my ears and immediately loved how they felt; the buds are lightweight at under eight grams per bud, the silicone design is soft, and the drivers point right at my ears so I can hear everything. They even work with my glasses on, which is a rarity in hook-style earbuds.
🔊 Feel the bass. Honor includes some impressive subwoofers in these buds, which I noticed the second I started playing music. They add depth and a strong presence to audio quality on the Earbuds Open, which is good news if you don’t want to sacrifice sound quality with a pair of headphones like this. I’ll need to test it more in my full review, but so far, the bass is strong.
🎧 Surprisingly great sound with minimal leakage. Overall sound quality has been impressive. Honor’s 16mm drivers and titanium-plated tweeters deliver solid quality when playing hip-hop, country, oldies, and more (yes, I tried it all). The buds also seemed to work well for movie clips and podcasts that I pulled up on YouTube in my brief time with them. Audio leakage has also been impressive; I cranked the volume to max on my Pixel 9 Pro Fold and my boss could barely hear what I was playing.
🔇 ANC on open earbuds feels weird. Honor includes a triple microphone setup on the Earbuds Open to cancel out some sounds around you (odd concept for open earbuds, I know), and in my early testing, the ANC felt weird to use. I could hear my own voice a bit less, and the street sounds from around Barcelona were a little quieter. I’ll need to test this more for a final verdict, but for now, I’m going with “kinda weird.”
🧑🎓 They’ve got the smarts. Honor packed in a lot of smart features with these headphones. They’re powered by AI and part of Honor’s new company-wide Alpha Plan that promises a smarter future with Honor’s products. The result? At least with these earbuds, it’s features like live translation, access to a voice assistant, and improved voice clarity and sound leakage. I’ll be curious to see how this mission effects Honor’s products long-term.
🔋 Six hours of battery. Honor claims the Earbuds Open can last up to six hours on a full charge, with 22 hours total of playtime with the case. I haven’t used them long enough to test this, but after two hours of using them while I wrote, the buds dropped from 100 percent to 80 percent. When it’s time to recharge, Honor says all you need is 15 minutes to get two hours of listening time back, which is nice.
💵 A solid price. The Honor Earbuds Open cost 149 Euros (around $153) which is a pretty good price for what you get. Again, I’ll need to test them more, but so far, I think this price is justifiable.
Honor will be announcing a launch date for the Earbuds Open soon, so stay tuned. Be sure to subscribe to The Shortcut so you don’t miss out on the rest of our MWC 2025 coverage!
Max Buondonno is Editor at The Shortcut. He’s been reporting on the latest consumer technology since 2015, with his work featured on CNN Underscored, ZDNET, How-To Geek, XDA, TheStreet, and more. Follow him on X @LegendaryScoop and Instagram @LegendaryScoop.
