Iconic Danish audio brand Bang & Olufsen (B&O) is well known for both its stunning industrial design, as well as its premium prices, but we still weren’t quite prepared for its new Beoplay H100 wireless headphones. They’re sleek, built from a combination of leather, aluminum, and scratch-resistant hardened glass, and each earcup has a rotating “haptic” dial for intuitive control over both volume and noise cancellation. The price for these new cans? $1,549 — a huge increase over the company’s previous flagship, the Beoplay H95, which were already pricey at $800.
If you can afford them, the B&O Beoplay H100 are available September 3 in three color options: Infinite Black, Hourglass Sand, and Sunset Apricot.
“Beoplay H100 is the best pair of headphones we have ever created,” said Neo Kaplanis, Bang & Olufsen director of technology, in a press release, and indeed, B&O appears to have thought of everything for the H100.
The lambskin leather ear cushions, textile headband liner, and batteries are all replaceable. They use 40mm titanium drivers, which B&O claims can reproduce frequencies from 10 Hz to 40,000 Hz, making them compatible with hi-res sources of music (up to 24/96).
Out of the box, you’ll be able to use the USB-C port to pipe hi-res audio into the headphones via a wired connection to a smartphone or computer. However, the company also says it will be updating the cans with hi-res Bluetooth codecs so you can get a similar benefit from wireless listening. It did not indicate which hi-res codecs would be included in the update or when the update will be released.
Also set to be included in the update is the ability to do three-device Bluetooth Multipoint (versus the normal two-device capability.)
That USB-C port can also be used with analog sources of audio with the included USB-C to 3.5mm analog cable.
Helping audio sound even better (potentially) is B&O’s new EarSense adaptive audio processing, which the company says can tailor the sound to the wearer’s unique fit in real time.
Noise canceling is now twice as effective (compared to the H95) according to the company and is powered via a six-mic array. A four-mic array dedicated to voice pickup “delivers crystal-clear voice even in very demanding situations.” Spatial audio is also available with head tracking, and has been optimized for Dolby Atmos.
In addition to those clever dials on the earcups — something we haven’t seen since Microsoft released its second-gen Surface Headphones — you get a few physical button, as well as touch controls on the glass outer surfaces, which enable a quick-listen option when you cover them with a hand. They’re all customizable in the B&O companion app.
About the only thing that hasn’t been improved is battery life. On the H95, B&O said you could expect about 38 hours of playback with ANC enabled. The H100 only delivers 32 hours with ANC on, and this drops to 30 hours if you enable spatial audio and head tracking, according to the official specs.
Finally, what set of $1,549 headphones would be complete without their own leather carrying case? Yep, you get one in the box.
