soundcore Liberty 5 by Anker, Noise-Cancelling Wireless...

Most Helpful Review

"Firstly I'll say these are great all rounders for earbuds. Sound is great, the ANC and transparency are pretty good, and I do like that these have IP55 dust/water resistance (Great for the gym), that and the gaming mode works wonderfully this time! (Not the case when the Liberty 4 Pro came out) However if you have a pair of either Liberty 4 model earbuds, I'd wait for the inevitable Liberty 5 Pro later on. These do have some improvements over the Liberty 4 Pro but sadly there's a couple of backwards steps.First issue is there are no sliding controls on the stems of the earbuds, which was present in the Liberty 4 Pro. It's now squeeze controls and I'm not a fan of this. Now it can be customized where either a single, double, or triple squeeze could be custom set to do whatever you want. But volume adjustment by squeezing wasn't very intuitive or responsive compared to the Liberty 4 Pro. Even said squeeze controls are worse this time around and I think that's due to the smaller section on the stem dedicated to the squeeze function. Maybe the later models after this one will improve this or even hopefully patched.Next is the ANC is a bit worse than the Liberty 4 Pro, not by much but with reducing volume to voices. When I'm at the gym or at home, I can't tell the difference between the 2 earbuds, but hearing voices both natively around me or on TV, certain tones of a voice pierce right through. (And I got a replacement set as this can be a sign of a faulty set of buds, this was the same with both units) Now this I don't mind too much, as I don't want ANC so good it's almost like sensory deprivation. But you'll want to be aware of this. Especially since I've been seeing reviewers say the ANC is outright better than the Liberty 4 Pro, and that's just not true. It's good, but not better.Now what I do like is the vastly improved transparency mode! While not as good as my flagship earbuds the Pixel Buds Pro 2, it's definitely an improvement over past Soundcore earbuds. I'd even say it's their best in show at the moment. It's very easy to hear conversations if you don't have the volume cranked too high, and I can easily hear traffic when out for a walk.They also improved the in-ear detection, much better than previous earbuds. It does take a couple seconds to pause music when taking a bud out, but it starts resuming my music almost immediately as I place it back in. The Liberty 4 Pro didn't even have this feature at first, and even with it being patched in it was a solid 5 or so seconds before music would pause or play.Also the battery life is improved quite a bit. A 4 hour walk and gym session had my Liberty 5 at around 49% battery, whereas the Liberty 4 Pro I'd be under 30% with the same time. Thankfully both earbuds have some impressively quick charging from their charging cases. A 20 minute top off had both back to 100%. However the Liberty 4 Pro's charging case does charge slightly quicker than the Liberty 5, but not by much. I imagine you won't notice if you charge your buds overnight or even for a few hours.Another thing I do love that's now working out of the box is the gaming mode. No issues thus far with either my phone, Nintendo Switch, or my Razer Edge when playing COD Mobile. Hardly any audio latency at all which is very impressive. Sadly wasn't the case with the Liberty 4 Pro, even now it's still a bit awkward to use. (You can't have multipoint on and they have to be connected directly to the device you're gaming on to work properly) I'm glad it's now working properly on the Liberty 5 right out of the box.For audio I can't really comment or even complain about. They sound great to me, but you'll want to use the Hear ID feature if they're too bass heavy or sound 'off' from your regular earbuds. Basically it's like a hearing test where you go to a quiet room and you'll answer which tones you can/can't hear. As well as listening to samples of a song that you think sound better. I hate fidgeting with levers and this gets rid of all that.Lastly with fit, you'll find something that'll work. Besides the included 6 sets of eartips, the nozzle where said ear tip goes has a universal shape where almost any 3rd party ear tip will work. I've had great luck with Spinfit, both their Omni and Ice eartips work real nicely. (They don't affect the seal and they're silicone, meaning they won't wear down over time as quickly as memory foam) Azla also makes great eartips that work wonderfully as an option too.In short, these are amazing earbuds that aren't exactly Airpod killers like what some reviewers claim. But I imagine you'll like these quite a bit if you need a slightly above cheap set of earbuds, or if you need something for the gym with good battery life. They do a lot of things real well (Maybe not so much with touch controls, but that's minor) but they don't do anything bad."