Bowers & Wilkins Pi8 Earbuds Review: A Must-Have for Any Music Lover

The Bowers & Wilkins Pi8 are hands-down the best wireless earbuds I’ve listened to this year—and for $400, they amended be. These premium earbuds are compact and durable, with each the bully looks and comfortableness 1 expects from a flagship product. The companion app is casual to use, and the buds person beardown ANC.

But the Pi8’s assertion to fame perfectly lives successful its reference-grade dependable quality. No substance what you’re listening to, it volition dependable fantastic – adjacent podcasts. The highs, mids, and lows are well-balanced with a spacious soundstage. The earbuds are a must-have for the audiophile successful your life.

That’s not to accidental that the Pi8 is without its flaws. The telephone prime could beryllium better, and the artillery beingness isn’t arsenic agelong arsenic that of its competitors. But if you’re looking for earbuds designed to fto you perceive euphony the mode euphony producers and dependable engineers do, the Bowers & Wilkins Pi8 earbuds marque it happen.

Bowers & Wilkins Pi8: Design and Fit

Despite its charging lawsuit (1.6 ounces, 2.6 x 1.1 x 2 inches), which is simply a spot larger than different premium earbuds, the Pi8 earbuds are connected the tiny side. At 0.24 ounces, they are astir arsenic airy arsenic immoderate of my all-time favorites, the Sony WF-1000XM5 (0.21 ounces), and astir arsenic compact.

©Photo: Sherri L. Smith/DreamSmith LLC

The Pi8 is simply a beauteous brace of earbuds mixing glossy and matte plastics with a bladed vent separating the two. The tops of the Pi8 are shiny and person Bowers & Wilkins successful the center, portion the remainder of the lodging is matte achromatic with 4 gold-colored connectors, a sensor, and a mic vent. It ends with 1 of the smallest silicone receptor tips I’ve seen. Bowers & Wilkins packages 3 further tips to guarantee a due fit. My reappraisal brace of the Pi8 came successful Anthracite Black, which is lovely, but man, I privation I got either the Jade Green oregon Midnight Blue editions, arsenic they look stunning. And for fans of achromatic gadgets, the earbuds are besides disposable successful Dove White.

The Pi8 aren’t conscionable pretty, they’ve got a spot of durability built successful with an IP54 rating, which means the earbuds person ingress extortion against particulate and water. And by water, I mean airy sprays oregon possibly immoderate sweat. Don’t spell dunking these successful water; you’ll beryllium bittersweet and $400 poorer. The Pi8 is much durable than the XM5, which is lone rated IP4 (light h2o sprays).

©Photo: Charles Anthony Davis/DreamSmith LLC

Back to the charging case. Like the earbuds, the Pi8’s lawsuit is made of matte Anthracite Black integrative with a heavy set stamped with Bowers & Wilkins. A presumption airy sits straight below. A USB-C charging larboard is straight astatine the bottommost of the case. The lawsuit eclipses the XM5, which weighs 1.4 ounces and measures 2.5 x 1.8 x 1.04 inches.

With my weird, tiny ears, I ne'er thought I’d spot the time I’d person to swap retired receptor tips for larger ones, but present we are. The Pi8 ships with the other tiny receptor tips connected default. They were excessively small, forcing maine to displacement to the tiny tips. From there, I was golden. The seal was unafraid capable that I tackled the beast, my elliptical machine, and they stayed put. I ended up comfortably wearing the Pi8 for six hours straight.

Bowers & Wilkins Pi8: Controls

Unlike different flagship earbuds, the Pi8 has conscionable a fewer pat controls to learn. Play/pause and answering calls are performed by a speedy azygous pat portion skipping guardant connected a track, and ending a telephone requires a treble tap. You request to property and clasp the close bud to entree the dependable assistant. To power betwixt Passthrough and ANC, property and clasp the near bud.

©Photo: Charles Anthony Davis/DreamSmith LLC

My lone gripe is that you indispensable usage the app for the archetypal pairing. Once the escaped Music|Bowers & Wilkins app is installed, you request to clasp either bud for 3 seconds. It’s a tiny quibble, but sometimes folks privation to dive into listening alternatively of dealing with a companion app. But arsenic acold arsenic companion apps go, this isn’t a atrocious one.

The interface is clean, with an adjustable equalizer with a Passthrough and progressive noise-cancelling modes. The app besides lets you aggregate respective streaming services, including Tidal, Deezer, Pandora, TuneIn, NTS, and Soundcloud, granting entree and power to the services via the app. You tin besides get a two-month escaped proceedings of Qobuz. Although it would beryllium bully to person a find my buds diagnostic for specified an costly brace of earbuds, Bowers & Wilkins volition regenerate mislaid buds if 1 goes missing.

Photo: Bowers & Wilkins

Regarding connectivity, the Bluetooth 5.4-compatible earbuds besides person multipoint capabilities and tin link with 2 abstracted devices.

Bowers & Wilkins Pi8: ANC

Bowers & Wilkins integrated 3 microphones into each earbud. Two of the mics are designed to cancel retired ambient noise, portion the remaining 1 is determination to amplify dependable for conversation. Combined with a bully seal, the mics tin instrumentality immoderate almighty progressive sound cancellation. Is it arsenic bully arsenic the Bose QuietComfort Buds oregon the Sony WF-1000XM5? No, but the Pi8’s ANC inactive does a bang-up occupation of keeping the sound of New York City astatine bay.

©Photo: Sherri L. Smith/DreamSmith LLC

I walked astir my vicinity with ANC enabled. I could perceive astir of the conversations astir maine without immoderate euphony playing, conscionable astatine a muted volume. And erstwhile the bid passed overhead, I heard each crick, crack, and bump. Turning connected the euphony instantly drowned retired immoderate extracurricular NYC din. Back home, the Pi8’s ANC could lone drown retired my tv if the measurement was acceptable to four. Compare that to the XM5 (volume 6) and the QC Ultra (volume 7). Overall, you tin usage the Pi8’s ANC to dull sound alternatively than wholly mute ambient noise. However, determination are precise fewer earbuds that tin assertion that feat.

The Pi8 has a passthrough mode for letting the extracurricular satellite in. This is useful erstwhile exercising outdoors oregon erstwhile you privation to enactment up of your surroundings.

Bowers & Wilkins Pi8 Review: Performance

Reference earbuds? Whew, Bowers & Wilkins, that’s a large claim. The institution says that portion it’s improbable a workplace technologist would drawback a brace of wireless buds to maestro work. However, these earbuds bring the astir close show Bowers & Wilkins tin compression from a wireless device. That means fans of enhanced bass and treble request not apply. I similar a level tuning arsenic it lends itself amended to skipping genres astatine will. And since I support my playlists connected shuffle, these earbuds were seemingly made for me.

©Photo: Sherri L. Smith/DreamSmith LLC

So, however does Bowers & Wilkins bash it? The reply lies successful the cone drivers. The institution has created mini versions of its c cone drivers, typically successful loudspeakers oregon headphones. The Carbon Cone thrust portion is stiffer and truthful behaves much accurately astatine higher frequencies due to the fact that it doesn’t crook arsenic overmuch arsenic a accepted cone would. Plus, with its lightness the cone operator tin respond faster to dynamic changes successful your euphony resulting successful a much almighty and realistic sound. I rapidly learned that the resulting 12mm c cone drivers are impressive, offering a warm, balanced show careless of genre. As with each my testing, I utilized Tidal with Hi-Fi and Master prime tracks.

To footwear things off, I started with Jamirquoi’s “Time Won’t Wait” and was instantly grooving to robust bass, a lively guitar, silky horns, and perky percussion. The soundstage is spacious, with everything having its space, adjacent the spacey dependable effects that ringing retired occasionally. Best of all, I didn’t request to propulsion the measurement higher than 50-60%, depending connected the environment, to execute a full shutout of New York City.

The vocals connected Doechii’s “ALLIGATOR BITES NEVER HEAL” sounded downright ethereal, the lilting soprano balanced by a spunky alto and a fervent tenor. And I person to say, I was truthful taken with however Snoh Aalegra’s “DO 4 LOVE” that I listened to the way 4 times earlier I fto it go. The strings sounded truthful full, gathering into a gorgeous crescendo that gives mode to a forward-facing keyboard and a strong, plaintive vocal backed with beauteous choral backgrounds. These are easy 1 of the champion wireless earbuds I’ve listened to this year.

Bowers & Wilkins Pi8 Review: Call Quality

While the Pi8 earbuds excel successful euphony and podcast audio quality, their telephone prime needs improvement. I called respective radical with the buds and adjacent participated successful a fewer video conferences. However, retired of 3 calls and 2 video conferences, lone 1 produced bully results. My callers rapidly remarked that I sounded muffled successful each the different calls and conferences.

It was my large complaint, arsenic I sometimes had to strain to perceive radical clearly. However, aft a bundle update, I got amended results, but not much.

Bowers & Wilkins Pi8 Review: Battery Life

Bowers & Wilkins estimation the Pi8 volition past 6.5 hours with ANC enabled. The institution doesn’t database an estimation for utilizing the earbuds sans ANC. However, I deed 8 hours without sound canceling. The charging lawsuit brings an further 13.5 hours of artillery beingness to the mix, bringing full artillery beingness to 19.5 hours with ANC and 21.5 hours without. As a staunch protagonist of progressive sound canceling, I squeezed 6 hours and 35 minutes retired of the Pi8 streaming music, watching episodes of “Invincible Fight Girl,” and taking calls earlier I got the low-battery warning.

That’s not excessively shabby, but it can’t lucifer the WF-1000XM5’s staying power, which lasts 8 hours with ANC enabled and 12 hours without. The charging lawsuit adds different 24 hours, for a full of 32 hours of ANC and 36 hours without sound canceling.

Bowers & Wilkins Pi8 Review: Verdict

The Bowers & Wilkins Pi8 has flaws – mediocre telephone quality, deficiency of find my buds feature, and good, but not great, progressive sound cancellation. But the Pi8 has fewer rivals with its reference-grade drivers for stellar philharmonic audio quality. Plus, they’re durable, compact, and sleek-looking, precisely what you’d expect from a brace of flagship earbuds. As a reviewer, I tin accidental that these volition beryllium my main earbuds for astatine slightest the archetypal 4th of 2025. It’s up to the different flagships to marque maine enactment them down.