Anker Soundcore Liberty 3 Pro Truly Wireless  Headphones Review

The Anker Liberty 3 Pro have a similar oval-shaped design to their predecessor, the Anker Soundcore Liberty 2 Pro Truly Wireless. They're mostly made of sleek plastic and look somewhat non-descript, although they stick out of your ears quite a bit. They come in four color variants if you prefer a different look: 'Midnight Black', 'Frost White', 'Dusk Purple', and 'Fog Gray'.

The Anker Liberty 3 Pro have a comfortable fit. They're lightweight, comfortable, and come with four different kinds of silicone ear tips and stability fins so that you can get a good fit. However, the buds stick out of your ears quite a bit.

Update 03/15/2022: We originally reported that these headphones didn't have volume controls. However, this was a mistake, and we've changed 'Volume Control' from 'No' to 'Yes'.

The Anker Liberty 3 Pro have good controls. They have a touch-sensitive surface on each bud, but the controls aren't the most intuitive out of the box. They can't skip to the previous track. That said, once you get used to the layout, it's easy to use, and there are beeps to confirm your touch commands. You can also turn off this feedback in the companion app if you prefer or remap the controls to fit your preferences.

On the left ear:

• Single tap: Lowers the volume.
• Double tap: Skips to the next track.

On the right ear:

• Single tap: Raises the volume.
• Double tap: Plays and pauses audio.

On either earbud:

• Double tap: Answers or ends calls.
• Press and hold for one second: Declines a call.
• Press and hold for two seconds: Cycles between ANC on or transparency mode, which allows you to better-hear your surroundings without pausing your audio. While you can't turn the ANC off with the controls, you can turn it off using their companion app.

Using one earbud:

• Double tap: Plays and pauses audio. Also answers and ends calls.
• Press and hold for one second: Activates voice assistant. Also declines calls.

The Anker Liberty 3 Pro are exceptionally portable, which is to be expected from in-ear headphones. They're small and can easily fit into most pockets or bags without an issue.

The Anker Soundcore Liberty 3 Pro's case is great. It's made of plastic, and there are three LED lights to indicate battery life. There's also a button on the back of the case in order to enter pairing mode. However, depending on how the silicone fins are placed on the buds, the case may not close or open properly.

The Anker Liberty 3 Pro's build quality is good. They're made of plastic and silicone but feel sturdy. They're also rated IPX4 for protection against splashes of water. They should survive a couple of accidental drops without taking too much damage. However, the case's lid can open if dropped.

The Anker Liberty 3 Pro have great stability. Once you achieve a good fit using the provided stability fins and ear tips, they shouldn't move around your ears, even during more intense physical activity.

• Anker Soundcore Liberty 3 Pro headphones
• 4x tip sizes
• 4x stability fin sizes
• Charging case
• USB-A to USB-C charging cable
• Manuals

The Anker Liberty 3 Pro have a v-shaped sound profile that delivers extra thump, rumble, and boom to mixes. At the same time, vocals and lead instruments are bright and sparkly. If you prefer a different sound, their companion app offers a graphic EQ and presets so that you can adjust their sound to your liking.

The Anker Soundcore Liberty 3 Pro's frequency response consistency is great. Assuming you achieve a good fit using the provided ear tips, you should get a consistent sound each time you use them.

The bass accuracy is satisfactory. It's overemphasized across the range, so mixes have extra thump, rumble, and boom. However, some users may find they sound boomy and muddy.

The Anker Liberty 3 Pro's mid accuracy is excellent. The range is fairly flat and neutral, which results in present and clear vocals and lead instruments. However, a bump in the high-mid can make their upper harmonics sound harsh.

The Anker Soundcore Liberty 3 Pro's treble accuracy is passable. It's overemphasized across the range, resulting in harsh vocals and lead instruments. Sibilants like S and T sounds are also piercing.

The peaks and dips performance is good. The peak in the mid-bass adds a touch of extra warmth to mixes, while a prolonged dip in the low to mid-mid nudges vocals and lead instruments to the back of your mixes. Another peak in the high-mid makes vocals and lead instruments sound a bit harsh, but a dip in the low treble hurts their comprehensibility and veils details. Another peak in the mid-treble makes sibilants like cymbals piercing.

The Anker Liberty 3 Pro's imaging performance is excellent. The group delay falls below the audibility threshold, resulting in tight bass and transparent treble reproduction. Our unit's L/R drivers are also well-matched in amplitude and frequency response, ensuring a balanced and stable stereo image. However, a peak in the phase response's high-mid to low-treble range can cause inaccuracies in the stereo image and can be audible with real-life content. That said, our results are only valid for our unit, and yours may perform differently.

The Anker Soundcore Liberty 3 Pro have a bad passive soundstage, which is to be expected for in-ear headphones. Due to their design, they fully bypass your outer ear, which needs to be activated by sound to produce an out-of-head or speaker-like passive soundstage. As a result, sound seems like it's coming from inside your head, and it isn't very immersive.

These headphones support 3D Surround Sound by Soundcore, which is advertised to give you a more immersive audio experience by enlarging the sound field. You can find this feature in the companion app. However, you can't use this feature while also listening to LDAC content.

The Anker Liberty 3 Pro's weighted harmonic distortion performance is great. All frequencies fall within very good limits, resulting in clear and pure audio reproduction.

These are the settings used to test the Anker Soundcore Liberty 3 Pro. Our results are only valid in this configuration.

The noise isolation performance of the Anker Liberty 3 Pro is great. They have active noise cancelling (ANC) and a feature called 'HearID ANC'. This feature, which you can adjust in the app, allows the headphones to adjust their ANC based on your in-ear pressure. It's advertised to create personalized and optimized noise cancelling. To test this, we put the buds in our test head's ears and played a pink noise to perform the HearID ANC test. Once this test was completed, we manually selected the 'Strong' ANC setting in the app.

Using the HearID ANC calibrated to our dummy head's ears, these headphones can block out the low rumble of bus and plane engines as well as ambient chatter. They also do an outstanding job of cutting down the high-pitched hums of AC units.

The leakage performance of these headphones is outstanding. Even at high volumes, the amount of leakage is quite low, so others around you shouldn't be bothered by your audio if you like to crank it up high.

The recording quality of the Anker Liberty 3 Pro's integrated mic is poor. Your voice sounds full-bodied but thin, dark, and distorted.

The mic's noise handling performance is very good. While the mic lowers the volume of your voice as it reduces background noise, and your voice taps a dip in quality, it's still understandable. If you're taking a call from a busy street, you'll be intelligible.

The Anker Liberty 3 Pro's battery performance is satisfactory. They're advertised to last around eight hours on a single charge, and we measured 5.5 hours, which is a lot less. That said, battery life can vary depending on usage, so your real-world experience may be different. Unlike the Anker Soundcore Liberty 4 True Wireless, their carrying case also holds roughly three additional charges, which is handy in a pinch. They also have an advertised 15-minute quick charge, which is supposed to give three hours of playback time. You can also use one bud while the other one charges and they have an auto-off timer that you can set in their app.

The Anker Liberty 3 Pro have a great companion app with robust features. It offers an 8-band graphic EQ and 20 EQ presets to help you adjust their sound to your liking. This app also allows you to use HearID, which offers personalized noise cancelling depending on in-ear pressure and your environment, or you can select manual mode, which allows you to adjust the amount of noise cancelling. In addition, you can cycle between ANC on, normal, and transparency mode. You can even remap buttons, activate 3D Surround Sound, adjust the auto-off timer, and tweak the tone feedback for controls.

Update 11/25/2021: We originally reported that these headphones use Bluetooth version 5.0 and don't support multi-device pairing. However, they support Bluetooth version 5.2, and they can connect to two devices at once. As a result, we have updated our review, and the scoring of this box has changed.

The Anker Soundcore Liberty 3 Pro have great Bluetooth connectivity. They support LDAC, which is great if you want to listen to Hi-Res audio. However, you can't use it in conjunction with their 3D Surround feature. These headphones also support multi-device pairing. If you get a call on one device, the audio from the other device is automatically paused so that you can answer the call. On the downside, you won't be able to play content from both devices simultaneously, and you need to pause audio on one device to play audio from the other one. LDAC codec is also disabled when you're connected to two devices at once.

These in-ears have very high latency on PC, iOS, and Android, which is disappointing if you like to stream video. If you're looking for earbuds with lower Βluetooth latency, take a look at the Apple AirPods (3rd generation) Truly Wireless. That said, some apps and devices compensate for latency differently, and your real-world experience may vary.

These are Bluetooth-only headphones, and you can't use them wired. They come with a USB-A to USB-C cable for charging their carrying case.

These headphones are fully compatible with Bluetooth-enabled PCs. However, you can't connect them to PCs in any other way.

The Anker Soundcore Liberty 3 Pro come with a carrying case that holds roughly three additional charges. It has a USB-C input so that you can charge it. The case also supports Qi Wireless charging.