Anker Soundcore Life Dot 2 Truly Wireless Headphones Review

The Anker Life Dot 2 are earbuds with angled tips and a flat outside surface. The buds are a bit on the big side and stick out of your ears more than the smaller Samsung Galaxy Buds+ Truly Wireless, but they aren't bulky or cumbersome. They're mostly made of glossy plastic, though the center caps are made of a matte speckled material that adds a bit of contrast. They come in an all-black or all-green design.

The Anker Life Dot 2 are decently comfortable. They enter quite deeply into the ear canal but don’t exert too much pressure, so they shouldn't be too annoying to wear for long periods of time. They come with a pretty broad selection of ear tips and stability sleeves, which helps with finding a comfortable, secure seal. Unfortunately though, using the touch-sensitive controls can push the earbuds further into your ears.

The Anker Life Dot 2 have disappointing controls. They aren't very intuitive and lack some useful functions, like volume controls. You can tap the touch-sensitive surface on either bud to play and pause audio. A one-second press on the right earbud skips the track forward, while the same command on the left earbud skips the track backward. You can also tap either bud to answer a call or reject a call with a one-second press on either bud. A quick double-tap on either earbud activates your phone's voice assistant. While this control scheme can be a bit confusing at first, there are beeps when the earbuds turn on or off and when they pair with a device.

The Anker Life Dot 2 are very breathable, like most in-ear headphones. They don't trap any heat against your ears, and shouldn't make you sweat more during exercise.

The Anker Life Dot 2 are exceptionally portable. They’re small enough to fit into most pockets and each one has a strong magnet inside to keep them together. Their included charging case is a little on the bulky side but easily fits into bags and bigger pockets.

The Anker Life Dot 2 come with a good charging case. It feels solid and looks somewhat premium, with a dense feel and a glossy plastic interior. It's a bit bulky compared to the cases that come with many other truly wireless earbuds, but it's not too heavy considering the big battery inside.

The Anker Life Dot 2 feel well-built. The buds are made of high-grade plastic and are rated IPX5 for water resistance, though we don't test for that currently. Their charging case feels quite sturdy, so it should take a few drops and bumps without sustaining much damage.

The Anker Life Dot 2 have good stability. Once you find a good fit with the selection of ear tips and stability fins provided, they create a pretty tight seal and shouldn’t fall out, even during high-intensity workouts. That said, if you're looking for truly wireless headphones that are even less likely to fall out of your ears, take a look at the SoundPeats TrueFree 2 Wireless.

• Anker Soundcore Life Dot 2 headphones
• Charging case
• 5x ear tips
• 3x stability sleeves
• USB-A to USB-C charging cable
• Quick start guide

The Anker Life Dot 2 have a somewhat bass-rich sound profile. Mixes have extra rumble, punch, and boom, while vocals and lead instruments sound present and clear, although these elements lack a bit of detail because of a dip in the treble range. Unfortunately, they don't come with any sound customization features like an EQ or presets. You may want to take a look at the JBL Tune 125TWS Truly Wireless if you want a pair of truly wireless headphones that have a more neutral sound profile with a bit of extra bass.

The Anker Life Dot 2 have superb frequency response consistency. Once you achieve a good fit with the included tips and stability fins, you should hear a consistent sound each time you use them.

The Anker Life Dot 2 have very good bass accuracy. The whole range is overemphasized but quite flat, so they have some extra rumble, punch, and boom, but it shouldn't be overwhelming or muddy.

The Anker Life Dot 2 have excellent mid accuracy. It’s quite flat across the entire range, so vocals and lead instruments should sound present and accurate. While a small dip in the mid-range nudges vocals slightly toward the back of the mix, this shouldn’t be too noticeable for most listeners.

The Anker Life Dot 2’s treble accuracy is decent. Vocals and instruments should sound reasonably bright and airy, but a dip in the low-treble range veils some finer details.

The Anker Life Dot 2's peaks and dips performance is impressive. There are a few peaks and dips, but most are fairly minor. A peak in the mid-bass gives mixes more body and punch, and a dip in the mid-mid range nudges vocals and lead instruments towards the back of the mix. A bigger dip in the low-treble causes lead instruments and vocals to lose some clarity and detail, while a peak in the mid-treble makes sibilant sounds like cymbals more piercing.

The Anker Life Dot 2 have an impressive imaging performance. The weighted group delay falls beneath the audibility threshold for the entire range, ensuring tight bass and transparent treble reproduction. The L/R drivers are also very well-matched in frequency, amplitude, and phase response, so objects like instruments and voices are accurately placed in the stereo image. That said, these results are only valid for our unit, and yours may perform differently.

The Anker Life Dot 2 have a bad passive soundstage performance, which is normal for in-ear headphones. The design means sound doesn't interact with your outer ear, which is essential for creating an out-of-head, speaker-like soundstage. Instead, sound seems to come from inside your head, and the soundstage seems small and closed-off compared to that of most open-back headphones.

The Anker Life Dot 2 have a good weighted harmonic distortion performance. While some distortion is present at higher frequencies at normal listening volumes, it still falls within acceptable limits and shouldn’t be noticeable overall.

These are the settings used to test these headphones. These results are only valid when using these settings.

The Anker Life Dot 2 do a good job of passively isolating you from ambient noise. Even without active noise cancelling (ANC), they block out more sound than the Anker Soundcore Life A2 NC Truly Wireless in the mid and treble ranges, so you don't have to crank up your music to drown out chatting coworkers or the high-pitched hum of a nearby AC unit. That said, they aren't very effective at blocking out bass-range noise, so they aren't ideal if you want to cut out the low rumble of a bus engine during your commute.

The Anker Life Dot 2 have an exceptional leakage performance. Even if you listen at a high volume, very little sound escapes, so you're unlikely to bother people nearby, even in a quiet room.

The microphone has an okay recording quality. Your voice is relatively clear and natural, but it doesn't sound very full-bodied or detailed. If you're looking for budget-friendly in-ears with a better recording quality, consider the JBL Vibe 100TWS True Wireless.

The Anker Life Dot 2’s microphone struggles to isolate speech from ambient noise. The person on the other end may not be able to hear you if you use them to talk on the phone in a loud place like a subway station.

These headphones have a decent battery performance. They have a continuous battery life of roughly 7.3 hours, although it's much shorter than some other truly wireless earbuds, like the Samsung Galaxy Buds+ Truly Wireless, which last for 13 hours. However, battery performance can vary with real-life usage, so you may have a different experience.

These headphones also come with a case advertised to hold roughly 12.5 additional charges. That brings their total battery life to nearly 100 hours, although we don't test this currently. The earbuds automatically turn off after two minutes when not paired with a device, which can save battery life when they aren't in use. You can also use one bud while the other charges in the case. Anker advertises that a 10-minute charge yields 90 minutes of playback, but we also don’t test for this.

These headphones don’t have a companion app. For similar in-ears that offer a companion app with a graphic EQ, check out the Creative Outlier Air V2 True Wireless.

The Anker Life Dot 2 have alright Bluetooth compatibility but don't have a lot of extra features. They don't support multi-device or NFC pairing. Their latency with PCs as well as iOS and Android devices is likely too high for mobile gaming or streaming video without noticeable audio lag. However, some apps seem to compensate for latency, so you may have a different experience.

These truly wireless earbuds can't be used wired. They only come with a USB-C to USB-A charging cable for their case.

These earbuds are compatible with Bluetooth-enabled PCs, but their latency is a bit too high to game or stream video without a noticeable delay.

The Anker Life Dot 2 come with a case advertised to hold enough charge for almost 100 hours of continuous playback, although we don't currently test that. You can charge it with the included USB-C to USB-A cable. It doesn't support wireless charging.