Anker SoundCore Space NC Wireless
HEADPHONES REVIEW

The Anker Space NC are great-looking headphones. The back of the ear cups are touch-sensitive surfaces covered by faux leather, which gives them a premium feel at touch. However, the headphones aren’t really made out of metal, but dense plastic that has a shiny metallic finish.

The SoundCore Space NC are comfortable, and you’ll be able to wear these for a while before feeling any ear fatigue. The headband and the ear cups have thick padding, which is a bit stiff but should soften up with time. The headphones are fairly lightweight and apply a good pressure on your head. They might be a bit too tight for people with larger heads, and the cups might be a bit small for larger ears.

The SoundCore Space NC have touch-sensitive controls on the right ear cup and some additional physical buttons. You get play/pause, volume control, and track skipping on the touch-sensitive surface. You can manage calls on a physical button and have a noise canceling switch. You can also access your device’s voice assistant by holding the call button.

For the volume, you can swipe up or down and keep your finger on the surface at the end of the movement to register the same command again. This means you can go from no volume to max volume with a single swipe. The physical buttons offer great feedback, but you might cover the LED indicator when powering on/off the headphones. Also, you need to be slow and precise with the touch-sensitive area. A quick press or swipe won’t necessarily register, so be sure to put enough pressure on the pad.

Like most over-ears, the SoundCore Space NC are not the most breathable headphones. They trap heat under the ear cups, and some may feel a difference in temperature after a long listening session. These won't be a good option for working out, since you'll sweat a bit more than usual.

Like most over-ears, the SoundCore Space NC are not very portable headphones. However, their cups swivel, making it easy to slide inside a bag or to wear around your neck. Also, they fold into a more compact format and fit inside their great hard case, which doesn’t add too much bulk.

The case of the Anker SoundCore Space NC is great. It is a hard case that protects the headphones well against scratches, water exposure, and impact. The interior of the case is molded to fit the headphones perfectly and gets rid of any wiggling room. The headphones lay flat in the case, and the drivers are also protected.

These headphones have a surprisingly good build quality for their affordable price point. The ear cups feel dense enough to survive a few accidental drops without breaking, and the headband is mostly made out of metal. Unfortunately, the cups aren’t made of metal and are only plastic with a shiny metallic finish. The weakest point of the headphones seem to be the hinges that hold the ear cups, as they feel a bit thinner than the rest of the build.

The SoundCore Space are fairly stable headphones due to their good clamping force. You should be able to jog with these, but their bulky design might not be ideal for more intense physical activities. Their lightweight design doesn’t fall off when tilting the head forward or backward, and since they are wireless, you won’t have to worry about a cable getting hooked on something.

These headphones can be used passively and come with a 4-foot 1/8” TRRS right angle audio cable. The connection going into the headphones is 1/8” TRS. They also come with a micro-USB charging cable.

The bass of the SoundCore Space NC is mediocre. Their LFE (low-frequency extension) is at 10Hz, which is excellent. However, low-bass is overemphasized by about 9dB which will result in excess thump and rumble. Mid-bass, responsible for bass guitars and kick drums, is also overemphasized by about 6dB. High-bass, responsible for warmth, will be slightly boomy due to the 2dB overemphasis. If you'd like a less hyped bass but still want to feel the thump and rumble of it, take a look at the Plantronics Backbeat Go 810.

The mid-range performance of the SoundCore Space is above-average. The whole range is fairly even, but is noticeably under our target curve by 4dB. Vocals and lead instruments will sound rather thin, and since mid-mid is also recessed, they will be pushed to the back of the mix.

The Anker Space NC have mediocre treble performance. The range is flat before 4kHz but gets underemphasized and uneven after. This results in sharp S and T sounds (sibilances) to lack detail and brightness. This will be most noticeable on vocals, instruments, and cymbals.

The frequency response consistency is very good. They seem to be using their noise canceling system to check for bass consistency. Therefore, in the bass range, they perform extremely consistently across our five human subjects. In the treble range, they are decently consistent, but not as much as the bass range, showing a maximum deviation of about 6dB under 10kHz. This results in a consistent delivery of bass and treble across multiple users and re-seats.

Their imaging performance is good. Weighted group delay is at 0.27, which is very good, but the GD graph shows that the response crosses the audibility threshold around 30Hz, but this shouldn’t be too audible. Additionally, the L/R drivers of our test unit were well-matched in frequency and phase response but had a bit of mismatch in amplitude. This is important for the accurate localization and placement of objects (like voice, instruments, and video game effects) in the stereo field. However, these results are only valid for our unit, and yours may perform differently.

The SoundCore Space NC have a sub-par soundstage. The PRTF graph shows a decent amount of pinna activation. However, the interaction is not accurate, and there's not a 10kHz notch present either. This and their closed-back design suggest a soundstage that is perceived to be located inside the listener's head, as opposed to in front of it.

The total harmonic distortion performance of the Space NC is decent. The graph shows that the right ear cup produces more distortion, which correlates with the small phase and group delay mismatch, especially in the bass range. THD is elevated, and the peaks around 4-5KHz could make these frequencies sound harsh and impure.

The Anker SoundCore Space have a good isolation performance. With the ANC (active noise cancelation) enabled, they achieve more than 18dB of isolation in the bass range, which is quite good. This means they can cancel out the rumble of airplane and bus engines to a good degree. In the mid-range, important for blocking out ambient speech, they isolate by 18dB, which is also very good. In the treble range, occupied by sharp sounds like S and Ts and fan noises like A/C systems, they isolate by 36dB, which is good. They isolate quite more than the Anker Soundcore Life 2, but don't have their good audio reproduction.

The leakage performance of the SoundCore Space NC is good. The significant portion of leakage sits between 1kHz and 5kHz, which is a relatively narrow range. This results in a leakage that sounds fuller and more comprehensible than the leakage of in-ears and earbuds, but not as much as open-back headphones. However, the overall level of leakage is not too loud. With the music at 100dB SPL, the leakage at 1 foot away averages at 33dB SPL and peaks at 50dB SPL, which is just about the noise floor of most offices.

The Anker Space NC’s integrated mic has an above-average recording quality. The LFE of 281Hz results in recorded/transmitted speech that is relatively thin. The HFE of 3.7kHz suggests a speech that lacks detail. Overall, the intelligibility of speech on this microphone will be decent since it depends on the 500Hz-3kHz range.

The noise handling performance of the integrated microphone is mediocre. The mic achieved a speech-to-noise ratio of 14dB, meaning they will have a hard time transmitting clean and noise-free speech even in environments that are moderately loud.

The SoundCore Space NC have a great 21-hour rechargeable battery life but take about 3 hours to charge fully. We couldn’t really find what was the real advertised battery life, since Anker shows 12hrs, 20hrs, and 25hrs on the product page and specs sheet. They also say you can get 50 hours of continuous playback if you use the ANC feature when the headphones are wired, but we couldn’t confirm this. You can use the headphones with an audio cable, even when the battery is dead. However, when you plug the audio cable, be sure to turn off ANC if you want to save battery life, as the headphones will automatically be turned on and use the ANC feature. Note that if you are charging the headphones and plug in the audio cable, you’ll have passive playback, but as soon as you connect the cable, they stop charging.

Anker doesn’t have an application to enhance your listening experience with customization options.

These headphones are Bluetooth compatible but don’t support NFC for quick and easy pairing, and they can’t be connected to 2 devices simultaneously, which would have been useful at the office to switch between your phone and work computer. Unfortunately, these are not Bluetooth 5.0 headphones so if you have a 5.0 source then you may get a slightly better wireless range performance with the Cowin SE7 (see our recommendations for the best wireless over-ear headphones).

You can use the headphones with the included 1/8” TRRS audio cable. It also has an in-line microphone that will be supported by PCs and console. You can also use them passively even if the battery is dead. If there’s still power, you can use the ANC feature while being wired too. If your ANC switch is on when you plug the audio cable, the headphones will automatically turn on.

These headphones do not have a base/dock. If you’re looking for headphones with one, we suggest the SteelSeries Arctis Pro Wireless.

The Anker Space have excellent wireless range. With 53ft of distance when the source was obstructed by walls, you should be able to walk around a small office or go to your next-door room without too much problems. You should get any audio cuts if you keep your source close or on you. However, the wireless range is dependent on your device’s signal strength, so your experience may vary.

With 154ms of delay, the SoundCore Space NC have better performance than the average Bluetooth headphones, which usually get 200-220ms of latency. Their number might still be a bit high for watching video content and gaming, but some devices and apps offer some sort of compensation, so you might not notice the delay as much.