The Bose Sport Open Earbuds are open-ear headphones designed for outdoor sports. They have a stable fit and sit outside of your ears so you can still hear ambient sound around you while running outdoors. However, this design makes them less versatile than other sports-oriented headphones like the Bose Sport Earbuds Truly Wireless. They can't block out any background noise and they leak a lot of audio. They also lack a lot of bass and don't have any customization features. While their 9.5-hour battery life should be enough to last through a commute, their carrying case doesn't offer any additional charges.
The Bose Sport Open Earbuds are mediocre for neutral sound. While they have a flat and balanced mid-range, they lack a lot of low-bass. Unfortunately, they don't have any sound enhancement features to help tweak their sound to your liking. Their design doesn't really produce a wide or natural soundstage, either. That said, they can reproduce bass and treble consistently.
The Bose Open Earbuds are sub-par for commute and travel. While they're portable, they won't isolate you from any of the rumble of bus engines or ambient chatter, and they also leak a lot of audio. Even though they're comfortable, you won't be able to wear them while also wearing glasses or a mask. On the upside, their 9.5-hour battery life should last through a long commute.
The Bose Sport Open Earbuds are great for sports and fitness. They have an open-ear fit so you can hear ambient noise around you while running or working out outdoors. They also have a stable fit, although they can put some pressure behind your ears and their design isn't the most malleable. They also have an IPX4 rating for water resistance, although we don't currently test this.
The Bose Sport Open Earbuds are disappointing for office use. They don't isolate noise by design, so you hear everything that goes on in the office, and they leak a lot of audio. They're decently comfortable but unfortunately, you won't be able to wear them while also wearing glasses or a mask. On the upside, their 9.5-hour battery life should be enough to last you through your 9-5 workday.
The Bose Open Earbuds are compatible with Bluetooth-enabled PCs, but their latency is likely too high to be suitable for wireless gaming. They aren't compatible with Xbox One or PS4 consoles.
The Bose Open Earbuds are wireless-only, so they aren't suitable for wired gaming.
The Bose Sport Open Earbuds are middling for phone calls. Their integrated mic captures your voice clearly, although it struggles to separate speech from ambient noise around you. Since these headphones don't really cover your ears, they also don't block out any noise around you, so it may be harder to focus on your conversation.
The Bose Sport Open Earbuds come in one color variant: 'Triple Black'. You can see our model's label here. If you come across another variant of these headphones, please let us know in the discussions and we'll update our review.
The Bose Sport Open Earbuds are open-back, open-ear headphones designed for sports and fitness. Unlike the Bose Sport Earbuds Truly Wireless or the Bose SoundSport Free Truly Wireless, they sit slightly outside of your ear to give you better spatial awareness while outdoors. However, due to this design, they may not be comfortable for all users and they lack a bit of low-bass. While they have a carrying case, it doesn't hold any extra charges, which can be a little limiting. Check out our recommendations for the best headphones for running, the best open-back headphones, and the best Bose headphones.
The Bose Sport Earbuds Truly Wireless are more versatile headphones than the Bose Sport Open Earbuds Truly Wireless. While both headphones are designed for sports, the Sport Earbuds are more comfortable and stable. They have a better-balanced sound profile and their carrying case holds two additional charges, which is nice. However, the Sport Open have a completely open-ear design that allows you to hear more ambient noise around you, which make them even more suitable for running outdoors.
The AfterShokz Aeropex Bone Conduction and the Bose Sport Open Earbuds are both headphones designed for outdoor use. The AfterShokz have a bone conduction transducer that uses vibrations on your temples to produce audio, and they don't go into your ear at all, which helps keep you aware of your surroundings. They're more comfortable, have a longer continuous battery life, and support multi-device pairing. However, the Bose sit outside of your ear, also leaving it completely open so that you can hear what's going on around you. They're more comfortable, better-built, stable, and have a more neutral sound profile.
The Bose Sport Open Earbuds Truly Wireless are better for sports than the Sony LinkBuds Truly Wireless. They have a significantly more comfortable, stable fit and better build quality. They reproduce a bit more bass and have longer continuous battery life. On the other hand, the Sony headphones have a smaller design that you may prefer if you can get a good fit. They also come with sound customization features and a case that holds extra charges, unlike the Bose.
The Bose Sport Open Earbuds are better for outdoor sports and fitness, while the Apple AirPods (2nd generation) Truly Wireless offer a more versatile overall performance. The Bose are more stable and don't cover your ear, so you can stay aware of your surroundings. They also have more consistent audio reproduction. However, the Apple are more comfortable, have five additional charges in their carrying case, and have an H1 chip so that you can seamlessly pair them with your Apple devices. Their sound profile is better-balanced, too.
The Bose SoundSport Free Truly Wireless and the Bose Sport Open Earbuds Truly Wireless are both well-suited for sports and depending on your preferences, you may favor one over the other. The SoundSport Free are more comfortable, have a better-balanced sound profile, and leak less audio. Their carrying case also holds two additional charges. However, the Bose Sport Open is designed for outdoor running, which some users may prefer, as they don't go inside your ear. They also have longer-lasting continuous battery life.
The Bose Sport Open Earbuds Truly Wireless are better open-ear sports headphones than the Sony Float Run Wireless. The Bose are slightly more stable and comfortable for long runs and workouts. They also have a better-performing mic than the Sony headphones and are more portable. However, despite being less stable, the Sony headphones have better frequency response consistency. This means that you won't have to constantly adjust them during your workout to get a consistent level of audio delivery. The Bose headphones have a similar outer-ear build but require more adjustment to get the right fit.
The Bose Open Earbuds are decently comfortable. Once you're placed them correctly, you don't really feel them and they don't move around too much. That said, you won't be able to wear them if you're already wearing glasses or have a mask on. They're also quite big, can put pressure behind your ear, and don't have a very malleable design, so people who have bigger earlobes may find them a bit more tricky to wear.
The Bose Sport Open Earbuds have alright controls. The right earbud has most of the controls. Using the button, you can play or pause audio with one press, skip a track forward with two presses, skip a track backward with three presses, and a long press turns them on, off, or accesses pairing mode. You can also slow tap the touch-sensitive surface to raise the volume. The left bud allows you to check the battery level with one press of its button, activate voice assistant with a long press, and lower the volume by slow tapping the touch surface. Both touch surfaces are responsive and you can also turn them off if it bothers you. The buttons are responsive, and there are voice prompts when connected, as well as a battery level when powered on.
The Bose Sport Open Earbuds aren't very malleable, so we can't properly test them using our rig. However, as their design doesn't really cover the ear, we don't expect them to trap heat and their average temperature difference should be negligible.
The Bose Sport Open Earbuds have a good case. It's made of plastic with a fabric inner covering. It has a magnet to keep it closed. However, the case won't turn off or recharge the headphones, so you need to remember to turn them off before putting them in their case.
As the Bose Open Earbuds sit outside of the ear canal and they have an open-back design, they really struggle to reproduce low-bass, so genres like EDM and hip-hop lack thump and rumble. That said, they have a neutral mid-range, which helps vocal-centric content sound clear and accurate. Unfortunately, they lack any sound customization features to help tweak their sound.
The Bose Sport Open Earbuds have bad bass accuracy. They're lacking a lot of low-bass, which is due to their open-back, open-ear design which sits away from your ear canal. Their mid-bass is also underemphasized, so your mixes lack punch and body. However, the high-bass adds boom, although some users may find it a bit muddy.
These headphones have good treble accuracy. The low-treble is even and slightly overemphasized, resulting in detailed and present vocals and lead instruments. The mid-treble is a little underemphasized, though, so sibilants like cymbals are dull and lispy.
The peaks and dips performance is disappointing. There's a dip in the low-bass, so your mixes lack thump and rumble. The peak in the high-bass adds intense boom, which can muddy your mix. Another peak in the low-treble adds some detail to vocals and lead instruments while a dip in the mid-treble weakens sibilants.
The Bose Open Earbuds have poor imaging. There are a few large peaks in their group delay response, indicating loose bass. The treble range falls under the audibility threshold though, ensuring transparent treble. While the left and right drivers are well-matched in amplitude, they're mismatched in frequency and phase response, so objects like footsteps may not be accurately placed within the stereo image. However, these results are only valid for our unit, and your experience may vary.
The headphones have a poor passive soundstage. Since they sit outside of your ear canal, they're somewhat able to interact with your outer ear, which helps their soundstage seem a bit more open. However, it won't sound very natural.
The Bose Sport Open Earbuds have an alright weight harmonic distortion performance. There are a few peaks across the range at a normal listening volume, but it's very minor and can be hard to hear with real-life content. At a high volume, the range falls within good limits, resulting in clean and pure audio reproduction.
These are the settings used to test these headphones. Our results are only valid when using them in this configuration.
The noise isolation performance is bad, but that's to be expected for open-ear headphones. They don't really cover the ear, as this design allows you to stay aware of your surroundings while you run outdoors. Due to this, you can easily hear the rumble of bus engines, ambient chatter, and the hum of an AC unit.
The Bose Open Earbuds have a sub-par leakage performance. Since they don't go inside your ears, they leak a lot of audio, especially in the treble range. Although escaping audio sounds thin, if you're listening to audio at a high volume in a somewhat noisy environment like an office, people around you can hear it.
The Bose Sport Open Earbuds have mediocre noise handling. The integrated mic struggles to separate your voice from even moderately noisy environments like a busy street.
The Bose Open Earbuds have satisfactory battery performance. They're advertised as having 8 hours of playback time with a two-hour charging period. While we measured about 9.5 hours of continuous battery life with a recharge time of just over an hour, battery performance can vary according to usage, so your experience may vary. If you're looking to save battery life, they have an auto-off timer that can be set within their companion app.
The Bose Music app is decent. It's pretty basic and it allows you to check the battery level, update the headphones, turn on or off the touch surface volume controls, and adjust the auto-off timer. You can also access a guide on how to use the headphones and see all known devices. However, this app lacks sound enhancement features. If you want more customizable open-ear headphones, try the Sony LinkBuds Truly Wireless.
The Bose Sport Open have alright Bluetooth connectivity. They don't support multi-device or NFC pairing, and their latency on PC is likely too high to be suitable for gaming or streaming video. Their latency on iOS and Android devices is much lower, though. That said, some devices and apps compensate for latency, so your experience may vary.
These headphones come with a proprietary charging cradle, which can be annoying if you forget it somewhere but need to charge them up. It doesn't hold any charges or have any inputs.