Focal Bathys Wireless Headphones Review

The Focal Bathys look quite similar in design to other Focal headphones like the Focal Celestee. However, if you have trypophobia (or a fear of holes), you'll want to avoid looking too closely at them. They have aluminum ear cups with a circular cut-out design. In the middle of the ear cup is the manufacturer's logo, which has a white backlight when using the DAC mode. They only come in one color variant: 'Black/Grey'.

These headphones are comfortable. They're not as heavy as other Focal headphones like the Focal Clear Mg, and have soft padding, which feels good against the skin. This ensures you can wear them for long periods without causing a lot of fatigue. They clamp tightly on your head, and if you wear glasses or have a larger head, you'll experience more pressure from the headphones.

The controls are good. They have physical buttons on both ear cups that are easy to use. There are different chimes to let you know when you've registered a command, and there's also a tone when you reach max volume. However, you can't hear the max volume chime if you're already listening to music. That said, it's hard to tell the difference between chimes when switching between ANC modes. There are also no voice prompts when using the controls via USB-DAC mode.

On the left ear cup:

• ANC/Transparency button: Cycles between 'Silent' (ANC on), 'Soft' (ANC at moderate strength), and 'Transparency' (transparency mode) when held for two seconds, so you can hear your surroundings without taking off your headphones.

On the right ear cup:

• '+' and '-' buttons: Adjusts the volume.
• Voice assistant button: Activates your device's voice assistant.

Multi-function button:

• Single press: Plays and pauses audio.
• Double press: Skips to the next track.
• Triple press: Skips to the previous track.
• Press and hold: Enters Bluetooth pairing.

Switch

• Slide left or right: Moves between off, DAC (USB audio or only ANC), and on (analog or Bluetooth) modes.

The Focal Bathys aren't very portable. Although the ear cups can swivel to lay flat, you can't fold them into a more compact form.

They come with a great carrying case. It's smaller than other Focal cases, which helps make them a bit more portable, although it doesn't feel as premium. The case also feels sturdy and will protect the headphones from water and impact damage. Inside the case is a storage space and a mesh pocket to securely place the cables.

These headphones have great build quality. Although they look cheaper than other Focal headphones like the Focal Clear Mg or Focal Celestee due to their more plasticky ear cup housing, a few of their design choices reflect their premium build. What aligns them with their audiophile counterparts is that their aluminum-magnesium dynamic drivers are made in France, even though the headphones are made in China. There's leather padding on the ear cups and on top of the headband. The headband is also reinforced with metal and has a soft fabric bottom that's well-padded. Each ear cup has a mesh vent and the Focal centerpiece lights up when connected via DAC.

These over-ears have decent stability. If you're casually listening to music, they won't move around much. That said, if you like to headbang to your favorite tunes, they can fall off if you're not careful.

• Focal Bathys headphones
• 1/8" to 1/8" TRS audio cable
• USB-C to USB-C cable
• Hard case
• Manuals

Using them via Bluetooth, the Focal Bathys have a bass-rich sound profile. They deliver extra boom, punch, and warmth to mixes. That said, vocals and instruments are nudged a bit back in the mix and sound veiled. Sibilants like cymbals are also dull. Luckily, if you prefer a different sound, you can adjust them to your liking using their companion app's graphic EQ and presets to your liking.

You can also use these headphones wired via 'DAC' mode. Many users have reported that this connection results in the best audio quality. You can see a comparison between the Bluetooth, DAC, and analog frequency responses here. Overall, there isn't a difference in measured frequency responses between the different modes. However, one of the notable changes is in volume. The DAC connection delivers a higher volume than Bluetooth. Before firmware update 1.4.2, the headphones would automatically default to 100% volume on PCs when switching to DAC mode, which is very, very loud. It seems like this issue was fixed with this firmware update, but if you encounter it, please let us know in the discussions. In addition, we also experienced a small rattling sound coming from the right driver when connected via analog. It was only audible when using this connection and with low to no audio content playing. This issue could be limited to our unit, though.

The Focal Bathys' frequency response consistency is great. They deliver bass very consistently but are more prone to deviations in treble delivery due to positioning and fit. Once you get a good fit, you'll achieve more consistent audio delivery.

The bass accuracy is outstanding. The range is very flat and neutral, resulting in accurate thump, punch, and boom. Songs with a rumbly bassline, like 2020 by SUUNS, sound full-bodied and warm.

These headphones have decent mid accuracy. The low-mid is pretty flat and neutral, which ensures that vocals and instruments are present. The mid to high-mid are underemphasized, pushing vocals and instruments to the back of the mix and weakening them.

The Focal Bathys' treble accuracy is sub-par. The whole range is underemphasized, veiling vocals and instruments and hurting their detail. Sibilants like S and T sounds are also dull.

The peaks and dips performance via Bluetooth is satisfactory. The bass range is pretty flat, indicating there isn't much deviation from the sound profile in this range. A small bump in the low-mid slightly muddies vocals and instruments, while a dip in the mid-mid pushes them to the back of the mix. There's another peak in the high-mid, which makes vocals and instruments sound harsh, but the uneven low-treble both veils and brightens these sounds. The low-treble is also very uneven, so sibilants like hi-hats are lispy and piercing.

If you switch to the USB-DAC mode, you can expect similar peaks and dips performance. However, there's a slight mismatch between the left and the right drivers in the Bluetooth's high-mid, which shifts to the DAC's low-treble range and is a bit more noticeable. The right driver is more emphasized, making vocals and instruments harsher than the fairly neutral left driver. However, the rest of the DAC's peaks and dips response is largely the same as the Bluetooth response.

The Focal Bathys have outstanding imaging via Bluetooth, which isn't surprising. This manufacturer is known for their driver's craftsmanship, and most of the products we've tested from them have well-matched drivers. Our unit is no exception, and the L/R drivers are matched in group delay, ensuring tight bass and transparent treble. They're also well-matched in phase, amplitude, and frequency response, which results in the accurate placement of objects like voices in the stereo image. Even if you switch to the USB-DAC mode, you can expect imaging to perform similarly compared to Bluetooth.

The passive soundstage performance via Bluetooth is poor. Since they have a closed-back design, their soundstage doesn't feel very open or spacious. It also feels wide but a bit unnatural. Sound seems like it's coming from inside your head rather than from speakers placed in the room around you, which doesn't create a very immersive audio experience.

Using the USB-DAC mode, the passive soundstage results are very similar. Their soundstage feels a bit less open and more like sound is coming from inside your head.

The weighted harmonic distortion performance via Bluetooth is very good. There's a small peak between the low to mid-treble at normal volumes. However, it can be hard to hear in real-life content. The rest of the frequencies fall within good limits, resulting in fairly clear and pure audio reproduction.

Using the USB-DAC mode, you can expect a similar weighted harmonic distortion performance. Audio is reproduced fairly clearly, although there's still a minor peak in the low to mid-treble range. This peak, like the one found in our Bluetooth results, is hard to hear with real-life content.

These are the settings used to test these headphones. Our results are only valid when used in this configuration. Although they support aptX Adaptive and this codec is backward-compatible with aptX HD, our test instrument would only alternate between SBC and aptX codecs.

Unlike most audiophile headphones, the Focal Bathys have a noise cancelling (ANC) system and have very good noise isolation. Although blocking out the low rumble of car engines isn't their strong suit, they can reduce ambient chatter and the high-pitched hum of computer fans well. The ANC has a couple of settings: 'Silent', which is ANC on at full strength, 'Soft', which is moderate noise cancelling, and 'Transparent', which is the transparency mode. You can also use ANC while using the DAC mode, though it performs similarly to ANC via Bluetooth. That said, you can see a comparison of all the modes here. Also, our 'ANC Off' measurements are conducted with the headphones turned off.

These headphones have a noticeable noise floor when the ANC is on. This unwanted noise can be annoying for some users, especially if you're already sensitive to this kind of sound.

The Focal Bathys' leakage performance is alright. Leakage is spread across the frequency spectrum but is slightly worse from the mid to treble range. This means the audio bleed sounds somewhat thin. If you're listening to audio in a quiet environment, others around you will hear it. It shouldn't be too noticeable in a busier space like an office.

The mic has a passable recording quality via Bluetooth. Your voice is understandable, but it sounds thin and a bit unnatural.

If you're using the DAC setting, your voice seems a little muffled and thin. It's still understandable, though. You can here the recording speech file using this mode here.

The mic's noise handling performance via Bluetooth is satisfactory. The mic can capture speech, even in noisy environments like a busy street, and it does a better job in this regard than competitors like the Sony WH-100XM4 Wireless. However, there's some vocal distortion present.

When using the DAC mode, the noise handling performance is somewhat similar. Your voice doesn't get completely lost in background noise, but it's a bit quieter and harder to hear than via Bluetooth. You can hear the pink noise audio sample here and subway noise audio sample here.

The Focal Bathys have a very good battery performance. The manufacturer advertises them to last 30 hours continuously via Bluetooth, and we measured a similar playtime. While you can use them wired, they still use the battery to power their ANC system, which you can't turn off. Even though the headphones also seem like they can charge and play audio simultaneously, since the LED indicator lights up and suggests that they're charging, the manufacturer notes that you're not supposed to use them this way.

The Focal & Naim app is decent, and you can see a video of how it works here. The app is fairly basic, but it offers a 5-band graphic EQ and presets to help you adjust their sound. You need to be playing audio to adjust the EQ, though. In addition to sound customization, you can also check the battery life and audio format as well as adjust noise cancelling modes and update the firmware. You can even adjust the LED logo light's brightness. Keep in mind that if you made changes in the app in Bluetooth mode, they'll apply in DAC mode, even though you can't use this connection with the app.

Unfortunately, some users have experienced issues when using the app to update their headphones. When updating to firmware 1.4.2, the app would freeze once the installation had reached 100%. After encountering this issue a couple of times, we uninstalled the app, restarted the phone, and installed the app again, which seemed to solve our issue. If you encounter this issue, please let us know in the discussions, and we'll update our review.

These headphones have a satisfactory Bluetooth performance. Unfortunately, they don't support multi-device or NFC pairing, so you can't connect them with more than one device at a time. They support aptX Adaptive, which is backward-compatible with aptX HD. These codecs are designed for streaming hi-res audio content with better audio quality. However, we don't currently have a way to test for aptX Adaptive, and we can't isolate aptX HD latency either. That said, they have high latency on PCs, whether by SBC or aptX codecs, and you'll notice your audio and visuals fall out of sync. Their latency is lower on iOS and Android devices, making this connection a solid choice for streaming audio. Latency varies as some apps compensate for it, though.

The Focal Bathys come with a 1/8" to 1/8" TRS cable as well as a USB-C to USB-C cable. The USB cable supports audio passthrough and has somewhat low latency, reducing lip sync issues.

The Focal Bathys can connect to PCs via Bluetooth with full audio and mic compatibility. They can also connect to PCs via analog, but they only support audio using this cable. If you're using wired USB, you'll get full audio and mic compatibility.

These headphones can only connect to your PlayStation console via analog, and you'll only receive audio. If you try to use the DAC mode on PS5, you can't receive audio or use the mic.

These headphones support audio only via analog.