JBL Tune 510BT Wireless Headphones Review

The JBL Tune 510BT are simple-looking on-ear headphones very similar in design to the JBL Live 400BT Wireless, with an embossed manufacturer logo on their small ear cups and a slim plastic headband. They're available in a couple of different color schemes, including the conservative black colorway of our unit and a similarly conventional white color scheme. If you're feeling a little more adventurous, they're also available in dark blue or light pink.

The JBL Tune 510BT are reasonably comfortable. They feel very light on your head, have ear cups with a wide range of articulation, and don't clamp your ears especially tightly. Unfortunately, only the middle of the headband is padded. Their ear cups are shallow, too, even by the standards of other on-ear headphones, which could cause some discomfort for users with larger ears.

The JBL Tune 510BT have a decent physical control scheme. All the buttons are found on the right ear cup and are easy to tell apart. Holding down the volume up and volume down buttons skips tracks forward and backward, respectively. Pressing the middle button pauses and plays music or answers and ends phone calls, while holding it down on a call mutes your mic or rejects incoming calls. Double tapping it turns on your phone's voice assistant. The buttons are clicky, offering good physical feedback. There are also audio cues for reaching maximum and minimum volumes, and chimes for powering on the headphones or pairing them to a device over Bluetooth.

The JBL Tune 510BT are decently breathable. They don't cover the outer edges of your ears completely, which should allow for a bit of airflow. That said, your ears are still likely to sweat more than usual if you wear them during workouts.

These on-ears are fairly portable. Their ear cups can swivel to lay flat and fold inwards to reduce their footprint, making them easier to store. Unfortunately, they don't come with a carrying case or pouch.

The JBL Tune 510BT have mediocre build quality. They're mostly made of cheap-feeling plastic, though their padding is lined with faux leather. Their ear cup hinges and yokes aren't especially solid, though the hinges offer a wide range of articulation. They lack an IP rating for water or dust resistance too, but it's worth noting that we don't currently test for this.

These headphones aren't very stable. Even low-intensity movements can cause them to loosen their fit and slip off your head, so they aren't the best option for activities that cause you to shake your head.

• JBL Tune 510BT wireless headphones
• USB-C to USB-A charging cable
• Quick Start guide

The JBL Tune 510BT have a slightly V-shaped sound profile. This should add extra kick and boom to your favorite EDM and hip-hop tracks but can slightly muddy some vocals and lead instrumentals. Their mildly overemphasized treble range adds a bit of extra brightness to your mix, though some users may find this a bit piercing and harsh. Unfortunately, they lack any sound customization features, with no in-app graphic EQ and no onboard EQ presets. If you're looking for over-ears with an adjustable sound profile, check out the Sony WH-CH520 Wireless.

The JBL Tune 510BT have very good frequency response consistency. Aside from some minor variances in the treble range, audio reproduction shouldn't differ too much on different listening sessions if you take the time to properly adjust their fit and positioning.

The JBL Tune 510BT offer decent bass accuracy. It's mostly overemphasized across the range, adding extra thump and kick to EDM and hip-hop tracks. However, some listeners may perceive excess boominess and muddiness.

These headphones have excellent mid accuracy. Their overemphasized high-bass range carries over into the low-mids, slightly cluttering vocals and lead instrumentals. Thankfully, the flat, even mid-mid range should mean that vocals and lead instruments are present within the mix. A slight dip in the high-mids slightly weakens these notes, though that isn't too noticeable overall.

The JBL Tune 510BT have very good treble accuracy. The range is slightly overemphasized, with slight bumps in the low and mid-treble ranges that can brighten some mixes. However, some sibilants, like S and T sounds, may also be perceived as being slightly harsh or piercing.

The JBL Tune 510BT have decent peaks and dips performance. A bump in the low through mid-bass range results in an extra thump and kick. A small dip in the low-mids thins out vocals and lead instrumentals, while another broader drop in the high-mids through the early low-treble range weakens them. The following rise in the low-treble range makes the upper harmonics of vocals and lead instruments slightly harsh, and another peak in the mid-treble range makes sibilants, like S and T sounds, piercing and painful.

These on-ears have satisfactory stereo imaging performance. Their weighted group delay falls mostly beneath the audibility threshold, resulting in a fairly tight bass and transparent treble response. The L/R drivers are also reasonably well-matched in regards to amplitude response, though some minor frequency mismatch is present. There's also a significant degree of phase mismatch, which could create inaccuracies in the stereo image at certain frequencies. This can hurt the accurate localization of objects like voices and footsteps within the stereo image. That said, these results are only valid for our test unit, and yours may perform differently.

The JBL Tune 510BT have a poor passive soundstage. It isn't very spacious or natural, and sound is likely to be perceived as coming from inside the listener's head rather than speakers placed all around them. However, it's noticeably more open than some other closed-back over-ear headphones like the JBL Live 500BT Wireless.

The JBL Tune 510BT have decent weighted harmonic distortion performance. Aside from some distortion at moderate listening volumes in the bass range, which can be hard to notice with real-world content, audio reproduction is fairly clean and pure.

These are the settings used to test the JBL Tune 510BT. Our results are only valid in this configuration.

These on-ears have bad noise isolation performance. They do almost nothing to filter out bass or mid-range ambient noise, like the low rumble of bus or plane engines, as well as background chatter. They do an okay job of isolating you from higher-pitched ambient noise, like the hum of a nearby AC unit, though.

These headphones have acceptable leakage performance. People nearby may hear some of what you're listening to if you play media at a high volume, even in a moderately busy environment like an office.

The integrated mic delivers decent performance. Recorded speech sounds reasonably clear and quite natural, if a little thin.

The integrated mic offers mediocre noise handling performance. People on the other end of the line can struggle to understand you if you call from a noisy or crowded environment, like a subway car or a sports stadium.

The JBL Tune 510BT offer satisfactory overall battery performance. Depending on your usage habits, you can expect more than 38 hours of playback time on a single charge, which should be more than enough to last for a couple of days and is relatively close to the advertised battery life of 40 hours. They also have a quick charge feature, with five minutes of charging being advertised to supply two hours of playtime, though we don't currently test this. Unfortunately, they don't have any power-saving features, like an auto-off timer or a standby mode, to help conserve the charge when not in use.

These headphones have great Bluetooth connectivity. They support Bluetooth 5.0 and multi-device pairing, allowing you to listen to content from both your phone or computer without having to go through the re-pairing process, though incoming phone calls take priority over any other system's audio. Unfortunately, their latency on PCs, mobile iOS, and Android devices is somewhat high, which could be disruptive if you plan on using them to stream video content. That said, apps and devices compensate to varying degrees for latency, so your real-world experience may vary.

The JBL Tune 510BT only come with a USB-C to USB-A cable for charging purposes.