Sony WH-CH710N Wireless Headphones Review

The Sony WH-CH710N are simple, straightforward wireless over-ears. They're available in black, white, gray, or blue, and overall their design isn't particularly flashy.

The Sony WH-CH710N are comfortable. They're lightweight and don't fit too tightly on the head. The headband and ear cups are well-padded. However, the ear cups are a bit shallow, and your ears may occasionally touch the drivers, which is annoying.

The Sony WH-CH710N have good controls. There are four buttons, and they each have a dot or indentation that makes it easy to know which one you're pressing. The buttons aren't very clicky, unfortunately, but you hear voice prompts for some commands

On the left ear cup is the power button. It offers the following controls:

• Two-second press: Turn headphones on or off.
• Seven-second press: Enter pairing mode.

On the right ear cup, there is an ANC/ambient mode button, which lets you cycle between 'Ambient Sound Mode' on, active noise cancelling on, and both modes off. 'Ambient Sound Mode' is intended to allow you to hear your surroundings while listening to audio. There's also '+' and '-' buttons that allow you to adjust the volume. Between the volume buttons is a multi-function button that offers the following controls:

• One click: Play/pause audio
• Two clicks: Skip track forward.
• Three clicks: Skip track backward.
• Two-second hold: Activate voice assistant.

The Sony WHCH710N Wireless have sub-par breathability, like most over-ear headphones. They aren't intended for sports use and may make you sweat more if you use them during workouts. However, it shouldn't be too much of an issue with more casual use.

The Sony WH-CH710N Wireless aren't very portable. Like most over-ears, they have a bulky design. Fortunately, the ear cups swivel down to allow the headphones to lay flat so they can fit easier into your bag.

These headphones have a decent build quality. They're mostly made of plastic that feels fairly durable. The headband is made of plastic and metal, and the ear cup and headband padding is covered in a faux-leather material. While they should be able to handle a couple of drops without any damage, they don't feel extremely sturdy, and the ear cup hinges seem like a particularly weak point.

The Sony WH-CH710N are decently stable headphones. They should easily stay in place during casual listening sessions, but aren't intended for sports use and may fall off your head if you use them for workouts. On the plus side, their wired design means you don't need to worry about a cable snagging on something and yanking the headphones off your head.

• Sony WH-CH710N headphones
• USB-A to USB-C charging cable
• 1/8" TRS audio cable
• Manuals

The Sony WH-CH710N have a slightly bass-heavy sound profile. Overall, it's neutral enough to be suitable for most music genres, but the extra thump and punch in the bass range is ideal for genres like EDM and hip-hop. However, a dip in the low and mid-treble ranges hurts the comprehensibility of instruments and lead vocals and makes sibilants like cymbals seem dull. Unfortunately, there aren't any sound customization options for these headphones.

These headphones have alright frequency response consistency. Their mid and treble delivery varies based on the headphones' fit, seal, and positioning on your head, so you may need to adjust the headphones each time you use them in order to get a consistent sound.

These headphones have a good bass accuracy. It's slightly overemphasized across the range, which adds extra thump, punch, and boom to the mix. However, some listeners may find it to be somewhat muddy.

These headphones have excellent mid accuracy. The overemphasized low-mids can slightly clutter vocals and lead instruments. However, the rest of the range is quite flat and balanced, so lead instruments and vocals are mostly clear and present. That said, they have somewhat inconsistent mid delivery, so this performance represents the average response and your experience may vary.

These headphones have poor treble accuracy. The dip in the low and mid-treble ranges hurts the detail and articulation of instruments and lead vocals and makes sibilants like cymbals sound dull and lispy. However, they have inconsistent treble delivery. This performance represents the average response and your experience may vary.

The Sony WH-CH710N have passable peaks and dips performance. There are slight peaks in the low and high-bass ranges, which add a touch of thump and boominess to mixes. The peak in the low-treble makes instruments harsh and painful. The large dip in the low and mid-treble can make instruments and lead vocals sound less detailed and articulated while some sibilant sounds, cymbals, seem dull. However, a peak in the mid-treble makes some sibilant sounds piercing.

These headphones have an amazing imaging performance. Weighted group delay falls mostly below the audibility threshold, ensuring a tight bass and transparent treble. There are some peaks in the bass-range, but they shouldn't be audible for most with real-life content. Also, the L/R drivers of our unit are well-matched in phase, frequency, and amplitude response, so objects like voices and instruments are accurately placed and localized in the stereo field. Note that these results are only valid for our unit, and yours may perform differently.

They have a disappointing passive soundstage performance. Sound is perceived to come from inside your head rather than from speakers set in the room around you. Also, while the soundstage seems fairly large, it's not as open or spacious as that of most open-back headphones.

The Sony WH-CH710N have a reasonable weighted harmonic distortion performance. There's some distortion present in the treble range at both normal and high volumes, but it shouldn't be too noticeable with real-life content, resulting in fairly clean and pure audio reproduction.

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

The Sony WH-CH710N have a sub-par noise isolation performance. Though they have an ANC feature, it struggles to block out bass-range noises like rumbling bus and plane engines. However, they isolate you from a fair amount of sounds like ambient chatter or humming A/C units.

These headphones have a good leakage performance. They don't leak a lot of sound, and the leakage isn't very loud, so even if you're listening to audio at high volumes, your music is unlikely to bother people sitting near you at the office.

The Sony WH-CH71N Wireless' integrated microphone has a decent recording quality. Your voice is clear, but it also sounds a bit muffled and unnatural.

The microphone has a decent noise handling performance. It can separate your voice from moderate background sound, although noise seems to cut in and out, which can be a bit distracting. If you use them to take a call somewhere loud like a subway station, your voice can get completely drowned out.

The Sony WH-CH710N have a great battery performance. They last for just under 30 hours of continuous use on a single charge, which is less than the advertised 35 hours, but should still mean you don't need to charge them every day. However, battery performance can vary with real-life usage, so your experience may vary. They also have standby mode to conserve battery when they aren't in use and can even be used passively if the battery dies. Unfortunately, they take a long time to recharge.

Unlike the Sony WH-CH700N Wireless, the Sony WH-CH710N don't have a dedicated companion app.

The Sony WH-CH710N have good Bluetooth connectivity. They support NFC pairing, but you can only connect them to one device at a time, which may be inconvenient if you like to use your headphones with your computer and your phone. They have high latency on PC, iOS, and Android, so they aren't ideal for watching videos or movies. However, apps compensate for latency differently, so your experience may vary.

These headphones come with a 1/8" TRS cable that doesn't have an in-line microphone. There's also a USB-A to USB-C charging cable.

The Sony WH-CH710N are compatible with PCs using their 1/8" TRS audio cable. However, you can only receive audio.

These headphones are compatible with PlayStation consoles via analog connection if you plug the 1/8" TRS audio cable into a controller. However, you can only receive audio.

You can plug these headphones into your Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S controller using their 1/8" TRS cable, but you can only receive audio.