Our Verdict
The Q9A are decently versatile headphones that are best used for sports thanks to their stable, compact and wireless design. Unfortunately, their mediocre-at-best sound quality and poor noise isolation, means they won't be ideal for critical listeners or to use in loud, noisy environments.
- Stable and portable design.
- Comfortable fit.
- Very low leakage.
- Poor noise isolation.
- Exceedingly bass-heavy sound.
Subpar for neutral listening. The small closed ear buds cannot create an adequate soundstage. That combined with their exceedingly bass-heavy audio reproduction makes them sound too dark and unbalanced for most listeners.
Decent for commuting. They're easy-to-carry around and the low leakage can compensate for the poor noise isolation by playing your audio at higher volumes. However, they don't block much noise and shouldn't be your first choice for loud, noisy commutes.
Good for sports. The stable ear-hook design and compact, portable size makes them suitable to use while running or exercising. They're also wireless and a bit more comfortable than some other in-ear headphones.
Above-average for office use. They will let a bit of the office chatter seep into your audio due to their poor isolation. However, they don't leak much and won't be audible to anyone around you.
Changelog
- Updated Nov 21, 2019: Converted to Test Bench 1.3.1.
- Updated Nov 21, 2019: Converted to Test Bench 1.3.
- Updated Feb 16, 2018: Converted to Test Bench 1.2.
- Updated Oct 02, 2017: The microphone has been tested with our new methodology, as explained here
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You can also discover how we produce recommendations like this one so that you can find the best headphones (or earbuds!) for your needs.
Test Results
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