Just a few years ago, truly wireless earbuds were few and far between. Today, there’s almost too many to choose from, and new offerings get quickly lost in the sea of earbuds if they don’t stand out. Edifier’s approach to making its new wireless buds distinctly different is a transparent charging case that may only appeal to those who have no shame over how dirty their ears are.
Even if you’re obsessively clean, your ears will still produce ear wax—it’s just how your body works. The material is naturally secreted by skin glands inside your ear canals to help trap dust and debris from actually making it all the way to your eardrums and damaging them. That being said, it’s still gross, and who among us hasn’t taken their earbuds out and quickly shoved them into a charging case to hide the wax-covered ear tips? Ignorance is bliss.
That’s not an option with Edifier’s new GM5 wireless earbuds. Featuring a design that’s similar to the original Apple AirPods with an extended stem creating more room for a larger battery, they can actually last through eight hours of playback on a single charge, compared to just five hours for AirPods. How that battery life fairs when making calls or playing online games with friends and having to stream audio in both directions remains to be seen.
The battery life can be extended up to 32 hours when away from a power source using the GM5's charging case to top up the buds, but that convenience comes with the trade-off of your buds being on display while they’re safely tucked away inside the case. When slipped into your pocket that’s not an issue, but leave these out on your desk and your coworkers will have a front seat view to all the waxy build-up transferred from your ears to these buds, and you’ll be the next topic of conversation at the water cooler. (That may not be a problem when many of us are still working from home, but think of the future!)
The Edifier GM5 wireless earbuds will launch sometime in March in two colors: gray and darker gray. They don’t offer active noise cancellation, which means they can be had for the low, low price of $80.