Sony WH-1000XM6 Review: The King of Noise Cancelling Returns

★★★★★ Game changer , best over the ear headphones I have ever own. I’ve used a lot of noise canceling headphones over the years, and the Sony WH-1000XM6 honestly feel like a real step forward. The noise cancellation is the first thing you notice. On a recent flight, the constant engine hum faded into the background within seconds, and in a busy café it significantly softened voices and clatter without creating that heavy “pressure” feeling some ANC headphones have.Sound quality is clean and balanced. Bass has depth but doesn’t overpower vocals, and highs stay clear without getting sharp. They handle everything from podcasts to layered studio tracks very well. Calls are also clearer than expected — people on the other end mentioned my voice sounded natural even outdoors.Comfort is another strong point. The ear cups are soft, the headband doesn’t create hot spots, and I’ve worn them for several hours straight without discomfort. Battery life has been consistent with heavy use.They’re expensive, but if noise cancellation and everyday comfort matter to you, these are easy to recommend.

★★★★★ Super ANC, amazing battery life, fast charging and comfortable. Well im sure whoever is reading this had watched countless review videos before buying, (if you dint go watch them). It is as most reviewers describe, good battery life, superb ANC, featured packed that make it easy to use and control. build quality is good not great. Synthetic materials feels fragile, the cups have a thin or easy to crack plastic. The ear cups are comfortable despite what reviewers have said and the pressure of the headphones isn't as strong as most people said it would be, quite the contrary its good enough that sound isolation happens without ANC to a great quality. Easily connects and switches between my z fold 7 and my MacBook M1PRO. The app allows for good EQ adaptation thus don't bother too much about sound differences between competition when it comes to sound as it can be matched to better sounding headphones like the momentum 4. Carrying case is of good quality, 3.5mm jack allows for easy to use on planes or older devices. a must buy when on sale.

★★★☆☆ Expensive? Yes. Great headphones? Maybe. Worth the price? Absolutely not. There are new problems with the hinge because Sony can't properly engineer it. With this new design, the hinge allows for more movement of the earcups, which improves comfort. However, this free movement also allows the earcups to adapt to your shape and wearing style, which can cause the hinge to twist. Unless the headphones are placed perfectly on your head, both earcups completely parallel and the headband straight, it is extremely hard to avoid turning the hinge which can cause wear over time, potentially leading to the snapping of the hinge, a common issue present in the XM5s but still not completely fixed by these XM6s.Audio quality is fine - the equalizer now has more increments for adjustments which allow for more customizability. According to Sony, the XM6s legally have the best ANC in the headphones industry and its new chip is significantly faster than the XM5s, but after a week of use, I've heard absolutely no difference in both aspects (ANC & sound quality) having owned both generations. I'm not saying that the audio and ANC haven't improved, but this change will go unnoticed by 99% of consumers.The new listening modes are not useful. "Cinema" and "Background music" is essentially spacial audio, but the audio quality drops significantly in both modes. Plus, the audio lacks depth, which doesn't make the spacial audio sound immersive, but rather flat.I am quite disappointed in these headphones. For nearly 700 CAD you would expect more upgrades from the previous generation, but the changes are extremely incremental and not worth the price increase. If you get the Sony XM5s with a discount, these are almost twice as expensive, for very small improvements. Get something else instead.

★☆☆☆☆ Great sound and NC* in a $150 product shell. Coming from an XM5 I enjoyed the sound of the XM6's and the NC, the pressure was quite harsh and something one either wants or needs to get used too. However while the NC is great when enabled as such (the pressure from NC is nonexistent for me unlike on the XM5), when you enable ANC it becomes garbage, worst than the XM5, the mics feed too much sound through under the same settings as the XM5's making me have to lower the ambient sound setting to remove said sounds (my jacket rubbing against me, the XM5 did a great job at level 8, XM6's need to be at 6 and that muffles people greatly).Now for the build quality, I think they have fixed the hinge issue a lot of people had with the XM5's it feels more sturdy and shouldn't break, HOWEVER I do think they introduced a new point of failure, the hinges at the housing. So if you wear glasses don't buy these, if you are in a place that has winter/cold/wild temp swings don't buy these, if you wear a hat you probably shouldn't buy these. The hat issue is due to the added pressure which comes from the hinges that attach to the housing (speakers), in order for me to use these headphones with the hat I have to increase the band by a significant amount something I didn't really have to do with the XM5's which only needed a small adjustment. Now for the winter, maybe it's my units or maybe it's the hinge area which applies the excessive amounts of pressure and where I think the new fail point will be for these units. Indoors the hinges work great, but outdoors anywhere "near" freezing (apparently 5C above freezing is too cold for these things) the hinges start squeaking and creaking not always while walking but almost every time you move your jaw. I get it that in Japan you are "forbidden" from eating and walking but I'm not there and nor is most of the world, and hearing the headphones over my audio is unacceptable for a $500 unit. Finally the glasses, I wear mostly bayonet style sunglasses and all I can say is these headphones should not be matched with any glasses, it's not the back that causes issues it's the entry point aka the front, it makes wearing both the glasses and headphones very uncomfortable, and once again I'm blaming it on the pressure inducing hinges as this issue was barely a thing for me with my XM5's.The final part about build quality is the over all aspect of the unit, its garbage, something I would expect from a $150 or less unit! The fingerprints are obvious an issue but that's something I'm used to from the XM5's, I fear the spring aspect in the hinges that creates the added pressure will eventually fail in cold, extreme climate changes or over time, the headband has basically no padding vs my XM5's which I would like to point out I bought in June 2022, THATS RIGHT my nearly 4 year old pair of headphones still have better padding than these brand new units, and yes I use them nearly daily! Finally the foam between the speakers and my ears, it's getting rubbed against the speakers over time I can see it wearing out, something that shouldn't happen at all for a $500 unit.Overall I can't recommend them to anyone who wants to use them outside, and for those who would only use them inside for NC, buy the cheaper WH-CH720N, I bought them as a gift and have yet to get a single complaint about them.Some minor things: The XM6's occasionally will turn off randomly on Windows and Bluetooth is choppy randomly outside, my XM5's are set to best audio quality not connection and I've never had either issue.Amazon or Sony (via Amazon) offered me about a 20% refund instead of returning these, I'm sorry but to whoever though I would want to keep a $150 (or less) product quality with what I would expect from a $500 audio inside it, you would have to do much better, say offer me 70% back? If you did then sure I would have kept them because audio is great but becomes pointless when they break with no repair or warranty options (that's right Sony blames everyone but themselves), the 20% isn't worth the issues I have with it, not when I can get all of my money back.So good job Sony, outside of your media (which has been lacking greatly recently) you just lost me on the only other product I'm willing to buy from you. I'll keep using my XM5's till they break or die, but after that I'll try Bose or someone else.

★★★★★ The headphones are great. The noise cancellation teleports you to another world. Honestly everything is good, comfort, build, quality, sound in general. The only thing keeping me rating this 9/10 instead of 10/10 is the bass. The bass isn't that great but still good enough.

★★★★★ Ürün dış kutusunun ucu hafif ezilmiş şekilde geldi ancak üründe sıkıntı yok. Uzun süredir kullanmıyorum ama kalitesi baya iyi. Oyun, müzik, telefon görüşmesi gibi ortamlarda denedim. Gayet kaliteli ve konforlu bir kullanımı var.

★★★★★ Cómodos. Buena duración de la batería. Con una cancelación de ruido altamente efectiva. Buen volumen. Modo de transparencia claro. Si se usan para hacer conferencias virtuales, tu voz y la de los participantes se escucharán nítidas, claras - aún cuando aveces los micrófonos de los participantes no sean tan buenos.Buenos para escuchar música, respetando el audio original sin distorcionarlo, pero si quieres aumentar o resaltar los agudos y los graves, puedes instalar su software (Sound connect) y equilizarlos a tu gusto. Tiene muchas opciones esta app.A 13 mil pesos, me parecen caros, pero si encuentras una oferta, aprovéchala.

★★★★★ Chegou tudo certinho, dentro do prazo. O produto é original, mesmo vindo da China. Apenas a warehouse da Orbitek é de lá.

★★★★★ I have a headphone problem, or so my wife says. I’ve owned the Apple AirPods Max, the Sony XM5’s, the Bose QC and QC Ultra the QC 45’s and 35’s both I and II, the Sonos Ace, and the Beats Studio Pro. Going into my XM6 purchase, my favorite are/were the Bose QuietComfort Ultra. I bought the QuietComfort Ultra during Prime Day for an unbelievable $329! I have found that they offer the best combination of comfort, sound and ANC for the price. So, how does the XM6 compare? The ANC is second to none. I augment our central air with a window unit, which sits right behind my head, and I can completely eliminate its sound. But static sounds are pretty easily muffled by most of newer ANC headphones, so how about dynamic sounds like a tv or normal conversation? The XM6 excel there, too. Put simply, they offer the best ANC of any of the aforementioned headphones. They are also pretty comfortable and clamp down relatively tight, though I haven’t found anything to be as comfortable as either the QC or QC Ultra. The XM6 are designed to be over ear headphones, yet my ear doesn’t seem to fit inside the cup like other over ear headphones. This, in my opinion, makes them less-comfortable then they could/should be. However, the memory foam is a nice touch and does help.The sound is well-balanced and pretty good right out of the box, though I had to make use of the ten-band EQ to get them to sound just a tad better than my QC. With my current EQ settings, I would say they offer the clarity of the Apple AirPods Max, but with the bottom end of my Bose QuietComfort. The bass isn’t overpowering, it’s actually pretty accurate (after EQ tinkering).In the final analysis, the XM6 offer the best sound of any of the headphones I mentioned, but not by much. Furthermore, the ANC is superior to everything else I’ve owned, but not by a staggering amount.So, which should you buy? If you’re like me and in search of the best possible sound, and won’t settle for anything less than the best ANC, then get the XM6. If, however, you prioritize comfort and value, and don’t mind making some very minor concessions regarding sound and ANC, then get the Bose QuietComfort or the QC Ultra (wait until you catch them on sale, which is pretty often). I hope that helps. Happy listening!Update: “6/02/2025: Intermittent crackling in left speaker. Had to return them. I have replaced them, though.Update 06/07/25: I received the replacement pair and everything seems great.I neglected to mention in my previous review how great the Sony app is and how customizable the XM6 are. First, you get a ten band EQ, instead of the Bose three bands. Additionally, there are some awesome (optional) features that are missing from Bose. Sony has speak to chat, which mutes your music and puts your headphones in aware mode when you speak. Also, there is an option to accept or reject calls by simply nodding or shaking your head, which is very cool. If you’re into features like that and general customization, then the Sony XM6 are for you.UPDATE 06/17/2025. Started hearing crackling again in the right speaker this time. This time I did a Google search to see if others were having the same problem, and it seems like turning on DSEE Extreme could be the culprit at high volumes. The DSEE Extreme setting is supposed to upscale compressed files. I turned off the setting and no more crackling. I replayed the same part of the same song with and without it engaged, it it’s definitely the DSEE Extreme. Consequently, I’ve turned off that setting and now everything seems fine.