Earbuds

Great sound and controlled leakage, but the fiddly blade controls and weak noise cancelling hold them back in first impressions.

Sound great with noticeably better and adaptive noise cancelling than the base model, but the fiddly blades and max ANC level disappoint.

Light and clearly not luxury, but he thinks they feel sophisticated and intentional in their design.

They work underwater using radio waves, though sound quality is mediocre, earning 8 out of 10.

Roughly built fake AirPods with good fit and crisp but bass-heavy sound, rated 7 out of 10.

Standard Pixel Buds Pro included in the Hip Hop 50 box, not customised.

Premium-feeling and good fit, but one earbud failed to connect and the bottle-opener case is daft; 3/10.

Seamless real-time translation that earns a spot in his travel bag, despite a paywalled offline app and cheap build; 8/10.

Dual-driver top-end earbuds with a big step up in sound and isolation, let down by a glossy finish and middling battery life.

Cheap AirPods-style earbuds that sound surprisingly good and last 40 hours, held back only by a fiddly setup.

USB-C AirPods are annoying for recent Lightning buyers but good news for those who held off.

Awkward, stiff earbuds where only one worked at first, but fine for most people once paired.

Low-latency gaming earphones with noise cancellation that are not the best sounding.

Crisp, upbeat sound with lovely attention to detail, though slightly lacking bass; rated 8 out of 10 for the price.

Good passive noise cancellation and sparkly highs, but lacking deep bass.

Standard black pair bundled free with the S23 Ultra exclusive, worth about $150.

Received free with his S22 pre-order and found he valued them less because they were thrown in.

The real AirPods come with more packaging and a slightly tidier build, but look almost identical to the fakes.

Surprisingly well built and decent sounding for $10, but one earbud failed to connect and they lack finer audio detail.

A $3 ear hook with open sound that is not immersive, better as a puzzle than an earphone.

Easy to recommend on value thanks to great sound, a full feature set and a low price, despite a questionable design and a hype-heavy launch.

Wallet-sized earphones that are impressively slim, though he wondered about battery life.

Very thin sleep earbuds that fade music out and track sleep, and he was a big fan on first impression despite average sound.

Eighty dbrand-customised pairs were giveaway prizes.