Methodology
How we choose and score
The 0-to-10 scores in the charts are ours, not the manufacturer's. They follow the same rule every time, so two models can actually be compared instead of judged by how well their listing is written.
Where the data comes from
Every page starts from the product's real Amazon.com listing: title, price, average rating, review count, features, spec table and the reviews the page itself shows. The photos are the product's own, hosted on our server.
We then cross-check that listing against the manufacturer's official site and, where needed, against specialist retailers. It is a necessary step, because Amazon listings often arrive incomplete or flatly contradictory: one of the models on this site promises forty hours of battery with noise cancelling in its bullet points and twenty in its own spec table, a few inches further down the same page; another states a 12 mm driver where the manufacturer publishes 30; and a wired headphone, with no battery and no electronics of any kind, claims to be controlled from an app. When there is a conflict, the manufacturer's figures win and we say so on the page.
What we do when a figure is missing
We leave it empty. You'll see a «—» in the table and a note explaining it. We do not estimate, we do not round to a believable number and we do not borrow the figure from a similar model. If a brand does not publish the battery life with cancelling on, that field stays blank and the matching axis of the chart is marked «no data».
It looks less impressive, but it's the only way the comparison is worth anything.
The six scores
The first three are computed from manufacturer data; the last three are the editor's judgement, checked against verified buyer reviews. Every score is recalculated whenever a new model is added, so they stay comparable. When a manufacturer does not publish a figure — and battery life with noise cancelling on is the one they hide most often — that cell stays empty and the axis is not scored. We would rather show the gap than fill it with a guess of our own.
Battery life
From the battery life WITH noise cancelling on, not the one the manufacturer advertises. 4 h scores 0 and 40 h or more scores 10. If the brand does not publish the figure with ANC on, we leave it empty instead of making it up.
Cancelling
No active cancelling scores 0. With cancelling, the score depends on the type (hybrid, with mics inside and outside, scores higher than basic), on whether there is a transparency mode, and on whether it is adjustable by levels.
Sound
Driver size and type, high-resolution codecs available, and whether there is an adjustable EQ in the app. This is not an acoustic measurement: it is what can be verified on the listing.
Comfort
Weight, form factor and, on headband models, the type of earpad. On earbuds we penalise the weight per bud; on headband models, the total weight.
Calls
Number of microphones, whether it claims noise reduction on calls, and whether it connects to two devices at once.
Value
The sum of the other five axes divided by the price, normalised within its category. An expensive model only scores high if it genuinely gives you more.
How we make money
From Amazon affiliate commissions. If you buy headphones through our links, Amazon pays us a percentage and you pay exactly what you would have paid going in directly.
That creates an obvious conflict of interest, and the only way to handle it is to be transparent: we write each model's cons in the same detail as its pros, we summarise the negative reviews the same way as the positive ones, and we rank nothing by the commission it pays. If a pair of headphones has a known problem, it is written on its page.
Read the full affiliate disclosure.
Prices go stale
The prices you see are a snapshot from the date shown next to each one. Amazon changes them constantly. Treat them as a guide for comparing models, never as the price you'll pay: you only know that when you open the link.