Beats by Dre Powerbeats Pro Review

The Powerbeats Pro struggled during some of our testing, providing lackluster noise-cancelling performance and good but not great sound quality. However, they offer impressive comfort and battery life.

Sound Quality

Our expert listeners feel the Powerbeats Pro lack clarity at lower volumes. At high volumes, it sounds muddy and blown out, with vocals losing their crispness. Middle-high volumes are the sweet spot, providing the clearest and punchiest soundscape.

These earbuds are bass-forward, followed by mids, then treble, making them a solid choice for your EDM or hip-hop lovers. If you enjoy punchy music and don't mind a somewhat unbalanced equalization (EQ), these are a good option.

Songs like “I'd Rather Go Blind” by Etta James and “Lay Low” by Snoop Dog shine at 1:32 and 1:15, respectively, with the volume turned up slightly past the mid-mark.

Soundstage

The soundstage of an earbud describes where the music seems to be coming from around you. Because earbuds are small, they often struggle to replicate a natural, live music experience. But with advancements in technology, some earbuds are building more expansive and immersive stages.

While they don't offer the crispest vocal clarity, they do a good job of creating a vast, immersive arena when they fit well and a mid-frequency song is playing. Songs like “Feels Like Rain” by Buddy Guy and Bonnie Raitt and “Tomorrow” by Shakey Graves sound great.

Their sound quality scores seem to correlate strongly with how well these earbuds fit in our testers' ears. When they are seated well, they are much more immersive and warm.

The frequency response of the Powerbeats Pro follows our GearLab House Curve pretty closely, deviating more widely in the treble bands.

Overall, these earbuds will make your average pop song sound fun and punchy, but if you prefer softer music like classical, folk, etc., they probably aren't the best option.

Comfort and Fit

The Powerbeats Pro proved exceptionally stable and comfortable across all ear shapes we tested. These buds sit deep in the ear canal, which provides a tight seal and good sound immersion, though it has the potential to bother some users with internal pressure.

Stability

There is a bendable arm that wraps around the ear for ultimate stability during high-intensity activity, making them great for cyclists, runners, and gym-goers who want easy-to-use, secure earbuds with an immersive, punchy sound.

Noise Cancellation

The Powerbeats Pro are not noise-cancelling earbuds, so we could only test their passive ability to seal out background noise. The Powerbeats Pro don't offer active noise cancelation, but they do have a passive seal that works much like an earplug.

We used our testing rig to measure how much sound bleeds through the ear seal. Their performance is only okay. They have silicone ear canal tips blocking some background noise, but you can hear high-volume background noise.

We wouldn't recommend these buds if your primary use is commuting or travel, as they don't do much to dampen the whir, hum, and chatter around you.

You can increase the volume to help block out the background, but these are better suited for environments like a gym, where you'll want your music at louder volumes.

Ease of Use

These earbuds are simple and easy to use.

App Features

The Powerbeats Pro lost favor when it came to sound customizability. You can't adjust the EQ or test the ear seal. Because of the lack of EQ customizability, if you like softer music, these might not be for you.

Connectivity

The Powerbeats Pro earbuds are satisfactory in terms of connection quality. One tester noted that pairing them to an iPad was quite easy. Another tester reported that the Beats lacked issues during our in-house listening sessions.

To get a broader picture of connectivity, we crowdsource information through a 1-star Amazon User Reviews survey. We note every instance of a user citing a connectivity issue and calculate the frequency of these mentions relative to the total number of reviews. The Powerbeats has a 0.96% rate of reported issues, which is lower than the average reported problems for the group.

Battery Life

We tested the PowerBeats Pro battery performance by playing sound at a set volume until it died, and they knocked it out of the park. These earbuds can last a whopping 9 hours and 20 minutes (20 minutes longer than the manufacturer claims) before recharging. You can also squeeze out another 1.5 hours of playback time with just 5 minutes in their charging case. The case will net you another 18 hours of playback via two charges before it also needs recharging.

These do not have wireless charging. If ANC is not important to you and you don't like having to worry about charging your earbuds frequently, the PowerBeats Pro is a great option.

Call Quality

We tested the PowerBeats Pro call quality by playing spoken phrases out of our head simulator's mouth, which were then captured by the earbud's mic. Playing varying levels of background noise allowed us to capture exactly what others would hear when on a call in different environments.

During the subway noise test, these earbuds struggled to keep up, particularly distorting high-frequency voices and allowing a lot of background noise through.

In an office setting, we could begin to hear some background noise bleed through, which slightly distorted the microphone.

Without any background noise, the PowerBeats Pro sounds great, providing very clear call quality.

Overall, the Powerbeats Pro performed well for being one of the less tech-infused buds in our lineup, but they aren't the best option if you plan on taking calls in loud environments.

Should You Buy the Beats By Dre PowerBeats Pro?

The PowerBeats Pro performed well enough in our testing but struggled in a few key areas. The lack of customizable EQ and noise isolation makes them hard to recommend to all audiences. If you're an avid adventurer, like high-octane activity, and don't care about premium features like ANC and customizability, these are a solid option. However, other earbuds offer premium features in this price range, though maybe they aren't quite as stable and comfortable across ear shapes during high activity.

What Other Earbuds Should You Consider?