It’s easy to think you need to spend big on audio equipment when it feels like everyone is wearing AirPods that cost around £200, or fancy noisecancelling headphones (where some price tags end up close to £300).
But, I review loads of earphones every day. Trust me when I say there are a few things reviews don’t tend to mention to prospective buyers.
Firstly, the best cheap headphones sound terrific in 2024; secondly, comfort and convenience are more important than special extra features you might not use, and lastly, while active noisecancelling is great, you can get a similar effect from a great seal that stops exterior noise from reaching you in the first place.
These budget Sony buds are among one of the best deals I’ve found on true wireless earbuds in 2024. The WFC500 blasts out the kind of sonic experience you’d expect from rivals that cost twice or three times as much, delivering a clear, balanced and detailed tuning that made every track we played sound its best.
They also offer a long 10hour battery life (with an extra 10 hours from the case), as well as splash and sweat resistance in a compact design.
While they don’t have active noisecancelling (ANC), the included ear tips gave me such a good seal that I didn’t miss it, and I’ll always appreciate not having to deal with the hiss of wind noise coming through the noisecancelling microphones — something that happens on almost every ANC model.
I also like that these have reliable buttons for control, rather than a complex touch interface where you have to memorise a series of taps and holds to get the earbuds to do what you want. The comfort is also excellent, as they’re very tiny and discreet, with a weight of only 5.4g per earbud, and I love that they come in a fun range of colours: black, green, orange and white.
They’re not without some notable but minor downsides. While I love the passive noise isolation, they will be challenged by extremely loud sounds. I found they block out the noise of an Elizabeth Line train, where the din isn’t quite as intense as on older London Underground trains.
I think you’ll be better off with something with active noisecancelling built in if you want to wear these in an environment where ambient sounds are over 80 decibels though (cabin noise in a plane averages around 8085 decibels).
Also, as much as I like the control buttons, it’s a shame you can’t reassign them to create your own control scheme in the app. It’s also true that other rivals can offer more battery life and a lot of extra appbased features – there’s a lot of competition in this category.
Overall, though, I find the Sony WFC500 are highly convincing budget true wireless earbuds. They’re not quite cheap enough to feature in our roundup of the best headphones under £50, but they’re right in the sweet spot for many buyers looking for compact and pocketable earphones that are comfortable and have a long battery life.
The major benefit of these is that they also sound terrific and have such a good passive seal from the ear tips that I’d have mistaken them for noisecancelling buds a few times.
For excellent sound quality, longlasting battery life and pocketable convenience, you won’t find much better than these earbuds for under £60.
Simon Cocks is Hearst UK’s Technology Ecommerce Editor, overseeing tech shopping content and strategy across a range of titles including Good Housekeeping UK, Esquire UK, Digital Spy, Men’s Health UK and Women’s Health UK.
Simon specialises in testing the latest smart gadgets, home entertainment gear, headphones, speakers, portable chargers, radios, ebook readers and smartphones. He’s reviewed top tech products from brands including Google, Apple, Amazon, JBL and Bose.
A magazine journalism graduate from Kingston University in 2014, Simon also worked on the Discovery and Silkroad inflight magazines. He then gained experience writing about entertainment at SFX and Total Film. He also contributed reviews and interviews to TwitchFilm (later ScreenAnarchy), CultBox and Frame Rated.
He joined Good Housekeeping UK as the Editorial Assistant for Special Projects and was part of Good Housekeeping’s Consumer Affairs Team between 2014 and 2019. In this role, he conducted price comparison research, wrote detailed household and moneysaving advice guides and edited thousands of indepth reviews for the Good Housekeeping Institute.
He has focused on technology and gadgets since 2020, where he started by testing out power banks and instant cameras. He writes reviews, roundups, news articles and deals updates, and also covers top tech deals during sales like Amazon Prime Day, Black Friday and Cyber Monday.
When not testing out the latest gizmos, you’ll find Simon either catching up with the newest releases at his local cinema or out shooting with his beloved compact camera.
You can follow Simon on Instagram at @simonrcocks, on Threads at @simonrcocks, and on Twitter/X at @simoncocks.