Xiaomi never ceases to impress me with their really good, value for money, products. It started with their Android smartphones. Then came battery power banks, fitness trackers, and other gadgetries. Today, I’m writing about their Mi In-Ear Headphones Pro, which comes across highly recommended by many others. It costs only S$27.99, so it couldn’t hurt to try.
Getting hold of the Mi In-Ear Headphones Pro turns out to be much harder than expected. It is perpetually out-of-stock at the Mi Singapore website. Don’t ask how I got mine. It took some effort, and it finally arrived in a compact little box with a plastic window showcasing the stylish earpieces and inline remote.
The Mi In-Ear Headphones Pro is the top-end of the in-ear offerings that Xiaomi has available in Singapore. The other in-ears are the entry-level Mi In-Ear Headphones Basic, and the mid-tier Mi In-Ear Headphones.
You may know from my other posts that I’m pretty fond of in-ear style headphones. This is one of the reasons that I’m keen to try out the Mi In-Ear Headphones Pro.
The headphones are really well-built. The earpieces are milled metal, with vented chambers. The metal finish looks quite exquisite, with fine engraving on them. The front is made of plastic, with a stem that has a metal mesh filter. The inline remote is also milled out of metal.
From an aesthetics point of view, the Pro looks like something a lot more expensive than it actually is. It kind of exudes an air of class and elegance. There is no obvious branding, apart from the unnecessary HD Audio engraved outside.
Xiaomi provides four pairs of silicon ear tips, with size ranging from XS, S, M and L. I actually prefer Comply foam tips, but perhaps others might not might these olives.
The wires leading to the earpieces are standard PVC insulated cables. But below the moulded joint, the headphones uses a thin braided cord leading to the metal plug. The braided cord lends to a more tangle-free experience, as well as less kicking in the cable.
The metal plug is a straight 3.5 mm gold-plated TRRS connector.
The inline remote includes a microphone. Using the inline remote seems to be a bit finicky though. Xiaomi’s product description says volume controls don’t work with iOS. I found the volume controls didn’t work with my Nexus 6P either (nor with my Retina MacBook Pro). With my OnePlus One, volume down works, but volume up rarely works. In all my test devices, I can pause and resume music playback, or skip tracks forward, but I couldn’t skip tracks backward. I suppose the inline remote might work better with Xiaomi’s smartphones.
Internally, the Pro uses a hybrid driver setup, with one dynamic driver and one balanced armature driver. Sound quality is really impressive, particularly when you consider the price category this headphones competes in.
The hybrid drivers deliver both richness and details that you usually get only in much higher-end headphones. The bass is punchy and pronounced, although it doesn’t extend all the way down to the lowest frequencies. Mids are a little mellow at the lower end, but start to deliver great detail higher up, and into the treble region. Overall, the headphones deliver an immersive listening experience with great clarity and resolution.
If you’ve only been using stock headphones that came with your smartphone or music player thus far, the Mi In-Ear Headphones Pro is an upgrade you must get.
The Mi In-Ear Headphones Pro sell for, as already mentioned earlier, an amazing low price of S$27.99, from the Xiaomi website (http://www.mi.com/sg/). You can also find these headphones at Gearbest (prices may differ).
Conclusion
The Mi In-Ear Headphones Pro sounds really good, almost unbelievably good in its price category. That it also looks good looks good is a nice bonus.
Pros:
- Impressive sound quality, rich and detailed
- Well-built and stylish
Cons:
- Inline remote issues with some smartphones
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