Xiaomi recently released their new noise-canceling TWS earbuds, the FlipBuds Pro. If you remember, Xiaomi had launched an active noise-canceling TWS earbud last year called the Air 2 Pro. However, these brand new earbuds come under a new lineup called Flipbuds.

So what upgrades and improvements does it have over the Air 2 Pro? Welcome to Gizmochina’s full review of the Xiaomi FlipBuds Pro.

Xiaomi FlipBuds Pro Review: Design

Unlike the oval cylindrical shape of the Air series, the FlipBuds Pro has become more rounded and compact. Xiaomi claims that this design is in line with the new Xiaomi logo design concept. However, in terms of shape, it looks very similar to OPPO’s Enco X. 

But FlipBuds Pro is still simpler and more like a pebble. The frosted material has also turned into a glossy finish. The Xiaomi logo is on the spindle, and the pairing button and charging port are at the bottom. Of course, the Flipbuds Pro case is still equipped with wireless charging. Other than that, there are no extra design elements. Unfortunately, it’s only available in black, and with the glossy finish, fingerprints will soon cover your entire earbuds case.

When you open the case, you will find that the lid is very flexible, so it is very easy to open the box with one hand. Taking out the earbuds, you can see that the shape of the earbuds is very familiar. It looks like the black version of Airpods Pro, but Xiaomi has added some of its own design elements, so you can find some differences if you look carefully. For example, the earbuds look similar to the AirPods Pro, but they are actually larger than the Apple earbuds. The earbud stem is also thicker. So they have a better fit in your ears.

We all know that the Air 2 Pro (our review here) does not have the best fit, but thanks to the enlarged earbuds and the new design, this issue is no longer a problem. There is a ring of a metal-like decorative strip to make the earbuds look less monotonous. This time the Flipbuds Pro has abandoned the Air 2 Pro’s personality design and changed to a more popular form factor, making it suitable for more people to wear. I think Xiaomi is right to make this change, after all, good wearing comfort and solid active noise cancellation performance of the earbuds are the most basic requirements.

Xiaomi FlipBuds Pro Review: ANC Performance

One of the criteria for identifying good and bad active noise cancellation earbuds is the strength of noise cancellation. Because recently I have been using my own noise-canceling TWS – the Samsung Galaxy Buds Pro, let’s talk about the difference between the Buds Pro and the Flipbuds Pro. 

First of all, let’s look at its disadvantages. Although the earbuds have improved the design to reduce the wind noise, the effect is still relatively poor, and when compared to the Samsung Buds Pro, there is a difference. The Flipbuds Pro’s transparency mode is not as transparent as the Samsung Buds Pro either, but other features of the Flipbuds Pro are basically the same as the Samsung Buds Pro.

There are three noise cancellation modes to choose from, but there is not much difference in noise reduction intensity. The transparency mode has an option to Enhance voice, which when turned on, will slightly degrade the environmental sound and retain the human voice. Considering the price, Flipbuds Pro’s noise cancellation performance is still at a relatively good level.

Xiaomi FlipBuds Pro Review: Sound Quality & Operation

The LHDC encoding on the Xiaomi Air 2 Pro is replaced with aptX Adaptive, a Bluetooth encoding protocol. We’ve seen the same on Redmi Airdots 3, which combines low latency and high sound quality. The tuning style favors heavy bass, the vocals have lower volume, so listening to rock or symphonic music is a more suitable choice. Gaming latency with Xiaomi phones is very low, but for non-Xiaomi phones the latency is very high, if you are not a Xiaomi phone user, you need to pay attention to this.

The Flipbuds Pro is also operated by touch instead of press. Long press to switch to the noise cancellation mode, short press to control the music play and pause, the previous song and the next song. Volume can also be controlled in the earbuds through custom settings. There is another good news too, you can control the Flipbuds Pro settings without using the XiaoAi App. You only need to go into the Bluetooth settings to do all the operations, and the response time of the pop-up animation has become faster too. But you can only enjoy the above features if you are a Xiaomi phone user, otherwise, you still have to use the Chinese XiaoAi APP. The app on Xiaomi phones and non-Xiaomi Android phones is the same, there are no missing features. But the XiaoAI iOS app does not support this earbud yet. 

One feature is particularly interesting, if you do not put your earbuds in the earbud case within three minutes, the phone will remind you that the earbuds are not in the case, which is a very useful feature for users who often lose their earbuds.

This time Flipbuds Pro also supports dual device connection similar to the Huawei FreeBuds Pro, which simply means that you can connect two Bluetooth devices at the same time. When you connect two devices, the earbuds will automatically switch to the device which is playing the audio, without you having to manually switch. The convenience of multi-device switching is even more convenient than the Samsung Buds Pro. 

One might wonder, can it connect to three devices at the same time? The answer is no, if there are three or more devices that need to be switched, they still have to be connected manually. Dual device connectivity should be the biggest highlight on Flipbuds Pro, and I think it’s worth buying it for this feature alone.

Xiaomi FlipBuds Pro Review: Battery Life

We were impressed by the long battery life of the Air 2 Pro, but the Flipbuds Pro does not continue this advantage, with only about 5 hours of battery life with the ANC turned on, and only 22 hours of battery life with the earbud case for charging. So the battery life is just ordinary.

The official price of Flipbuds Pro is $15 more expensive than the Air 2 Pro, but it upgrades the wearing comfort and stability, solves software problems, and enables multiple devices to be connected at the same time. I think these upgrades are still worth the $15. 

Would you consider it as your primary noise-canceling earbuds? Let us know in the comments section.

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TWS earbuds have been in demand for the past few years and Xiaomi is trying to further tap into the market with the launch of the new Flipbuds series in China. The first model in the lineup is the FlipBuds Pro, targeted at a relatively premium segment of the market with Active Noise Cancellation (ANC) and an Airpods Pro-like design.

There’s no denying that the Xiaomi FlipBuds Pro gets its inspiration from the Apple AirPods Pro. The typical short stem design with a curved body looks similar to the Apple earbuds. However, the FlipBuds Pro distinguishes itself with a high-gloss all-black body and it’s the only color available, at least for now. Xiaomi states that the earbuds get a mirror finish thanks to a nano NCVM coating that gives it a premium look.

The new ANC earbuds feature Qualcomm’s QCC5151 ultra-low power audio chip along with 11mm ultra dynamic sound drivers. It supports Bluetooth 5.2 and Xiaomi claims that low-latency activities like gaming shouldn’t be an issue on its new earbuds. As for gestures, it’s very similar to what you get on the Apple AirPods Pro. So long pressing either left or right earbuds will switch between transparency and noise-canceling modes, a single press will play/pause/ accept calls, a double press will move to the next music track or reject calls.

The new FlipBuds Pro can also seamlessly switch between your smartphone and your laptop (Dual Device Intelligent Connection). You can also connect two pairs of these earbuds to a single smartphone or laptop to share the audio output between two people.

Coming to its noise-canceling performance, the Xiaomi FlipBuds Pro can officially block up to 40dB of noise in its strongest ANC setting. You can choose between three levels of ANC like daily, office, and travel, depending on your environment for the optimum noise cancellation performance. You get these settings via the MIUI pop-up settings menu (on Xiaomi phones) or the XiaoAI app on other Android smartphones.

The FlipBuds Pro comes in an oval charging case which you can charge via USB-C port or a wireless charger. The company promises 28 hours of battery life in total with the case and up to 7 hours of playback on a single charge. The earbuds support fast charging so you can get up to 2 hours of playback in just 5 minutes of charging with the case.

The Xiaomi FlipBuds Pro will go on sale from May 21 across all sales channels in China at a retail price of 799 yuan (~$124).

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The post Xiaomi launches FlipBuds Pro with Active Noise Cancellation in China appeared first on Gizmochina.

Since Apple released the AirPods Pro, almost every brand has decided to follow-up with its own wireless earbuds with active noise cancellation. Xiaomi also released one earlier this month, the Air 2 Pro. As a brand popular for bringing high-end features to the affordable market, can the Xiaomi Air 2 Pro replicate the success of its other products?

Let’s find out.

Xiaomi Air 2 Pro Review: Design 

For design, the case of the Air 2 Pro has inherited a typical Xiaomi style as what we have seen on the previous Xiaomi earbuds products. It’s still shaped as a cuboid with rounded squares and can stay upright on a table. But the size is slightly bigger and it weighs a bit more, making it even larger than the Huawei FreeBuds Pro.

With this in your pocket, there wouldn’t be much space left as you still need to carry your phone. At the back, there is a lightning icon to remind you that it supports wireless charging. And considering the price tag, no doubt supporting wireless charging is a must. And the opening and closing experience of the case is much better than others as it also uses a magnetic design. 

When we open the case, the build quality and matte finish of the earbuds are pretty impressive. And the fine ceramic touch panel on the surface of the earbuds really caught our eyes at first glance.

Since this ceramic panel is used for touch-interaction, it may start collecting a lot of fingerprints. But we have to give credit where it’s due – the design of the Air 2 Pro is pretty special, as it does not follow AirPods-style design like many rival brands. 

Xiaomi Air 2 Pro Review: ANC Performance

Now let’s check out its performance of noise cancellation. In this round, we are gonna take the Huawei Freebuds Pro as a reference. Well, sorry to tell you that you get what you pay for. After we tested the earbuds under different environments including light noise areas like office and heavy-noise like roadside and school streets, our testers reached an agreement that the noise-canceling performance of the Air 2 Pro is a bit weaker than the Huawei Freebuds Pro, and they estimated that it could reach only 80% of the Freebuds Pro’s performance. The Air 2 Pro also didn’t handle wind noise well. When you are walking on a windy day with the Air 2 Pro in your ears, the wind noise can come in between your listening experience. Even though you try to keep the earbuds firm in your ears, it only reaches around 60% of the Freebuds Pro’s anti-wind-noise effect.

But on the other hand, we have noticed that the Air 2 Pro is around 50 bucks cheaper than the Freebuds Pro, so actually, it still lived up to our expectations. And about wearing experience, the testers felt that the Air 2 Pro handled ear pressure better than the Freebuds Pro when the noise canceling was turned on. 

The default ear tips of the Air 2 Pro do not really fit most ears well. Because most testers feel the fit to be a bit loose, it may also result in an insufficient noise canceling effect. But inside the box, Xiaomi provided 4 more pairs of silicone tips for replacement. So, we suggest using the largest one if you have a similar experience.

Xiaomi Air 2 Pro Review: Battery Life 

And if you are a heavy earbuds user, battery life should be another important buying factor. The Air 2 Pro has excellent battery performance. In the noise-canceling mode, my colleague used it for 5 hours and the power dropped by only 50%, which is the best battery performance for an ANC earbud that we’ve tested so far. You should get around 7-8 hours of playback on a single charge. 

Xiaomi Air 2 Pro Review: Operation

When connected to a Xiaomi device, you can change additional settings for Air 2 Pro in the official voice assistant App, XiaoAi. Or without the phone, you can have some default interaction with the earbuds. 

For example, double-click the left earbud to wake the voice assistant; double click the right one to play and pause music or video, and long-press either one for 5 seconds to switch between noise-canceling mode and transparency mode. But switching modes over the earbuds is really annoying. For example, in order to turn on the Noise canceling mode from the transparent mode, I have to put my finger on the touch panel for at least 10 seconds. Because I need to press for 5 seconds to switch to the ‘Transparency Off’ first and then another 5 seconds for the noise-canceling to turn ON. It’s really not a smart design to let users wait over 10 seconds for a simple operation. 

Even if you are not using a Xiaomi phone, all the functions that we just mentioned are also accessible. All you need to do is to download the XiaoAi App. And then probably the only difference is that there is no pop-up window on non-Xiaomi devices. You have to manually connect it to the Bluetooth list. But note that, XiaoAi only supports the Chinese language. If you are not good at Chinese, the app will be a bit useless, although there were some interesting features and setups for the earbuds.

Otherwise, all the basic interaction and features can still work well without the app, including the same noise-canceling strength.

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Xiaomi Air 2 Pro Review: Audio & Latency

In the last part, let’s go check out the sound quality and latency of the Air 2 Pro. Well, it should be noted that the firmware we are using is 3.0.12. And the officials have promised that the lower-latency mode and new Bluetooth codec LHDC would come in the next few firmware updates. It means that under low-latency mode the earbuds will be better for gaming and video play, while with the new efficient LHDC codec, its sound quality will be improved.

Right now, the Air 2 Pro has a 0.6-second delay when playing games on Xiaomi phones, while on the other brands’ devices, the sound output is delayed for 0.8-second.

The Air 2 Pro’s mid and low frequencies sound excellent, with crisp output, which is even more impressive than what we have with the Huawei Freebuds Pro. But its high frequencies were not as outstanding as the lows, and it sounds pretty close to what we had on the Freebuds Pro. 

Xiaomi Air 2 Pro Review: Verdict

In short, we can say that the Air 2 Pro’s active noise cancelation is still good enough to handle most conditions. However, if I’m not going to pay over 200 US dollars for earbuds, there are only a handful of options that provide excellent value for money. And the Air 2Pro is one of them. Although it can’t successfully challenge some more expensive earbuds in departments like noise-canceling and wearing comfort, the Air 2 Pro still has a unique appearance design, impressive battery life, and a really affordable price tag. And we’re really looking forward to its firmware update. If there are any new developments after the update, we’ll let you know.

The Air 2 Pro earbuds is currently available for international shipping via Giztop for $129. Also, if you want to check out more pictures of the new Xiaomi earbuds,  check out our earlier Air 2 Pro hands-on here.

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