Sony LinkBuds Fit review: Passing the Fit and proper earbuds test

The Sony LinkBuds Fit are one of two new entries in a Sony wireless earbuds range I have mixed feelings about. The original LinkBuds had a novel design but let in too much external sound to be viable for general use. The LinkBuds S, however, impressed me with their combination of a comfortable fit, decent ANC and Sony’s handy Adaptive Sound Control.

Fortunately, it’s the latter from which the LinkBuds Fit take their design cues. And, perhaps unsurprisingly, I like them for many of the same reasons. Achieving an optimal fit can be a faff, but once they’re snugly in your ears, they’re among the most comfortable earbuds around.

The selection of features available in Sony’s new Sound Connect app is comprehensive and,  while other earbuds offer superior noise cancellation, the LinkBuds Fit balance the attenuation of external noise with environmental awareness successfully.

Sony LinkBuds Fit review: What do you get for the money?

The LinkBuds Fit are available in four colours – white, black, green and violet – all of which will set you back £179. Sony also offers post-purchase colour customisation options in the form of case covers at £17 each and what it calls “Air Fitting Supporters” at £8 a pair – a fancy name for what other brands refer to as wing tips. These help secure the buds in your ears and you get one pair in the box along with four different-sized pairs of eartips to seal off your ear canals.

The buds weigh 4.9g apiece, are IPX4-rated for water resistance and house 8.4mm drivers with a stated frequency response of 20Hz to 40kHz – if you’re using Sony’s high-resolution LDAC codec. Also supported over Bluetooth 5.3 are the SBC, AAC and LC3 codecs.

The earbuds have a quoted battery life of 5hrs 30mins with active noise cancellation on and 8hrs with it switched off. The pill box-shaped case delivers around three full charges, taking total playtime to an estimated 21 hours (ANC on) or 28 hours (ANC off), but it doesn’t support wireless charging.

These figures will fluctuate based on which features you engage via Sony’s Sound Connect app. This is an updated version of Headphones Connect and provides access to EQ presets, control customisation options and several other features.

Speak-to-Chat, which automatically pauses music when you’re talking, is joined by a new Background Music Effect option, while Sony’s upscaling technology, DSEE Extreme, is present and correct alongside support for 360 Reality Audio.

There’s also Bluetooth multipoint pairing, auto pausing when an earbud is removed and Auto Switch, a feature that lets you transfer audio output between the buds and the new Sony LinkBuds Speaker automatically when you take the earbuds out of your ears and pop them back in the charging case.

Sony LinkBuds Fit review: What do they do well?

The LinkBuds Fit are among the least obtrusive and most comfortable true wireless earbuds I’ve tested. Achieving an effective noise-blocking seal took a bit of work – more on that later – but the super-soft eartips and wing tips created a “barely there” feeling that allowed me to wear the buds for hours on end without issue.

Once in your ears, the LinkBuds Fit’s suite of tools means you won’t have to fish your phone from your pocket too often. There are touch controls – picked up on the buds but also in the immediate area around your ears – as well as head gestures for receiving and declining calls and a choice of in-house or third-party voice controls.

It seems offering proprietary voice commands is all the rage – Bose did the same with its QC Earbuds – and Sony has implemented it equally well here. Simply say “Hey Headphones” followed by a specific command (such as “Play Music” or “Check battery”) and the buds will respond in an accurate and impressively rapid fashion.

Central to the wonderfully fluid Sony headphones experience is Adaptive Sound Control, which switches between the noise cancellation and ambient sound modes automatically, based on your activity levels – in Sony-speak, whether you’re “Staying”, “Walking”, “Running or “Riding a Vehicle”.

You’re free to choose which setting is engaged for each action and, as has been the case with every pair of Sony headphones I’ve tested it on, it works brilliantly here. Whether I was on the train to work, walking to the shop on my lunch break, sitting at my desk or pounding out the kilometres on the treadmill, the buds always adjusted accordingly. It’s also possible to have the headphones adapt based on your location: just register those places on the map in the app, associate them with the setting you want and they will kick in when you get there.

New to the LinkBuds Fit is Auto Ambient Sound; an extension of the Ambient Sound modes found on other Sony noise-cancelling headphones. Rather than allowing a set level of noise into your ears, this adjusts how much is filtered in based on what’s going on around you. This did a good job keeping me tuned in to my surroundings on its Standard setting, but I’d recommend avoiding the Low Sensitivity option if you don’t want to be overwhelmed with a barrage of unnecessary audio information.

The rest of the features on offer in the Sound Connect app are also, by and large, worthwhile inclusions. Speak-to-Chat proved very useful while using the buds in the office, where I would regularly need to engage colleagues in conversation, DSEE Extreme is a handy tool for making low-quality recordings sound that little bit sharper and multipoint pairing is a must-have on modern headphones. EQ presets and the ability to create a custom EQ are always welcome, though I didn’t find the LinkBuds Fit’s default sound signature required a huge amount of tweaking.

The LinkBuds Fit’s powers of detail retrieval are impressive and the dynamic and rhythmic astuteness that characterised the flagship Sony WF-1000XM5 is evident here, too, although to a lesser degree. The buds had no problem keeping up as Linkin Park’s The Emptiness Machine picked up pace, nor did they flounder when transitioning between placid and more frantic elements of the track. Both the male and female vocals possessed engaging clarity and tone. 

The presence of LDAC support means you’ve got access to 32-bit streaming at 990Kbits/sec, giving the LinkBuds Fit the edge over options such as the AirPods 4 and Bose QuietComfort Earbuds, for compatible Android smartphone owners at least.

The new Background Music Effect option is less of a must-have, though. This uses digital signal processing to create soundstages resembling either a small room, living room or cafe. It doesn’t add in extra elements to make it feel like you’re listening in those environments – so you’re safe from idle chatter and the whine of your hoover – but instead virtualises the aforementioned spaces.

This had a practical benefit when I was in the office: music sounded less immediate and intense in my ears, allowing me to enjoy what I was listening to while working without suffering sensory overload. You could just turn the sound down a bit, but I found the additional distance the BGM settings provided more effective for maintaining focus.

Sony LinkBuds Fit review: What could they do better?

While I loved how the LinkBuds Fit felt when wearing them, I found myself having to do a lot of fiddling to create an effective seal in my ear canals. The eartips are so thin and malleable that even if they’re slightly maladjusted, the sound quality suffers hugely, so it’s well worth persisting if, at first, you don’t get it right.

Even with an optimal seal, though, I didn’t feel the LinkBuds Fit attenuated sound quite as effectively as the Sony WF-1000XM5 or the Bose QC Earbuds I reviewed recently. They use the same Integrated Processor V2 and Auto NC Optimizer as Sony’s flagship buds but lack the HD Noise Cancelling Processor QN2e and aren’t quite as good at dimming low-frequency sounds. This was evident during my commute when the rumble of the Tube was more clearly audible over my music than with those aforementioned buds.

However, the LinkBuds Fit are a darned sight better than the standard Sony LinkBuds, and create a much quieter environment in which to enjoy audio. The design of the latter – and their successors, the new LinkBuds Open – provides little to no resistance against the penetration of external sound.

On the audio front, the LinkBuds Fit are perhaps a little overzealous in their low-end reproduction. There’s a lot of weight here, which isn’t a bad thing – as regular readers of my reviews will know, I love a healthy helping of bass – but it isn’t as well-defined as the similarly priced Bose QC Earbuds. The difference is minor, but I noticed the deeper bass notes on Origin Unknown’s Valley of the Shadows were just a touch rougher around the edges.

More irritating was the LinkBuds Fit’s execution of touch controls. Here they proved consistently inconsistent; I lost count of the number of times I tapped on the buds without getting a response. I found Sony’s “wide area taps” – where you tap in the vicinity of the buds – worked better but still had the occasional hiccup.

Sony LinkBuds Fit review: Should you buy them?

It’s hard to keep track of the countless pairs of capable noise-cancelling earbuds available at the LinkBuds Fit’s price point. All the big manufacturers have them and, honestly, there’s not a great deal to choose between them.

This particular pair are best suited to those who prioritise a comfortable fit and the ability to tune into the outside world while listening to music. If that’s you, I can’t see you being disappointed with your purchase.

Their Ambient Mode options are fantastic and I found myself forgetting I had earbuds in on more than one occasion. The LinkBuds Fit look more discreet than many of their peers, too, and have the advantage of Sony’s super-smart Adaptive Sound Control, which I love. Sound quality and noise cancellation may not be quite as stellar but it would be unfair to suggest that these aspects significantly undermine the LinkBuds Fit’s appeal.