Sennheiser Urbanite review

In recent times, headphones have become as much a fashion accessory as a way of listening to music, and people are now paying just as much attention to colours and materials as they are to drivers and frequency response. This has led to ever more fashion-inspired headphones such as Sennheiser’s Urbanite on-ear headphones. Sennheiser, at least, has a rich heritage in high-quality audio, but the Urbanite is its first real foray into fashion headphones.

The Urbanite headphones are supra-aural, which means they rest on your ears instead of enveloping them as circumaural headphones do. The velour earpads are comfortable but not up to the same comfort levels as the alcantara material used on Sennheiser’s Momentum headphones. The headband has a denim-like texture, and the material and comes in a variety of colours including black, blue, sand and two multi-coloured options. Of course, beauty is subjective, but we didn’t find the headbands design to be as attractive as those of the Momentum range.

The Urbanite is designed to collapse down to a smaller, more portable size. The hinges are stainless steel and the headphones overall feel very well constructed. You can adjust the size by sliding the earcups up and down an aluminium rail. There are no distinct ridges on the rail so you’re not limited to specific increments.

The Urbanite uses a flat, rubberised detachable 1.2m cable with an integrated three-button remote control and microphone. Just like other the features of the Urbanite, the cable felt well made, as did the connections at either end.

With a low impedance of just 18 ohms the Urbanite doesn’t require much to drive it, so you won’t need to crank up the volume on your connected device. The Urbanite has a distinctly warmer sound compared to the Momentum series. There’s a much stronger emphasis to the low-frequencies, providing far more bass presence although it is still far more restrained than other urban-styled headphones we’ve heard.

As for sound quality, although there’s a definite emphasis on bass we were pleased to hear the bass remain tight, with no loss of detail in the mid and treble ranges. While the Sennheiser Momentum has a much more neutral sound, which makes them more suitable for analytical listening, the Urbanite provides added energy to hip-hop and electronic music.

The Urbanites live up to Sennheiser’s reputation for excellent sound, and are a great choice if you’re a fan of bassy music such as hip-hop or house and want a Sennheiser-branded set of headphones. However, we still prefer the Sennheiser Momentum On-Ear headphones because of their classier design and a more generous amount of bundled accessories, such as a hard case and a choice of two cables. As the momentums are older they can often be bought at a bargain price.