Budget TWS earbuds are a dime a dozen these days and if you’ve been searching thoroughly you’ve probably come across the Soundcore liberty 5.
It’s cheap, it’s got ANC, and if you ask sound core, they’re gonna say it’s one of their best sounding TWS earbuds yet. But is it the best option for you? Lets find out.
What’s good
The design and build quality
These are genuinely one of the most trendy looking TWS earbuds I’ve tested recently and that’s saying a lot, cause I’ve gone through pretty much everything from brands like QCY and Haylou in the last few weeks.
I mean, look at the case, and let me put side by side with a similarly priced bud from Nothing – the CMF buds 2a. I like this one better.
The buds themselves look very premium, probably better than my current favorite in the QCY line up the Melobuds pro. And they feel solid too, so much that if I lied to you that these cost just you’d probably believe.
They’ve even got a designated groove for touch control, that’s a first in this price range. It’s a well made TWS earbud.
Everything feels posh
From the Soundcore app, to how the touch controls work, down to the proximity sensor which automatically detects whether the buds are in ear or not, everything works like a charm.
So I literally had these connected to my Umidigi Note 100 and I wasn’t really feeling the sound quality, so I wanted to switch to my Pixel Pro Fold just to see if it was the audio quality from the Note 100 messing things up and what do you know there’s a prompt on my pixel saying hey, do you want connect to your Liberty 5 buds, they’re nearby – nothing from QCY does that I can tell you.
It’s easy to just see how everything works smoothly on the liberty 5 and just take out for granted, but I’ll tell you that it matters you’ll notice overtime and it just makes using this bud feel very very smooth.
Battery life
You’ll get five hours of active listening time on the liberty 5. That’s very good for battery life all things considered. It’s not the best out there but five hours is pretty much standard for TWS earbuds at this form factor.
On standby these can stay on for more than 48 hours and with the carry case able to provide up to four 0-100 charges you can easily go a week without having to plug these in to a charging brick.
What’s bad
Sound quality
I had hard time classifying the sound quality under the weaker points of the liberty 5. To be honest it’s not a bad sounding earbud, I just feel there’s room for improvement.
My biggest issue with the sound quality is the sound clarity. There’s a bit of muffling with the trebles so vocals on these buds feel hazy especially at higher listening volumes. Remember how I said I needed to switch from my Note 100 to my pixel, well I did and while the haziness did cool off a bit it was still there.
Again, overall this sounds good, it’s a balanced soundstage, bass is punchy, mids are pronounced and even trebles sound decent. But, there are better sounding earbuds, many of them cheaper which leads to the next issue.
The price
I ordered this in batch with some of the QCY buds I recently tested and because those were in the $30 range at the time (they’re cheaper now even) I thought this was in that range too. Turns out, these cost a handsome $70.
Now it’s a very well made TWS earbuds, it works flawlessly, and sounds good. Problem is I can show you other well made TWS earbuds, that work good, maybe not flawlessly, but good and sound incredible.
Notice how I said sound incredible, and not just sound good, yeah there are buds on the market that in my opinion sound way better than the Liberty 5 and cost just a fraction of what Soundcore are trying to charge you for this bud.
Should you buy the Soundcore Liberty 5
I’m a sucker for things that look and feel good, there’s a reason the design segment comes before anything in my reviews. The Liberty 5 is undoubtedly the best looking and best built budget TWS earbud I’ve tested so far.
But, and there’s always a but, that win in design is not enough for me to recommend them over most of the other good stuff I’ve tried, especially considering the fact that some of those other options look and feel good as well. More importantly they sound better in my opinion and are cheaper.
If I was in the market for a budget TWS earbud the Liberty 5 is not where I’d stop my search.
