- Great noise-cancelling and transparency mode
- Good battery life
- Works well with iOS and Android
- Frustrating controls
- No autopause
The successor to the Beats Studio 3, the Beats Studio Pro are a big improvement in a lot of ways.
Beats has continued to broaden its horizons to more users, with better options for Android customers. With the majority of changes happening under the hood, including the addition of transparency mode and USB-C for the first time, the Beats Studio Pro are better but a few frustrations leave them short of hitting best.
Big sound, small problems
The Beats Studio Pro have a well-rounded profile, a little less bassy then you might expect from Beats. Although you’ll still get the full experience of bass and sub-bass like in Carly Rae Jensen’s "I Didn’t Just Come Here To Dance" and Fred again’s "Marea (we’ve lost dancing)" sounds as good as ever. However, if adjustable EQ is your thing, you won’t find it here.
Active noise cancellation on the Beats Studio Pro is really good. Great even, but not best. I wouldn’t say it blocked out the outside world completely with the beautiful silent bubble effect some earbuds can achieve, but even in a busy gym running alongside someone else on the next treadmill over, I was able to enjoy my morning podcast without disruption. The transparency mode is pretty good as well, lacking that artificial sound that is often the experience.
My biggest gripe with ANC and transparency is that it’s annoying to move between them. The power and pairing button which also cycles through noise management with a double press is quite small and located just below the Beats symbol on one side. I often found myself fumbling to find it. To compensate I largely just stayed in one mode the whole time, resting the headphones on my neck if I needed to not be in ANC or or using my phone to adjust.
With the play/pause and call controls located on one Beats symbol button on the opposite side and the volume buttons located in the surrounding ring on there, I don’t understand what prevented them from doing something with the other controls on the reverse. An issue I had with the main buttons is that because they're all mechanical they're quite loud whenever you're double pressing to skip forward or back or even just adjusting the volume.
The Beats Studio Pro looks great for a pair of headphones with a nice rounded design, not much at all of a departure from the design of the Beats Studio 3. The Beats Solo 4 which were released afterwards is cut from the same cloth which makes it hard to see the Beats Studio Pro stand out as the "Pro" product. They do come in a broader range of colours including nuetrals Black, Deep Brown, Navy and Sandstone and additionally some Kim Kardashian Special Edition colours in nude tones. Moon (which we tested), Dune and Earth. Thankfully, you don’t have to pay more for the privilege. The latter come with a matching colour soft case with a couple of inside pockets, a matching USB-C charging cable (which also allows for lossless audio) and a matching aux cable. This is all in the box for the base colours too, although they're not colour-matched.
I found the experience with lossless audio while connected to my Mac compared with being connected via Bluetooth to have minimal difference. Nathan Micay’s emotive electronic score behind HBO’s Industry was just as rich and resonant connected either way to my non-audiophile ears.
Hit and miss
The Beats Studio Pro ear cups have been redesigned with a new mix of leather and memory foam. Depending on total use for the day I could leave them on for an extended period of time but would find I needed to give my ears a rest at the end of the work day. The fit is nice although it may not withstand an extended headbang session if that’s your type of thing.
While they certainly look good (the Moon colourway grew on me), I found that they are a little tricky to clean. While a lightly damp cloth easily cleaned most of the surface of the Beats Studio Pro, I had a harder time with where the band and controls connect to the ear cup. Here the softer foam catches all kinds of dust and debris and while it has some give you can't really manoeuvre much to wipe it clean. And it's noticeably an issue on lighter-coloured sets.
Battery life on the Beats Studio Pro is great at up to 40 hours of listening time – without noise-cancelling or transparency on, and 24 hours when they are. Although it's not as good as 50 hours which you’ll find on the cheaper Beats Solo 4 and other over-ear headphones released this year.
Thankfully the Beats Studio Pro have fast charging, which gives you up to four hours of playback from just a quick 10-minute charge — this often saved me in a pinch. Products such as these with long battery life always fall under the radar and drop out of my nightly charging routine.
The fact there's no auto-off or smart pause added to this problem. Auto-pause is a fairly standard inclusion at this price point with headphones having sensors that automatically pause when they detect you've removed them from your head. As someone who sometimes spends hours at my desk immersed in music or listening to podcasts smart pause is essential to me. It’s not until it’s taken away that you realise how much you miss it.
Take the Beats Studio Pro off to quickly go do something, return five minutes later and you’ve got to work out where you were up to in your podcast episode. Plus, with no auto-off, the headphones with media paused just continued to drain the battery for hours on end while they were sat at the end of my bed or desk. Most products these days have some sort of standby mode they default to.
The Beats Studio Pro are fairly cross-compatible. Just about anything you can do with paired one ecosystem, you can do in the other including Apple and Google Find My services. You can use one-touch pairing if you're an iOS user or Google Fast Pairing if you’re an Android user so the Beats Studio Pro are a little easier to connect to.
However, there’s unfortunately only limited audio switching on the Beats Studio Pro. It's a feature that simply feels like magic with audio products that do have it and it's a bit disappointing that it's not fully available for all users on a "Pro" product.
For those in the Apple world, the Beats Studio Pro are automatically paired to every device with the same Apple ID. You have to manually select them as an output source on each. By comparison, AirPods do this automatically.
Android users get proper audio switching on the Beats Studio Pro. They can be connected up to two devices at once, such as an Android phone and a PC.
On the plus side, Apple gets Spatial Audio with Dolby Atmos. I didn’t have a chance to test this myself, my current music app of choice, Spotify, doesn’t natively support spatial audio.
Beats Studio Pro - Final Thoughts
The Beats Studio Pro have made a pretty bold leap with cross-platform functionality catering to both Apple and Android users. But they fall short with a few hiccups in the process. They’ve had to become less Apple-y at the cost of broad appeal which may ruffle some feathers with long-time users.
Beats have proved themselves to be Pros in the sound department but the lack of auto-pause, minimal design changes, and poor control locations leave you wanting for more from a "Pro" level product at this price tag. In saying that, chances are these days you can find it for for much less than the RRP.
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