Sony is in a league of its own making some of thebest wireless headphones. Its flagship products like theWF-1000XM4 earbudsand WH-1000XM5 headphones deserve a large share of the credit, even though people have recently reportedmajor issues with the former. Now, we have our first look at the WF-1000XM5 true-wireless earbuds and the accompanying charging case ahead of their official debut.
Given the stellar performance and reputation of the WF-1000XM4 buds, people have high expectations for their successor. We may need to wait a while to hear anything from Sony officially, butThe Walkman Blogobtained leaked images of the upcoming earbuds undergoing testing for certification (viaAndroidAuthority).
The earbuds
Starting with the earbuds themselves, the leaked images suggest the WF-1000XM5 will sport a slimmer, more compact shape compared to the current-generation model. The base of the buds — the surface that touches your ears — is sculpted instead of flat, so it sits better in your ears. An older FCC filing revealed the other side of the earbuds which will face outwards when in use will be a control surface, as always, supporting touch interaction to control music playback. The touch panel will also integrate the Bluetooth antenna.
The tactile dot is also unmoved from its usual spot on the left earbud. Just above it, Sony provides a hole in the case, but it isn’t clear if this is for better active noise cancelation (ANC) performance or for voice capture. Another oddity that’s immediately apparent is the gloss black plastic used to create this prototype. It is unclear if this is the production spec for the earbuds, which usually sport hard matte-finish plastic.
Pictures of the insides of the earbuds reveal a lot of delicate circuitry. Teardowns for repair could be tricky business because the antenna connector appears to be soldered on. Labeled as 3 and 4 in the images below, there seem to be two contacts for drivers. While Sony could keep the XM4’s single-driver design, it’s worth noting theLinkBuds Shas one speaker driver and only one such pair of contacts.
The charging case
There are quite a few changes in the WF-1000XM5 charging case design, but none of them are revolutionary. For starters, the case is better rounded and more like a river pebble, further smoothing out the few creases the WF-1000XM4 case has. It could be smaller than the current-generation case, but there are no pictures with a ruler in frame to say for certain. The body is finished in matte plastic, a promising sign the buds will get the same treatment.
The leaked images reveal Sony switching from a three-pin design to just two charging pins per earbud. Sony’s earbud battery recharging specifications of the upcoming model are 5V 230mAh instead of 5V 140mAh, indicating larger earbud battery capacity, or a lower charging time for them. The charging indicator light has also moved from inside the case to the outside.
As expected of flagship earbuds, Qi wireless charging is on offer, but we believe an improvement in the charging speed is unlikely. USB-C is also standard. A quick look at the PCB housed in the charging case reveals the main microcontroller will be unchanged from the WF-1000XM4, although larger flash memory could be in the cards. The Walkman Blog isn’t too sure of the benefits of larger flash memory, but it could help speed up firmware updates for the buds, which sometimes take up to an hour at present.
Besides confirming the speculation and choice of material for the earbuds, there isn’t much left to glean from Sony’s official announcement when it comes, although more software features would go a long way towards helping the new model rank among thebest wireless earbuds. We just hope these buds don’t suffer from battery bloating issues because they don’t seem as easy to open up and repair.
Sony WF-1000XM4
Sony’s WF-1000XM4 are some of the best wireless earbuds money can buy thanks to stellar active noise cancelation and fantastic audio. The buds recently received an update to enable multipoint audio, so they’re an excellent value proposition at their current discounted price.
