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Mu6 Ring open-air headphones review: Affordable headphones with notches for spectacles

Written by Eileen Brown, Contributor
Mu6 Ring open air headphones review affordable great sounding headphones with cool notches for spectacles zdnet

Mu6 Ring headphones

8.2 / 5
Excellent

pros and cons

Pros
  • Comfortable to wear
  • Notch for spectacles
  • Long playing time
Cons
  • Difficult to wear if you have lots of curly hair
  • Minimal bass range

The new Mu 6 Ring open-air headphones are sleek and comfortable with a great fit and good sound. It is easy to forget that you are wearing them. They have a good-sized 200mAh battery so you can play music all day without noticing that you are wearing them.

Inside the box, there are the headphones, a USB charging cable, a nylon storage bag, and a warranty card. There is also a set of reflective stickers that affix to the headset and will reflect if light shines in your direction in the dark.

The headphones are really simple to use. Light at 35g, it is easy to forget you are wearing them. Put them on, press the multi-function button on the right-hand side of the headset, adjust the ends of the headset down to position them in front of your ears, connect to Bluetooth, and play your music.

The multi-function button also acts as a volume control, will pause and play music, and manage phone calls. It really is a simple device.

As soon as you switch the headphones on, Bluetooth pairing occurs. Pairing is quick and easy and there are no hiccups during music play. You can connect the Mu6 Ring headphones to multiple devices, too -- useful if you use a PC, phone, and tablet during your day.

These headphones are not bone-conduction headphones. Rather, the speaker sits just in front of your ear playing music directly into your ear shell.

If you wear glasses, there is a slot for the arms of your glasses to fit into so you do not notice that you are wearing the headphones as well as your spectacles.

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Playtime -- or talk time -- is over 8 hours so you can easily use the Mu6 Ring headphones all day. If you take them off and forget to turn them off, they will automatically turn off after 10 minutes.

There is an unobtrusive micro-USB port hidden beneath a silicone cover that takes less than an hour to recharge the headset.

Sound quality is good in the mid and upper ranges, but this headset will not delight you if you are into booming bass. However, the sound is good and clear with no distortion, and voice calls are good.

There is little to dislike about these headphones. Others who sit close to you might notice a little sound pollution if you turn the volume up too much whilst playing your music. It is not too irritating, so I am told.

But I think some of you will have problems wearing them. The headphones fit snugly on heads with short-cropped hair.

However, if you have tousled masses of curls -- or an ultra-thick head of hair -- you will have problems getting these headphones to sit properly on your head. I had to fix my hair in a ponytail before I could position the Ring headset in a position that would not slip.

So, for short-haired wearers who want an unobtrusive set of headphones and do not mind the lack of bass sounds, then at under $60, the Mu6 Ring headphones could be just perfect for you. 

And, if you do have masses of hair and manage to get them to stay on all day, do please let me know how you did it.