This is the second time this year that you can pick up JBL’s Tune Buds at only $49.95. The only other time was just earlier this month! And at only $49.95, these make great truly wireless earbuds for work, and for playtime, if your belt is a bit tight this Black Friday. “How so?” You ask? They punch above their weight at this price point, with their feature set.
With ANC on, you get 10 hours of battery life which is pretty good for earbuds at this price point. And that ANC is decent, though there are earbuds with more robust cancellation which will cost you three or four times the price. There’s also Ambient Aware and TalkThru modes which allow sound in from your environment if you’re going to wear these on the street or in an office situation where you may need to have some conversations with them still in your ears. But let’s say that environment is the gym, or outdoors? The Tune Buds have an IP54 rating so they’re going to do well against sweaty gym goers, or commuters in wetter climates.
If money is tight, these offer a lot for just $49.99
Now look, these aren’t going to give you the biggest sound stage at this price. And they’re a fairly no frills package, though they do come in a few different colors to up the ante on what is otherwise a pretty pedestrian design.
The case charges via USB-C and the buds should get you around 10 hours of playback with an additional 30 hours from the case. You’ll also get 4 hours extra use from a 15 minute charge. The Tune Buds feature a V-curve sound signature but have a pretty solid app which comes with an equalizer so that you can tune them to your liking and back off the highs and lows so that you get a bit more balanced sound signature.
The Tune Buds are controlled via touch which offers the usual play/pause, skip, call answer, call end, and the ability to switch between ANC modes, and invoke your voice assistant. You can even set Alexa as your voice assistant instead of your phone’s default. All of the advanced commands can be modified using the JBL Headphones App. For only $49.99 you’ll also get multipoint pairing, allowing you to connect to two devices simultaneously.
One of the things I love about the space we’re in right now is that you can actually get solid performing audio without having to spend hundreds, if you temper your expectations, or aren’t an audiophile. And that’s a good thing.
