Huawei FreeClip review: earphones that let you hear everything
1/2/2024
Translation: Julia Graham
FreeClip are Huawei’s first open-ear headphones. They boast an eye-catching design and let you be aware of your surroundings while listening to good music.
Open-ear models are the current design trend in the world of headphones. The FreeClip marks Huawei’s move to bring visually striking models to the table. In terms of sound, they can keep up with classic true wireless models but leave a lot to be desired when it comes to the controls. The fact you can hear your surroundings at all times is intentional.
Striking design and incredibly comfortable
When I show my family the FreeClip earphones for the first time, I get a few snide comments. «You don’t have enough tattoos for eye-catching earrings like that», «they’d look better if you had tunnel earrings» and «rings like that go in your nose». There’s one thing Huawei has certainly achieved, and that’s making the FreeClip stand out.
Source: Jan Johannsen
Huawei talks about a C-bridge design. This name comes from the bracket between the acoustic sphere and the bean-shaped «comfort element», which looks like a C. The acoustic sphere loudspeaker floats in front of your ear canal, allowing ambient noise to reach it. What’s known as the comfort bean is the corresponding part behind your earlobe. It provides support and also houses some of the technical components
Source: Jan Johannsen
The 5.6 g earphones sit comfortably and firmly in my ears. I’m not afraid of losing them. But it’s a different story when I’m wearing a hat. As soon as I pull something over my ears, the FreeClip press uncomfortably. Classic true wireless models are a better choice in cold weather. What is practical, however, is that it doesn’t matter which earbud I put in – they fit both right and left. Not only that, they recognise which earpiece is in which ear and adjust the stereo sound accordingly.
Good sound with not a lot of bass
I’m impressed by the quality of the sound coming out of these little speaker spheres. The built-in 10.8 mm dual-magnet drivers do a great job, provided your surroundings aren’t too loud. As a result, the following statements only apply when it’s quiet around me.
Source: Jan Johannsen
The bass is less noticeable than in-ear headphones, which sit directly in my ear canal. The available low notes are subtle and unobtrusive. If you want to feel the bass, the FreeClip are definitely not the earphones for you.
I really like the way they render trebles and mids. They’re clearly distinguishable, and I like the fact the two are so well in tune with each other. Compared with good-sounding in-ear models, the FreeClip don’t display any downsides and can easily keep pace with them. Specifically, I’m thinking of the FreeBuds Pro 3, which are also Huawei models. However, what’s missing for excellent overall sound is the bass.
Source: Jan Johannsen
I think it’s quite impressive that only I can hear the audio from my FreeClip. They emit sound in such a targeted way that even someone sitting next to me on the bus or train can’t hear it.
Huawei has built three microphones into each earbud for phone calls. These pick up your voice and the surroundings in order to filter out the latter. That’s what makes you easy to understand in conversations. The only minor criticism I received from people on the phone was that there was a lot of reverb. It sounded like I was in a much larger space than my living room. However, this doesn’t have a negative impact on comprehension.
Limited gestures for operating
The Huawei FreeClip are easy to use. You can double or triple tap the earphones anywhere you like. The company has omitted simple tapping, which is good in my book, as I’d end up doing that far too often by mistake.
By default, you double-tap to start and pause audio playback. This is also how you answer or end a call. Triple tapping, meanwhile, takes you to the next track. You can alter this gesture configuration in Huawei’s AI Life app. The other two setting options for triple tap are skipping back to the previous track or starting your voice assistant on the connected device. You can also define different actions for the right and left earbud. That’s the basic controls covered, but I do miss having the function to control the volume.
Source: Jan Johannsen
I also have four different sound effects to choose from in the app, which amplify the bass, trebles or vocals. It doesn’t have an equaliser for individual settings. Instead, you can see which two devices the FreeClip is connected to. The earphones then allow you to seamlessly switch between devices, regardless of whether they run on iOS, Android or Windows.
Long battery life
The FreeClip boast very long battery life with a maximum of eight hours. At 55 mAh each, the built-in batteries are no larger than those in other true wireless models. But they also don’t need to power noise cancellation. Together with the 510 mAh battery in their charging case, the total runtime increases to as much as 36 hours.
Source: Jan Johannsen
The case uses a USB-C cable for charging. After ten minutes, your FreeClip should be able to play music for three hours. Fully charging the earphones takes about 40 minutes, while the charging case alone takes just under an hour. Charging wirelessly takes longer. In this instance, the case only receives a maximum of two watts.
Verdict: excellent open-ear earphones but they offer no advantage
I’m positively surprised by the Huawei FreeClip. I wouldn’t have thought open-ear headphones could sound so good. When it comes to being aware of my surroundings, I don’t notice any difference to many in-ear models. These also boast a long battery life and are very comfortable to wear – without a hat at least.
What I don’t like so much are the spartan gesture control, as I’ve become accustomed to more. Even Huawei has shown that a headphone app can have more settings. I’ll let you decide about the FreeClip’s aesthetics.
As much as the FreeClip are convincing open-ear headphones, when it comes down to it, they don’t hit the right note. Huawei itself boasts more useful models. The manufacturer lists the same recommended retail price for the FreeBuds Pro 3. In return, you get true wireless in-ear headphones with outstanding sound, more gesture control and active noise cancellation. If you want to be aware of your surroundings, simply switch on awareness mode. And when it comes to battery life, the much shorter time of 4.5 hours is more than enough for me.
Header image: Jan Johannsen
As a primary school pupil, I used to sit in a friend's living room with many of my classmates to play the Super NES. Now I get my hands on the latest technology and test it for you. In recent years at Curved, Computer Bild and Netzwelt, now at Digitec and Galaxus.
