Daisy Sound’s first headphones are excellent, high quality, and a little cheaper

Jack Mulroe thinks The premium headphones market is boring. Too much focus on black devices with the same look; We’ve fallen into the “spec wars” to find out what’s up The best headphone is. He just wants his California-inspired headphones to help people relax.

“I just saw a pattern of there being a dead space, frankly, in the headphone market, where the most recent culturally relevant brand was Beats,” Mulroe says. “It felt kind of old.”

Mulroe is the CEO and founder of a new audio brand called Daisy’s voiceheadquartered in California. It describes itself as “a team of industrial designers from outside the audio industry” aiming to disrupt the already saturated headphone landscape. The Daisy One headphones, which were unveiled on Tuesday, are the company’s first product.

These retro-style headphones are designed to go head-to-head with large, premium noise-cancelling cans like Apple’s headphones AirPods Max And Sony WH-1000XM6. These are headphones that typically retail for between $450 and $550. The Daisy One discounts it a bit at $399. The goal is to sell stylish noise-canceling headphones for a little less than the big dogs.

“I knew we would be competing with the big companies: Sony, Bose, Beats, Apple,” says Mulroe. “I didn’t really mind that competition. It’ll be good.” But competition in this space is fierce across the price spectrum, such as London-based Nothing Over-ear headphones And Anker’s Soundcore budget options (one of them Won the WIRED blind test) to premium boxes of Bowers and Wilkins or degree.

Courtesy of Daisy

Daisy Wan looks really pretty. They are meant to be durable and long-lasting, and are made of aluminum with TR90 composite headstocks, a material widely used by headphone manufacturers. (“You can just zip it up,” says Mulroe, extending the headband.) They’re a little heavier than their competitors at 318 grams, or nearly three-quarters of a pound. The earbuds turn on and off via magnetic contact. It works with Bluetooth but also supports additional USB-C and 3.5mm wired connections. The headphones come in three different color options – silver, a blue shade called Pacific, and a teal shade called Kelp.

The design is intended to evoke some California elegance, as most of the designers reside in the state. Some of Daisy’s crew are former engineers Harman Professional Solutionsan audio company owned by Samsung. The actual sound system inside was developed by a Utah-based company NXC SystemsWhich Daisy contracts with. Ambient sound clips recorded in California are stored on the device itself, such as ocean waves or the jungle atmosphere of Big Sur. There is also a guided breathing exercise to help people relax in stressful places like airports.

The Daisy One headphones have a battery life of approximately 35 hours with the noise cancellation feature turned on and 45 hours with it turned off. Despite the marketing that these headphones are reliable and built to last, there is no way to replace the battery. Mulroe says it’s something the company is working on for future models. The headphones have also gotten mixed reviews so far, with some early on Testers on TikTok He criticizes the headphones’ Transparency mode — which lets sound in so you can hear your surroundings — saying it leaves a lot to be desired. Mulroe is aware of this complaint and says it could be fixed later via a software patch.