Grab the fantastic Bose NC700 wireless noise cancelling headphones for under £200 from Amazon
My daily drivers.
Bose's NC700 make for a sublime pair of noise cancelling headphones with the combination of stylish looks, a comfortable fit, natural audio and class-leading noise cancellation. Currently, Amazon has slashed their price to under £200, which is an absolute steal for such a great pair of headphones.
The thing is, these are actually the headphones I use every single day - and have done for the last three years. They're immensely comfortable, with deep earcups and a rubberised headband that provides plenty of padding. While there are touch controls for media playback on the right earcup, it's nice to have some tactile buttons for selecting between connected devices, and to enable Bluetooth pairing. What's more, their design is especially sleek and futuristic to a degree, even if it's at the sacrifice of not being able to fold up entirely - they can rotate and lay flat, though.
The noise cancellation on offer is excellent, with 11 separate levels, as configurable in the Bose Music app. At its top end, the NC700 cancels out an awful lot of noise, and when I've been walking through busy streets, very little to no external noise is heard. It's nice having the fine-grained control, as well as the fun of Conversation Mode (in other words, a transparency setting) to enable you to hear the outside world without the need to take off the headphones. Bose rates the NC700 to last for 20 hours on a single charge, and that matches with my usage, although having music at higher volumes or using the ANC cranked all the way up will drain it quicker. It's solid endurance, although is less long-lived than Sony's WH-1000XM4.
The most important thing here though is, of course, audio. To my ears, the NC700s are excellent, with a natural, precise sound with solid detail and clarity. Higher-end frequencies can sound a little harsh at times, though. There's also quite the wide soundstage, especially for closed-backs, with plenty of breathing room for instruments to inhabit. They aren't quite as thumping as Sony's WH-1000XM4, but offer a balanced and precise sound that works well with a variety of genres.
If it's a fantastic set of ANC headphones you're after that look stylish, offer some best-in-class ANC and a precise and natural sound with a lot to like, then this Amazon deal on the Bose NC700 is for you.