TECHNOMALIST
Sony appears ready to bring back its award-winning WH-1000XM4 over-ear headphones in a more budget-friendly form, based on a product sheet leaked to WinFuture and covered by TechRadar. The new variant, called the WH-1000XM4C, would reuse much of the original's acoustic design while making small sacrifices to lower the price.
The original WH-1000XM4 was a critical hit. TechRadar awarded it five stars and called it the best headphones of its time. It also kept a top spot in the outlet's noise-cancelling recommendations for months after the WH-1000XM5 launched. The new model appears intended to compete against affordable active noise cancelling (ANC) headphones from Bose, Sennheiser, and a growing list of Chinese audio brands.
According to the leaked sheet, the WH-1000XM4C keeps the same 40mm drivers and the same 4–40,000Hz frequency range as the original, along with a nearly identical 253g weight. The physical design looks unchanged at a glance, but a small detail reveals cost cutting: the NFC logo previously printed on the left earcup has disappeared. The source does not confirm why, but it is presumed to be a way to reduce manufacturing costs.
Battery life takes a minor hit. The sheet lists up to 27 hours of playback with ANC switched on and 34 hours with it off. TechRadar notes that this is about four hours less than the original in one comparison, though it does not specify which mode that figure refers to. On the plus side, the new model reportedly steps up to Bluetooth 6.0.
Pricing has not been announced. WinFuture's leak points to a planned retail price of around €250, which TechRadar translates to roughly $290 / £215 / AU$410. That is significantly lower than the original model's launch price of $349 / £349 / AU$549, but it may still be more expensive than the older headphone's current street price, which the article places near $249 / £199 / AU$399. In other words, the new version would undercut the XM4's original debut cost, but it might not beat the discounts already available on the outgoing model.
The article notes that the predicted price would put the WH-1000XM4C above several well-regarded rivals, including the Bose QuietComfort Ultra headphones, the second-generation Bose QuietComfort, the typical deal price of the Sennheiser Momentum 4 Wireless, and the 1More Sonoflow Pro HQ51. TechRadar's author speculates that the new Sonys are likely to sound better than the Sonoflow, but acknowledges that Bose's current ANC headphones are tough to beat.
All details come from a single leak and have not been confirmed by Sony. If the reported specifications and price hold, the WH-1000XM4C could offer a compelling mix of proven sound and modern connectivity at a lower cost than the original launch, but it would still face stiff competition in a crowded market.
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