Raycon The Fitness Earbuds Review
A pair of gym earbuds that are better than you'd expect
Verdict
The Fitness Earbuds might have a terrible name, but these are solid true wireless sports earbuds that deliver a solid performance that make them good workout companions
Pros
- Small form factor
- Plenty of power
- Well integrated touch controls
Cons
- Bass-heavy sound won’t be for everyone
- Listening profiles don’t massively differ
- Need to play with tips to get optimal fit
Key Features
- IP resistanceIPX7 rating for sweat and water resistance
- Battery12 hours of battery life with ANC off
- Stabilizing finsThree sets of stabilizers for a more secure fit
Introduction
The Raycon Fitness Earbuds, as the name so quite explicitly tells you, are true wireless earbuds designed for exercise.
Brought to you by a brand co-founded by the music artist Ray J, these are the updated version of the same buds that launched in 2021. They now come offering ANC and awareness modes, touch controls, mics to take calls and the promise of a truly comfortable fit.
These mid-range buds seem to tick all the key boxes for what you’d want from truly wireless earbuds that are built for workouts, but do they pass the fitness test? Here’s my take.
Availability
The Fitness Earbuds are available to buy directly from the Raycon website for $119.99 / £119.99 and have recently dropped to $90 / £90. You can also pick them up from retailers including Amazon where you can grab them up for less than $100 / £100.
That pricing puts it up against the solid Jabra Elite 4 Active and other fitness-focused earbuds like the Monster DNA Fit and the Adidas Z.N.E 01 (ANC model).
Design
- Comes in four different colours
- Uses touch controls
- IPX7 sweat resistant design
The Fitness Earbuds are dinky little buds that sit inside of a similarly small and very pocket- and running belt-friendly capsule case, which offers a spot to loop in the bundled lanyard and carabiner if you want to attach them to a bag.
They come in four different colours including this cobalt blue shade, which won’t be to everyone’s taste, but I grew to like the look. The diminutive size of the buds means they sit discreetly inside your ears and to keep them there are three sets of gel fins along with five sets of earbuds sizes.
I’d say you can get away without adding on those fins for moderately intense workouts, but as soon as things get a bit sweatier, they’re worth adding on as I found they started to slightly move around in my ear.
I was surprised to find that touch controls make the cut here given how small they are small and that lets you adjust volume, skip audio, play, and pause and toggle between the three listening modes. I don’t think touch controls in general are very useful on fitness earbuds, especially when you’re working harder and don’t want to break your momentum trying to find the sweet spot.
Thankfully, they work reasonably well here. I always found the triple taps to skip audio were the trickiest to use, but for adjusting volume and skipping tracks and listening modes, they worked surprisingly well.
There are dual beam microphones squeezed in to handle calls and the buds alone carry an IPX7 rating, which means they’re resistant to light splashes of water and sweat. I’ve used them in the rain and haven’t had any sort of performance issues.
Features
- ANC and awareness modes
- 12 hours battery life (ANC off)
Raycon includes ANC and Awareness modes to block out the world or let some of it back in. Again, these are accessible from pressing down on the right earbud for three seconds. Both are effective in blocking out the world and letting everything back in. I’ve used them indoors in the gym and outside for runs and both modes work surprisingly well. You’re not getting best in class ANC or a very customisable Awareness mode, but they certainly aren’t bad performers either.
It’s a similar story with handling calls. You can use the onboard controls to answer, end and reject calls with the dual beam microphones providing enough volume and clarity, but you’d get clearer calls from the similarly priced Jabra Elite 4 Active.
It’s always nice to see support for Bluetooth multipoint and I had no issues pairing these up with a Garmin watch, a MacBook as well as an iPhone and Android phone. It’s a maximum of two devices simultaneously, which gives you scope to easily use them at home and when you’re on the move. There’s been no nasty connection dropouts across those devices either.
Battery life is also good on the Fitness Earbuds with or without ANC in use. Stated battery life with ANC off is 12 hours and I’d say with it turned on it’s just over half of that. Though I never found myself running low if you remember to drop them back into the USB-C-powered charging case after using them. A fully charged case tops the battery up to 56 hours in total. There’s an LED indicator on the case that uses a simple colour coded system to let you know the level of battery at a glance too.
Sound Quality
- 3 sound profiles
- Bassy profile
Raycon doesn’t share any sort of details about the kind of hardware delivering sound on The Fitness Earbuds, but it doesn’t take too long to know that they’re all about bringing the bass.
There are three different listening profiles you can toggle between. Balanced as it suggests, presents a more balanced and warmer sound. Bass Sound boosts the low end and Pure Sound is designed to deliver a little more finesse. In reality, I don’t think that’s how things play out.
There’s a prominent and dominant rumble of bass across all three listening profiles and while there’s warmth and plenty of workout-friendly power, it comes at the expense of what’s delivered in the treble and mids departments. It doesn’t ruin things, but there’s undeniably one key characteristic that shines through whatever you’re listening to.
I use the Songs to Test Headphones playlist on Spotify and on tracks like Earth, Wind and Fire’s, In the Stone, there’s a large albeit not super clear soundstage and that doesn’t really alter across the three listening profiles. On Bombay Bicycle Club’s My God you get a sense of that overbearing bass when using that Balanced mode where you’re hoping for something more refined.
It’s the kind of bass forward sound profile I’d associate with sporty Beats earbuds. It’s power and bass first and everything after, though you can get something a touch more delicately sounding on Beats’ buds. If you can live with that sort of sound and some slightly recessed mids and more textured treble performance, then there’s still something quite likeable about what these small buds can pump out.
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Should you buy it?
You want small earbuds that deliver big, bassy sound
If you like the idea of earbuds that sit discreetly in your ears and bring the bass, then that’s exactly what you get from The Fitness Earbuds.
You want more balanced sounding sports earbuds
While there are three different listening profiles on board, they simply don’t give you that more delicate sound that some workout lovers might prefer.
Final Thoughts
On just the name alone I didn’t have high hopes for The Fitness Earbuds. These are a diminutive set that pack some impressive power and the kind of bass-heavy sound that I think a lot of people will enjoy. You’ve got good ANC and awareness modes here too and touch controls that aren’t poorly integrated into that small form factor.
I’d say you can get more finesse from something like the Jabra Elite 4 Active, but they impressed me more than Monster’s DNA Fit sports headphones. Do not write these buds off because of that lame name. There’s something very likeable about them.
How we test
We test every set of headphones we review thoroughly over an extended period of time. We use industry standard tests to compare features properly. We’ll always tell you what we find. We never, ever, accept money to review a product.
Find out more about how we test in our ethics policy.
Tested with real world use
Tested for several days
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FAQs
Yes, the Fitness Earbuds are able to cancel noise with their active noise-cancellation system.
Full specs
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Professional conduct
We also expect our journalists to follow clear ethical standards in their work. Our staff members must strive for honesty and accuracy in everything they do. We follow the IPSO Editors’ code of practice to underpin these standards.
Editorial independence
Editorial independence means being able to give an unbiased verdict about a product or company, with the avoidance of conflicts of interest. To ensure this is possible, every member of the editorial staff follows a clear code of conduct.
Professional conduct
We also expect our journalists to follow clear ethical standards in their work. Our staff members must strive for honesty and accuracy in everything they do. We follow the IPSO Editors’ code of practice to underpin these standards.
