Samsung Galaxy buds pro review: Have Apple’s AirPods pro finally met their match?

There are a great many wireless earbuds out there to choose from, but when it comes to a good pair of easy-to-use, good-sounding earphones that work seamlessly with your smartphone, it’s a two horse race between Apple and Samsung.

And, chances are, if you own an iPhone or a Samsung galaxy phone, you’ll stick to that brand when it comes to your earphones too.

If you’re a proud member of Team Samsung and want a pair of noise-cancelling wireless earphones to rival the Apple AirPods pro, the Galaxy buds pro are what you’re looking for.

Active noise cancelling, dual drivers, waterproofing, wireless charging and a very Apple-like quick-pairing system exclusive to Galaxy phones are the standout features here, but there’s plenty more to unpack too.

We used the Samsung Galaxy buds pro as our primary earphones for a couple of weeks before writing this review. They were tested with smartphones from Apple and Samsung, and we used them in a wide range of scenarios, including working at our desk, walking through the park, running on a treadmill, and on a couple of short-haul flights.

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Setting up the Galaxy buds pro depends on what smartphone you have. Owners of recent Samsung Galaxy phones need only pop open the charge case and take out the earphones for them to pair with your phone. This works, and looks, a lot like the system Apple uses for pairing AirPods with iPhones. In both cases it’s a great feature and the perfect welcome to your new earphones.

The Galaxy buds pro are paired to other devices in the usual way, with a Bluetooth connection established quickly between the earphones and our laptop, tablet, and even an iPhone. Yes, you can cross no man’s land and use Samsung earphones with an iPhone, if you really want to. But because there’s no Samsung Galaxy Wearable app for iOS, you’ll be missing out on some functions taking that particular path.

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Once paired, the buds pro can be controlled by touch. They are very sensitive and recognise taps quickly, making it easy to play and pause content, or adjust the noise cancelling and audio pass-through functions (more on that later). We prefer to switch the touch controls off, as it’s very easy to accidentally pause music and skip tracks while adjusting the buds in your ears.

At first, the Galaxy buds pro look like they’ll easily fall out of your ears. They don’t seem as ergonomically-shaped as AirPods and they lack an arm for bracing them against the cartilage of your ear, but none of this seems to matter. In our testing they stayed put surprisingly well, even while walking or running.

Medium-sized rubber buds are fitted by default, with small and large options included in the box to ensure a good fit for most people. We found the trick was to rotate the earbuds while pushing them into our ears, then relying on a small lip at the rear of the bud to keep them in place.

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Samsung sells the Galaxy buds pro in four colours – violet, black, silver and white – with our violet review sample being mostly chrome on the outside.

The charge case is one of the most compact around. It is slightly thicker than that of the AirPods pro, but is shorter and so takes up about the same space in your pocket. The Samsung case has wireless charging (that can also draw power from the back of a recent Galaxy phone) and a USB-C port for adding up to an hour’s worth of listening time in just five minutes.

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On that note, battery life is five hours for the buds on their own, with an extra 13 hours available via three visits to the case. This increases to eight hours and 20 hours if you turn off active noise cancelling (ANC).

An IPX7 water resistance rating means the Galaxy buds pro can be worn in the rain and while exercising without being damaged.

Now that we’ve established they are well designed, look good, are easy to connect and stay securely in the ear, what are they actually like to listen to? Honestly, they are pretty good. Key to the Galaxy buds pro’s audio performance is how each bud contains two speakers, or drivers. This is rare for such small earbuds and means the highs and lows get their own dedicated speaker, instead of one driver acting as a Jack-of-all-trades.

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On paper this all seems very impressive, and there’s no denying the smart packaging that has led to fitting 11mm and 6.5mm drivers into each bud. But the sound produced can be a little flat. It’s perfectly decent in most situations, but lacks clarity and presence, with a soundstage that is narrower than that of the AirPods pro. Some elements of the Samsung’s output can be tweaked with the Galaxy Wearables app, but the narrow soundstage persists.

We’re splitting hairs here, and it’s unlikely that any consumer will be looking to pick between Apple and Samsung earphones anyway, due to them not working fully with smartphones made by the opposing team. But these are our observations nonetheless.

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ACN for the Galaxy buds pro is good, impressively turning down the volume of an aeroplane cabin and making it easy to listen to a podcast on a noisy Underground train without cranking up the volume to eardrum damaging levels.

A neat feature of the buds pro is how they detect when the wearer is talking, then automatically engaging audio pass-through, using external microphones to help you hear your environment. There’s also a feature (for users of compatible Samsung products) that automatically switches audio from one device to another. Say you are watching a movie on your tablet and get a call on your phone; the earphones automatically switch to the latter without you doing anything.

Lastly, a feature called Buds Together lets you and another Samsung fan each connect your buds to the same compatible device.