Skullcandy just announced a duo of sub $100 earbuds as part of its new Skull-iQ headphones lineup, including one major feature not seen on any competitor – including Apple's AirPods. It's no secret that there are plentiful earbud choices available in 2021. Regardless of the features, specs, or price someone's shopping for, chances are there's at least one option that fits the bill perfectly. This year alone has been home to numerous compelling releases, including the Pixel Buds A-Series, OnePlus Buds Pro, and Galaxy Buds 2.
Among those big-name brands, another company that's incredibly active in the audio space is Skullcandy. Skullcandy may not be as strong of a household name as Apple or Google, but when it comes to the niche of wireless earbuds, Skullcandy knows what it's doing. It's previously created excellent $130 AirPods Pro competitors, a pair of $25 budget earbuds that are surprisingly great, and is now stepping into a new niche centered around hands-free listening.
Skullcandy's making a few different announcements today, though they all come together in the end. From a hardware standpoint, it's launching the Skullcandy Grind Fuel and Skullcandy Push Active. We'll dig into the earbuds' hardware below, but the main selling point is that both feature Skullcandy's new Skull-iQ technology. Skull-iQ is a combination of a new earbud chip and redesigned mobile app enabling new smart features — the most compelling of which is hands-free voice control. Like other earbuds, voice control on the Grind Fuel and Push Active allows users to say, 'Hey Skullcandy,' followed by a command. This can be used to change the volume, skip tracks, enable aware/transparency mode, and trigger the voice assistant on a connected phone. Unlike earbuds with Siri and Google Assistant built-in, however, the Hey Skullcandy command works entirely offline. So long as the earbuds are connected to a phone and paired with the Skullcandy companion app, the 'Hey Skullcandy' command works even without an active data/Wi-Fi connection. These commands are also platform-agnostic. In other words, no matter if someone has an Android device or an iPhone, voice controls will work just the same. In a world where more and more earbuds are becoming platform-dependent, that's an increasingly rare feature.
Features & Specs For Skullcandy's Newest Earbuds
To introduce its Skull-iQ platform, Skullcandy's launching two different earbud options — the first of which is Grind Fuel. The Grind Fuel earbuds are marketed as Skullcandy's flagship everyday buds. They're equipped with 'premium audio quality,' up to 40 hours of battery life, IP55 dust/water resistance, built-in Tile location tracking, and a Personal Sound feature that can tune the audio experience exactly to someone's own listening. The case is also pretty impressive, featuring a compact design, USB-C fast charging, and Qi wireless charging. The Skullcandy Push Active are effectively the same earbuds — albeit a sportier version of them. Push Active introduce built-in ear hooks for a more secure fit, in addition to longer 44-hour battery life. This comes at the expense of Qi wireless charging and the Personal Sound feature, but everything else is the same.
Regardless of whether someone chooses the Grind Fuel or Push Active, they have the same Skull-iQ features. Along with the hands-free voice commands detailed above, Skull-iQ has a few other tricks worth mentioning. Want to share audio with another Skull-iQ earbud user? Like audio sharing between two AirPods, two pairs of Skull-iQ buds can sync up and play the same audio. Skull-iQ also enables the ability to remap playback controls on the earbuds, access Spotify Tap for easy access to Spotify playlists, and manual EQ controls to fine-tune the exact playback experience (something far too many earbuds skip over these days).
Overall, the Grind Fuel, Push Active, and Skull-iQ platform all sound like solid additions to the Skullcandy lineup. The specs sound solid, the additional features of Skull-iQ are exciting, and the prices are expectedly great — $99 for the Grind Fuel and $79 for the Push Active. Adding to all of this is Skullcandy's renewed focus on making its products more environmentally conscious. This is seen in small details like 100 percent recycled materials used in the packaging, along with larger plans to support the earbuds for 2-3 years of software updates in an attempt to keep them in people's ears longer. It's too early to make any final judgment on Skullcandy's latest offerings, but based on what's revealed so far, they have a lot of promise. For anyone interested, both the Grind Fuel and Push Active are available for purchase now.
Source: Skullcandy