Sony WH-1000XM4

With the WH-1000XM3 so widely praised and their price so competitive, what can the latest XM4 model offer by way of improvement?

For a great many users and reviewers of wireless noise-cancelling headphones, Sony got everything right with the WH-1000XM3. Quite frankly, it was hard to imagine what could be improved upon when reviewing those, but Sony has added enough polish to the new WH-1000XM4 to keep the XM3 gleam intact and add some new precious gems in the process. While Sony certainly hasn’t strayed far from its regal headphone lineage, the WH-1000XM4 is better for it.

From a design sense, very little has perceptibly changed — the lightweight, comfortable and subtly stylish design has returned almost unscathed, just a tiny bit more padding on the earcups and a touch less on the headband. Battery life remains the same, which is great, although so does the lack of any IP-rating or weather proofing at all, so while they feel a tiny bit more rugged than the XM3, you’ll still want to go with another option for workouts and rainy days.

You won’t be able to see the rest of the improvements at all, as they’re all under the hood, but you’ll certainly encounter them. Perhaps the most obvious is a retooling of its crown jewel — the noisecancelling itself. While the XM3 already had class-leading ANC, the

XM4 features an upgraded algorithm on its dedicated QN1 processor along with a brand new Bluetooth SoC (System on Chip) that adjusts the noisecancelling 700 times every second based on environmental noise picked up through two pairs of external microphones. In practice, this translates to the most thorough noise-cancelling we’ve yet experienced on everything from low traffic rumbles to wind, and even voice chatter, indicating that Sony has made specific improvements in higher frequencies than most noise cancellers achieve. And where some headphones suffer from a particularly strong ‘vacuum’ effect when enabling ANC, the Sonys feel comfortable in every situation we’ve tested them in. This is in part due to the rapid learning and adjusting they do, and also, if you’re lucky enough to get in a plane, the atmospheric pressure optimisation that can be activated with a long press of the ‘custom’ button.

A new and genuinely useful feature is Speak to Chat, which automatically pauses your audio and lets in ambient sound when the headphones detect that you’re speaking. This feature, coupled with Quick Attention (hold a hand over your right earcup to let in ambient sound immediately) make for a powerful pair of tools for navigating the outside world when wearing these otherwise thoroughly immersive cans. There’s also support for Sony’s 360 Reality Audio, although you’ll need material that supports it (Deezer or Tidal, for instance). So far we’ve been less than impressed by the bizarre effects of this ‘immersive’ processing.

With Sony’s Headphones Connect app, you’ll be able to tweak all kinds of settings to customise your WH-1000XM4 experience.

On top of the aforementioned features, you’ll be able to adjust smart assistant integration, 20 different degrees of noise-cancelling, whether to let in voices or not, and an adaptive mode that can use your location to automatically adjust audio and ANC settings dependent on frequently visited locations (commuting, home, and office are some obvious ones).

As for the audio itself, this has also been given an edge over that of its predecessor thanks to Edge-AI and DSEE Extreme processing. These two features offer a more advanced system for upscaling otherwise compressed or low-res audio signals (such as from a streaming service) into something closer to lossless. Sony’s warm but clear sound signature (a slight but pleasant bass boost and excellent separation and clarity across the board) is present here and sounds gorgeous out of the box. A five-band EQ is available in the app for further tweaking.

If you already own the WH-1000XM3 or find them at an especially good price, they are still exceptional headphones and the improvements in the XM4 might not be worth the cost of upgrading. For everyone else, Sony’s world-challenging noise-cancelling headphones just got better, and while we’ve heard better at higher prices, they keep the crown at this price — and we’ve seen them on sale $100 cheaper.