For many years I have bought my headphones on Black Friday: wired, wireless, in-ear and over-ear, whenever I needed an upgrade or replacement or just felt like treating myself, I always found Black Friday deals on exactly the headphones I knew I needed. So if you’re looking for a new game, now is a good time to start doing your pre-sale homework.
While many Black Friday headphone deals are impressive, they often refer to some of the more expensive headphones, so while the discounts on high-end Bose or Sony may be eye-catching, they’re still quite expensive. If you’re looking to get the most audio for your Black Friday money, you can find some really good options for a lot less.
These three sets of over-ear headphones impressed us at their full price and we hope to see deals during the Black Friday sales extravaganza. As we know from our in-depth reviews, some of the best headphones don’t cost huge amounts of money and you can get surprisingly good headphones with active noise cancellation and even high-resolution audio support for very low prices.
1More Sonoflow Pro HQ51: the best value over-ear headphones you can buy?
In our 1More Sonoflow Pro HQ51 review we said that they had established themselves as some of the best value over-ear headphones you can buy. They are strong in three key areas: they have a very satisfying sound that you can modify to suit your own preferences; they have the most effective noise cancellation at this price; and offer a fantastic 65-hour battery life. All this for a modest list price of $89 / £89 / AU$130, and I’d expect a Black Friday sale imminently.
These are truly amazing headphones – at this price you don’t expect high-end features like the high-resolution LDAC codec, and customizable equalizer is still relatively rare in this price range. The 1More cans offer both, and the sound quality is impressive for such an affordable pair of over-ear headphones. Bluetooth is 5.4 and the drivers are 40mm dynamic drivers.
My colleague Matt Bolton just did a large group test of noise-canceling headphones and said they block out noise almost as well as the Sony WH-1000XM4 – they far exceed their price.
And they won’t be uncomfortable even during long listening sessions: we found them generously padded and not too heavy.
Sony WH-CH720N – Stunning and affordable with Sony sounds
We really rate these affordable headphones – in our Sony WH-C720N review we said they were great for the price, and we’re currently seeing discounts that make them an even better buy.
You already know what you get with Sony headphones: extremely balanced sound, pleasant clarity, effective noise cancellation and simple, elegant design. The feature set is also solid, including multipoint pairing.
We feel that while you clearly won’t get audiophile-level sound anywhere near this price point, what Sony is doing is really impressive: these headphones offer finely balanced, detail-packed sound.
CMF Headphone Pro: spend your money on Nothing
CMF is the most affordable sub-brand of the Maverick Nothing phones and headphones, whose stylish products combine innovative engineering with interesting design. And these CMF headphones are also quite nice, with a focus on touch controls rather than tapping and the ability to swap out the ear pads for more colorful options. There is also a button called a “button”, which makes me smile.
The specification is impressive: 40mm nickel-plated diaphragms with 16.5mm copper voice coils, a ‘precision’ bass duct and a dual-chamber design to deliver plenty of oomph. The headphones are Hi-Res Audio certified for both wired and wireless listening, and feature LDAC and the usual Bluetooth codecs. Battery life is 100 hours with ANC off and 50 with ANC on.
We have these headphones up for review right now, and my colleague Becky Scarrott is impressed, telling me: “The circular headphones are extremely comfortable even with glasses on, with ample padding on the headband and decent but not too tight clamping force. True to Nothing’s strong sense of ‘go your own way’ style, my pistachio green set looks and feels much more expensive than it is. The buttons on each ear (there’s a bass slider on the left and a volume wheel on the right) are easy to find and really fun to use, and at least initially, there’s a good sense of separation and detail in the sound.”
These are already super affordable with a list price of $99 / £79 / AU$179 and yet we’re seeing some immediate price reductions, so it looks like they’ll become a Black Friday deal that will delight your ears and your bank balance.
More Black Friday deals in the US
- Amazon: 45% off TVs, AirPods, Air Fryers, and Vacuum Cleaners
- Apple: iPads, AirPods and MacBooks from $119
- Best buy: $1,000 off TVs, laptops, and headphones
- Housing deposit: 40% discount on appliances, furniture, grills and tools
- lenovo: 45% discount on laptops and tablets
- Lowe’s: up to 30% discount on appliances, Christmas decorations and tools
- Aim: 40% discount on Christmas decorations, clothing and furniture
- Walmart: cheap furniture, televisions and vacuum cleaners from $69
- Fair path: 54% discount on Christmas, furniture and decoration
