The next generation of the Bose QuietComfort Earbuds Truly Wireless is the Bose QuietComfort Earbuds II Truly Wireless. If you value noise isolation, you should consider these buds. Because of their active noise cancelling (ANC) system, Bose outperforms competitors such as the Apple AirPods Pro (2nd generation) Truly Wireless and Sennheiser MOMENTUM True Wireless 3 when it comes to blocking out background noise. Bose has also altered the design of the buds themselves, making them less bulky and more customizable, thereby improving overall comfort and fit. In addition, their carrying case is more expensive than their predecessor’s.
Bose has figured out how to tailor the QCE II’s audio response and noise cancellation to the individual user’s ear canal. CustomTune is the company’s proprietary technology, and it uses an audio signal – picked up by a mic inside each bud – to automatically calibrate ANC and sound frequency that best suits your ear. The frequency response is not specified by Bose, but after using the QCE II for a while, we estimate it ranges from ‘extremely deep’ to’very high indeed’.
The sound is delivered by a pair of 9.3mm full-range dynamic drivers – one per bud, obviously – and the buds are wirelessly connected via Bluetooth 5.3. Because of Bose’s involvement with Qualcomm, the only codecs supported are SBC and AAC, which is a little surprising given that we were expecting Snapdragon Sound compatibility (the QCE II use the Qualcomm S5 Audio chipset). Perhaps that will change in the future with over-the-air firmware updates – Bose did say updates will be available in the coming months, but did not specify what we can expect.
Another feature that we hoped would be included in the QCE II is multipoint connectivity, which allows you to pair with two Bluetooth devices at the same time. To be fair, this is more common in wireless over-ear headphones and hasn’t made it to true wireless models yet, but it would be nice to have. Wireless charging would be similar. This is also surprising given that competitors’ cases now support wireless charging, and the Bose is a pretty premium set of buds to forego this feature.
According to Bose, the QCE II provides up to six hours of battery life on the buds alone, with three additional top-ups in the case. That’s not a huge improvement over the previous generation, which also provided up to six hours of battery life on the buds but only two additional top-ups in the case. We didn’t get to wear the Buds for the full six hours, but we had ANC on full blast every time we used it, and after two hours of use, we only lost 20% of the battery on the buds, implying that you could get more than the six hours listed.