MIxcder 872 NFC on-ear headphones

Rating: 5/5

Review:
Very good headphones

This is a review of the Mixcder 872 NFC headphones in plain black.  They were sent to me for review and I think they are functionally very good, with impressive sound.

The headphones are very nicely packaged and come with a standard mini-USB charging lead, a good jack-to-jack lead for wired connection and a decent User Manual in pretty good English. The headphones look good, I think, in black and silver and don't go in for a lot of flashy "design" which is just fine by me. They fold up for transport and storage. They have both Bluetooth and wired connection, and I noticed no difference in sound quality between the two modes. You can use wired connection to connect to non-Bluetooth devices, of course, and also use it if the headphones are out of charge.

These are on-ear headphones; they are fairly light and, as long as you get on with on-ear pads, very comfortable. The ear pads are good and have enough movement to sit comfortably and give a good sound seal. They have a good firm grip but aren't too tight, and I find them fine for prolonged listening.   Bluetooth pairing is very simple both via standard pairing and NFC, and I found both the battery life and range good.  The controls are a feature, in that the volume and skip controls work by swiping a finger in the desired direction.  It took a couple of goes to get the hang of it, but they work very well.  There are also standard basic phone controls and a perfectly decent built-in microphone.

Sound quality is very good. I test all headphones and speakers (and I've tested a lot now) using a playlist of test tracks which give all aspects of the sound a thorough trial. It starts with 16th Century choral music, it ends with London Grammar and it has most things in between - orchestral, choral, vocal and chamber music, classic rock, acoustic music and so on. I thought these performed very well on everything; articulation is very clear, tops are bright without being harsh and the middles are rich and full.  The bass is very good; it's not over-dominant but it's all there so the sound is very nicely balanced, and the bass responds very well to a bit of EQ boost if you want it.  Instruments and voices in classical music are distinct and sound very good, rock really rocks when it needs to, acoustic music sounds bright and airy…I'm impressed, and the rolling deep bass in London Grammar's Hey Now, which really tests bass response, comes over very well.

There is now a crowded market in headphones in this price range, but I think these hold their own very well. You can get headphones with a more dominant bass, but for balanced, clear sound these seem excellent to me.  In short, these are a good quality pair of versatile, mid-range phones which, if anything, out-perform their price.  I can recommend them.