Costing roughly $800, this is an exclusive product. The Beoplay H95 Black headphones is touted by Bang & Olufsen as "the finest wireless headphones ever built" by the Danish audio specialist. The goal with the Beoplay H95 was to combine the highest quality in sound, long lasting comfort, truly effective noise cancellation, a beautiful chassis, the highest quality materials and the most satisfying user experience in a Bang & Olufsen wireless headphone to date.
"Beoplay H95 is a distillation of the best elements of Bang & Olufsen sound, design and craftmanship – an enhancement within the headphone category that elevates our 95 years heritage of high standards”, says Bang & Olufsen SVP of Product Management Christoffer Poulsen.
Comfort and fit are essential to truly enjoy sound quality and the Beoplay H95 comes with an oval, over-ear design with soft lambskin ear cushions that provide a luxurious and superior fit for long-term wear, while an innovative and intuitive user interface is provided through a combination of touch control and mechanical dials.
Through research and experimentation, the Bang & Olufsen engineers also created an earpad design that fits nicely around the ears and is no bigger than necessary. This shape, formed in soft memory foam, also creates good contact to the skin, which is important to block the noise from outside. The headband design has been completely revamped for a cleaner look, with top-grain cowhide, custom-knitted textile, and softly padded with memory foam for comfort.
A brushed aluminum framework contrasts with the texture of the leather headband giving a minimalist and refined appearance. Magnetically detachable lambskin ear cushions feel as good as they look, and the adaptive memory foam inner padding, combined with rotating and tilting earpieces that ensure perfect fit, provide the ultimate in comfortable listening and passive sound cancellation.
"Beoplay H95 is the product of our philosophy that purposeful design is beautiful design — aesthetics and performance working together,” says Bang & Olufsen VP of Design Gavin Ivester. “We express purposeful design with essential forms, driven by function, pristinely executed. That attention to detail and outstanding performance are the core of our design language, Expressive Minimalism, and give the Beoplay H95 its calm, confident personality,” he adds.
In today’s world, restorative silence can be vital part of mental space and peace of mind. The new Beoplay H95 headphones build on its impressive passive noise reduction with the most advanced Active Noise Cancellation (ANC) of any Bang & Olufsen headphones, which is both adjustable and adaptive. The ANC performance is entirely based on digital processing and uses both a feed-forward and feedback microphone to reduce noise as much as possible.
The tuning and testing of the ANC processing was done under real life conditions as well as Bang & Olufsen’s Virtual Acoustic Laboratory (VR Lab) in Struer, Denmark, where the engineers are able to emulate a variety of different noise conditions ranging from airplanes, train stations, office spaces and street noise.
Precision Dials for Volume, ANC and Transparency
Adaptive ANC is already a demanding development, but adjustable cancellation was only tried by Microsoft on the prototype of the Surface Headphones, and the final product has limited the level of adjustment to a few options in the shipping product. Bang & Olufsen has pioneered touch interfaces on aluminum surfaces and now the Danish audio company is taking this a step further by adding a precise aluminum dial to each side of Beoplay H95. Inspired by the focus rings on the lenses of high-end cameras, the dials move with precision and allow the user to feel just the right amount of smooth resistance. Each dial has a fine, linear texture that confirms contact. It is a high-touch element that feels natural to use, and it makes sound preferences quickly accessible. The dial on the right controls volume, while the dial on the left adjusts ANC and transparency.
“Home, work and transit can all be dynamic environments that demand a response, whether it is to adapt to a new noise level or change your focus for a minute to respond to someone. The dials make it quick and easy to do what you need and keep the moment flowing. They feel like precision equipment, because they are”, says Gavin Ivester.
To further bring an unrivaled listening experience, the Beoplay H95 headphones come with AAC and aptX Adaptive – the next generation dynamically adjustable audio codec from Qualcomm - delivering robust, low-latency, low-bit rate, high quality wireless audio – while Bluetooth 5.1 secures optimal connectivity.
Beoplay H95 comes with a market leading battery capacity with up to 38 hours of playtime in one charge – even with ANC turned on. If users need to keep in touch with family or work colleagues, four voice microphones give superb clarity when making calls. And the Beoplay H95 uses beam forming and advanced noise reduction technology to capture the voice as clearly as possible, while simultaneously reducing the influence of background noise. This also includes extensive side-tone processing that provides a more natural feeling of speech. Moreover, Beoplay H95 comes with a user- adjustable transparency mode to allow the user to hear surroundings without removing the headphones.
To enable enjoyment in the home, home office, workplace and for travel, the Beoplay H95 headphones are easily and elegantly transportable. The aluminum mono arms, a Bang & Olufsen signature element, are sculpted with refined surfaces and upgraded with additional pivoting hinges so the headphones fold flat and inwards to a very small size that fits neatly into a compact aluminum-shelled carrying case. Lined with matching textile inside, the headphones are protected from knocks. The case is classic Bang & Olufsen – built to last from beautiful materials and meant to be featured – not hidden.
Even the accessories – flight adapter, charging cable and audio cable - have been given a touch of refinement with matching aluminum housing and woven fabric cords with a leather strap to make tangled cables a thing of the past.
The Bang & Olufsen Beoplay H95 headphones will retail for 800 EUR or $800 USD, launching in Black and Grey Mist, available online, in select retailers and in Bang & Olufsen stores from September 10, 2020. Celebrating 95 years of Bang & Olufsen's heritage, 95 limited headphone sets will be available each with a unique number engraving from 1-95, already from 27 August 2020.
www.bang-olufsen.com
