JVC - Marshmallow+ True Wireless In-Ear Headphones - Black

I am always looking for affordable wireless earbuds to use around the house, when I exercise, commute to/from work, and in various zoom calls. I mentioned affordable because I don’t want to fear them being lost or broken. The JVC Marshmallow Plus do fit the needs that I am looking fit. After a week of heavy use in these aforementioned settings, here are my thoughts. They are larger than expected, almost the same size as the 1st generation AirPods. And because of that, they stick out of my ears and are loose in there. Knowing that, I immediately dis not consider them for exercising. Using them in office work or my commute seemed like the best choice. They have ambient noise cancellation so I don’t hear the noisy cars driving next to me, and they do a good job in muting my colleagues in the office. They are stated to have low latency when gaming on my iPhone. I tried it out on some of my games and it is true, but haven’t really noticed any latency with any earbuds for me to compare them with. I found that an odd as it sounded like real time reaching my ears with what I was watching. Another bonus is that these JVC’s are rated to 25 hours of use. With my commute and voice calls, I was averaging 20 hours before I needed to recharge them. Overall, decent and affordable for my needs. I wished they were a little smaller or had some wingtip to stay in my ears.

These are a decent set of earbuds if you can get them to seal up in your ear canal and stay in. That’s the most important aspect of these earbuds. If they don’t fit in your ear canal and seal up you will not have any bass at all and they will eventually fall out. So the first thing you will have to do is try the tips to see which ones fit the best. They include 2 memory foam tips and 3 silicone tips. For me it was the medium silicone tips. For my wife she needed the large silicone tips to get a seal and any bass when listening to music. Neither size of memory tips would seal or stay in our ears. Wearing them for an hour or more and they can make your ear canals a little tender. That is provided you can get them to stay in that long. Tenderness is not uncommon for this type of earbuds that rely on friction to stay on your ears. DO Make sure your ear canal, at its opening, is clean and the tips are kept clean or they definitely will not stay in. This applies to All similar earbuds I have used. I was amused at the instructions as they read: ”Rotate earbud and pop it into your ear then shake your head to check wearing stability”. Well ok, but I wouldn’t do it while standing on a concrete floor! When we did get the buds sealed in our ears they sounded pretty good. Played my usual "test" artists like Steely Dan, Alan Parsons, ABBA, Zeppelin, AC/DC, ZZ Top and similar music. Bass was low and solid. Not muddy or hollow. Highs were clean but very slightly harsh and lack extreme highs. I didn't expect the frequency response and sound I got with the Master and Dynamic earbuds I reviewed a couple of years ago. But for the price it’s not bad considering the M&Ds cost 5 times more. Do keep in mind that these are not active noise cancelling earbuds. That is there's no DSP (Digital Signal Processing) to remove / cancel noise. Filtering out the noise is how tight you get them to fit in your ears like ear plugs. Also known as passive noise cancelling. Call quality is good on both ends. That is when I was wearing them I could hear the person I was talking to clearly and they, me. When my wife was wearing them she called me and I could hear her very clearly and she, me. I was using my Sony WF-SP800N earbuds when talking to her. The JVC earbuds will pick up road noise when used in a car. It says Low Latency on the box for use in gaming. What that means is they should be in tight sync with the action on the screen. You can switch this on and off. Also has a mono mode. The very small instructions with tiny print tell you how to pair the earbuds by removing a plastic sticker on the stalk of the buds. Then replacing them back in the charging box and then removing them again to put them into pairing mode. This worked well for the first phone but not the second one. You have to turn BT off on the first phone they are paired to and then they will find the second one. This might take a few tries. There are no tactile switches on the buds. It’s all done by touch. The little booklet explains the functions. Might want to take a photo of it with your phone until you have used them a bit and remember what does what. But be aware that any repositioning you do to them to get them back into your ear tight will likely initiate a “function” whether you want it to or not. I have other brands of earbuds that work this way and it can be annoying at times when they exhibit the same behavior. There is no app available for these. There are no EQ settings. The extra ear tips cannot be stored in the charging storage case. So don’t lose em! The buds come in the charging box and a USB A to micro USB cable. You will need to provide a charger and almost any modern cellphone charger will do. It just needs to provide 5 VDC at 500 mA or more. Battery life is rated at 30 hours and I assume that’s with recharging them in the box until both earbuds and box batteries are depleted. Neither the included instructions or box specified. Build quality seems good for the price. One year warranty. Conclusion is that these have the potential to be decent earbuds if you can keep them sealed in your ears or just in your ears period. The latter is why I cannot recommend them and I'd really like to.

They are practical and easy to use. Connection is great