Nothing Ear hands-on: New flagship buds with smart ANC and incredible sound personalization

Nothing's Ear (2) noise-canceling earbuds are barely 12 months old, but the young British company is already on to its third generation of flagship ANC buds. As the follow-up to the Nothing Ear (2) and Ear (1), these next-gen buds join the recent Nothing Phone 2 and Nothing Phone 2a smartphone launches and are simply called Nothing Ear. 

I confess, I found the non-sequential model naming a little confusing, especially when you consider that the company has also launched a pair of $99 Nothing Ear (a) noise-canceling earbuds simultaneously. Nevertheless, the Nothing Ear (2024) buds offer several tech advances to boost performance over their predecessors and achieve what the company describes as its best-ever audio experience. 

Despite the significant tech boost with sound refinements and improved personalization, the Nothing Ear (2024) maintains the same MSRP as their predecessor. 

I've been testing Nothing's new flagship earbuds for just 24-hours, so it's important to clarify that these are my first impressions and that my full review will follow shortly. In the meantime, let's find out how the new Nothing Ear flagship buds stack up.

Nothing Ear hands-on: Cheat sheet

• Custom 11mm dynamic driver with a ceramic diaphragm and improved airflow
• LHDC 5.0 and LDAC codec for high-quality streaming over Bluetooth
• Adaptive ANC, which automatically applies one of 3 noise cancelation levels
• Improved noise cancelation that's 1.8 times stronger than Ear (2)
• 25% longer battery life than Ear (2)
• Same price as the Nothing Ear (2)

Nothing Ear hands-on: Specs compared

Nothing Ear hands-on: Price and release date

Nothing says that the Ear (2024) will be on sale from April 22 priced at $149 / £129 / €149. Pre-orders can be placed from today (April 18) via the company's nothing.tech online store. The price is the same as the company's Ear 2 that launched in 2023, which is $100 cheaper than Apple's AirPods Pro 2 USB-C flagship. Interestingly though, the new Nothing flagship is $50 more expensive than the recently introduced OnePlus Buds 3 flagship earbuds ($99).    

The new Nothing Ear will be available in black or white color options. Both colorways have transparent drop stems. 

Nothing Ear hands-on: Design

Nothing's see-through drop stem design is its signature look. I genuinely like the style and the transparent design, and the new Ear wireless buds look identical to the model they replace. 

As with the Ear (2), there’s plenty of attention to detail on the new version from the tiny printed lettering on each stem to the clearly visible touch sensors and three microphones in each earpiece.

The earbuds maintain their IP54 rating for the buds, making them protected from dust and resistant to sweat and moisture to the same level as the AirPods Pro 2 USB-C. The charging case dimensions have been modified slightly and the back version I tried for this hands-on has a sophisticated gray tint to its lid. It's still rated to IP55 for dust and water resistance and has a pairing button on the side along with a USB-C charging port. There's also a small LED to indicate the earbud's status.

I've tested several new wireless earbuds recently that rank in our best wireless earbuds buying guide, but the Nothing Ear are some of the lightest I've worn. I barely noticed them in my ears. The pre-fitted mid-size eartips worked well for my ears, and the Ear Tip Fit Test confirmed that they were indeed the correct size and made a good seal in my ear canal. 

Nothing Ear hands-on: Sound quality

Sound quality from the new custom 11mm driver is rewarding across the entire frequency range. I've been testing the new buds connected to my Sony Xperia 1 IV smartphone using LDAC over Bluetooth, and the results are impressive. 

Despite the driver being slightly smaller in this new model than the version fitted to their predecessor, there's no sense of any bass frequencies being sacrificed in any way. The new 5-level Bass Enhance and the improved air flow in the buds' acoustic architecture give low notes to tracks in my Tidal playlist all the energy and gravitas they need. Its a rich and and immersive sound, although I found I didn't need take Bass Enhance beyond level 3.

Just as I found with the Ear 2, the new Ear flagship get off to an impressive start even without any EQ tinkering. Nothing has taken its personalized sound even further though via a suite of features in the excellent Nothing X app designed to tailor the sound to your personal level following a short hearing test. The process takes several minutes to complete, but once done, I was able to activate a frequency map tailored to my hearing. Wearers can select between "Recommended" and "Richer" profiles, and there's an intensity slider which appears to adjust the amount of low frequency energy. Following my short test, I found I preferred the Recommended option with the Intensity slider set to 100%.

Nothing claims an improvement in ANC performance that's almost twice as effective as its predecessor. The buds claim a new smart ANC algorithm that checks for noise leakage between the earbuds and the ear canal and adds more noise cancelation accordingly. Ear also accounts for background distractions with Adaptive ANC and automatically applies one of 3 noise cancelation levels, high, medium, and low.

Nothing Ear hands-on: Outlook

I was surprised that Nothing decided to replace its flagship Ear (2) after just 12 months, but things move quickly in the earbuds sector and makers are updating more frequently with increasingly strong audio tech to stay ahead of the competition. 

Despite a slightly backward step with its name, the new Nothing Ear is everything you could want from a pair of buds. From my brief hands-on testing so far, they offer strong ANC, remarkable sound with LDAC and LHDC 5.0 support, and impressive sound personalization without boosting the price. Look out for my fully rated review coming soon. 

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