Our favorite budget headphones maker just revealed unbelievably cheap open earbuds that might actually sound good

• The 1More Ear Clip S12 are clip-style open earbuds
• 10mm dynamic drivers, Bluetooth 5.4 and 28-hour play time
• Just $39.99 (about £30 / AU$62), and available now

1More makes some of our favorite budget headphones, such as the five-star and eminently affordable 1More Triple Driver In-Ear Headphones, and more recently the 1More SonoFlow Pro HQ51 over-ear headphones, which we rate as the best noise-cancelling headphones under $100 / £100.

What they lack in the exciting-name department they more than make up for in terms of their "lush" sound quality and good build quality for the price. So the news of a very aggressively priced pair of clip-on open earbuds is intriguing.

The 1More Ear Clip S12 feature 10mm dynamic drivers and come in at a ridiculously low price: just $39.99 in the US – and they're on-sale now. Looking at Amazon US just now, there's a coupon offer that drops the price by a further 20%. This makes them less than half the price of the model we recommend as our favorite budget option among the best open earbuds currently.

The press release is US-only, and so far the only UK listing I can find is on a site I've not encountered before. 1More usually sells through Amazon UK where it has a dedicated store page, and from its own website; the S12 aren't currently there either. I'd expect them to turn up on both pretty soon.

1MORE Ear Clip S12: why these could be a brilliant budget buy

While 1More earbuds have been consistently impressive for us, we've been less enamoured by its clip-on buds so far: during our testing the 1More Fit Open Earbuds were promising, but let down by an unstable fit that we felt made them unsuitable for people who wear glasses and for people who want to wear them during intense exercise.

These new clip-ons look much better, with a completely different fit design that's closer to the likes of the JBL Soundgear Clips or the Bose Ultra Open Earbuds. We've tested those latter earbuds and found their design helped them stay in place no matter what we did, so hopefully 1More has managed to do the same with its clip-ons.

I hope so, because the spec here is impressive for the price: 28-hour battery life via the charging case, IPX5 water resistance, Bluetooth 5.4, a low-latency mode and large 10mm dynamic drivers. They're light, too, coming in at just 5g per earbud. If they've got the fit fixed, these could be among the best value clip-ons around.

The best open earbuds for all budgets

➡️ Read our full guide to the best open earbuds
1. Best overall:
Shokz OpenFit 2+
2. Best cheap around-ear design:
Huawei FreeArc
3. Best cheap clip design:
Shokz OpenDots One
4. Best high-end clip design:
Bose Ultra Open

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