I’ve used dating apps enough to know that looks can be deceiving, even when there are obvious red flags. And I recently learnt that this also applies to headphones.
Perhaps knowing of my penchant for the best cheap headphones, TechRadar’s audio editor Becky Scarrott recently got me in on a $10 challenge: find and test a pair of over-ear headphones that cost less than a sawbuck.
Not wanting to waste cash and seeing a pair of headphones that seemed at a fleeting glance to resemble the Apple AirPods Max, I halved that cost – and thus won at least part of the challenge, since Becky had only managed to snag a set of AirPods Max dupes that cost $37 (so expensive!).
Meet, then, the Generic P2961… I think. Amazon lists the brand as ‘Generic’ which I’m taking to be a company name and not a comment on the unique characteristics of the cans, but P2961 is definitely its name. I haven’t used any of the 2960 products before it in the range (should they exist) so I’m coming in fresh.
These headphones sell for a princely… £8.34 in the UK, and they were on sale for under £5 when I found them. Bizarrely in the US I could only find them listed on Amazon for $45.89 and I beg you not to pay this much for them, for reasons we’ll discover. I can only hope this listing price is a mistake, and the decimal point was in the wrong place.
Apple released its AirPods Max for $549 / £549 / AU$899 so whichever way you shake it (unless you shake it in the US), these headphones are dramatically cheaper: 2% of the price normally, 1% of the price when on sale. That’s right, over Black Friday you can buy 100 of these for less that the price of one pair of AirPods Max, and distribute them to your hundred worst enemies.
But should you? No, obviously, you shouldn't have 100 enemies, but what about buying the things for yourself? As part of the $10 challenge, I popped the Generics on just to be sure.
What’s in a name?
The unwritten truth with cheap gadgets like this is that they’re generally made in China and we all know the reasons why, even though we don’t like to admit them. What is written, though, makes it clear that these aren’t produced in an English-speaking country.
I was amused to learn on the P2961’s box that I shouldn’t “tlisten” at high volumes, that high temperatures might damage the “headsert” and that I could damage my hearing if I listened at a “hight” volume (it goes without saying, all ‘sic’). There were also obvious cases of a typo I too readily use: the use of a forward slash instead of a full stop (the buttons are right next to each other!)/
It wasn’t a good first look, but looks can be deceiving, as I’ve already said – and if you're selling headphones for this kind of price, a sub-editor becomes a luxury you probably cannot afford. Case in point on deceiving looks though: the cans themselves.
To my eyes, the P2961 looked a bit like the AirPods Max – when listed online, I must emphatically stress. Squint and you may see it too: the use of a flat nondescript oval as the casing, the… okay, that was it. I’ll admit that I didn’t have a pair of the AirPods in front of me so you’ll have to take my word that, when I saw the listing, I thought they looked a bit like the Max (I promise!).
That’s not a crazy assumption, though: cheap manufacturers tend to ape Apple products. The web is full of fake iPhones, AirPods knockoffs, barebones Apple Watches. So I stick to my guns: from the right angle, these are AirPods Max-a-likes.
Pulling them out the box revealed the truth, though: these are the epitome of ‘budget headphones’. They reminded me of cheapie things you’d get on a flight, or that were doled out in music classes at school when 32 kids were given a keyboard to mess around with and the teachers knew too well that all the children knew how to do with them was set the automatic drum machine to play at full volume.
These feel cheap, way more so than any other headphones I’ve tested. The brittle plastic, the rattles given off when shaken, the exposed wires, the scuffs they had picked up simply from being in the box. I can’t exactly be surprised, but picking them up was a real ‘touch-grass’ moment of how good I’ve had it testing some pretty decent headphones in my career.
I was surprised to see some buttons and ports, though, perhaps more than Generic could have gotten away with. There’s a 3.5mm headphone jack, a volume rocker and a button simply labled ‘M’ which enabled an FM radio mode when pressed. This just switched me from music to white noise static and I had no idea how to actually tune the thing, but it was an interesting touch.
A sound investment?
Putting the Generic P2961 on revealed what I already knew from touching the things. I was surprised to see that they fold down, something not all headphones do, and they do have adjustable bands (although you need to brute-force them a bit), though when I put them around my neck with the bands lengthened, my hair would keep catching and pulling.
I’m used to headphone pads, even on budget blowers, sitting around your ears to lock the sound in. Not on the P2961, which rigidly held to my face only by the sheer crushing pressure of the headphone band. Before playing any music, I could tell that I wouldn’t be getting the full sound potential.
Very quickly, I realised that ‘full sound potential’ may be a poor descriptor, in that it implies the existence of some potential of some kind. In my defense, the use of fairly big 40mm drivers did set my hopes higher than the price tag would suggest, and I’ve used some low-cost headphones in my day that are surprisingly decent-sounding.
But not these. These don’t sound good.
You know how annoying it is when you hear people playing TikTok videos or Instagram reels out loud in a public place; on a bus, in a waiting room or at a cafe? An insidious stream of tinny music, usually played at full volume. Now imagine you’re in a concert hall, especially designed for acoustics, and in place of an orchestra you’ve one person idly watching these same videos at top volume. That’s the best way I can describe how the P2961 sounds.
I’m not really going to go through the usual motions TechRadar requires (and I take no small amount of pride in) when reviewing the sound quality of headphones, talking about the balance and soundstage and quality, because that would feel like cheap potshots.
However, I do see the value of these headphones to people who don’t listen to music. My mom has some Sony headphones I gave her and she only ever uses them for podcasts. When I listened to spoken-word content on the P2961, the lower quality didn’t really affect my experience.
If, like my mom, you just need headphones to enjoy a podcast now and then, maybe cheap buds like this will be fine – and if you’re the kind of person who publicly listens to social media videos out loud, please buy some of these so the rest of us don’t need to listen.
How good it can get?
I’m glad I’m not writing a full 1,500-word review of the Generic P9261, as there’s not a huge amount to say about headphones that just aren't great, even for their lowly asking fee. But it did help me realize how good the rest of us have it.
One of my main areas of expertise is testing headphones, so I've heard many of them, be they top-end ones or cheaper options that are still really good. TechRadar will be sent the slightly cheaper options that manufacturers think hold a candle to the heavy-hitters, so we don’t often receive super-budget sets.
Judging by audiophile subreddits, I also know that many other headphone fans will buy multiple cans, or go through new pairs with reckless abandon, so there are lots of us who are well versed in the best headphones out there (be they budget or not).
But using the P9261 reminded me how even the worst headphones I test are still a lot better than the dreck available online. If you see a three-star review here, it may look bad, but that’s still a glowing recommendation compared to the cheapest of the cheap.
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