TechRadar Verdict
The Turtle Beach Stealth Pro is a premium headset that sounds and feels every bit as good as you would hope given the price tag. Armed with excellent active noise canceling, stunning hand-tuned custom 50mm drivers, and multiplatform versatility through 2.4 GHz and Bluetooth, this is everything a high-end model should be.
Pros
- +
Incredible audio quality
- +
Flawless active noise canceling
- +
Excellent build quality and comfort
- +
Versatile connectivity options
Cons
- -
Average sounding microphone
- -
Expensive
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The Turtle Beach Stealth Pro is the latest flagship gaming headset from the established brand, which positions its headset to become the be-all and end-all whether you’re playing on console, PC, or mobile devices. Armed with some excellent audio drivers, leading design and build quality as well as signature style, it’s set an incredibly high standard for what’s possible from cross-platform models.
The Turtle Beach Stealth Pro can easily be considered one of the best PS5 headsets and one of the best Xbox Series X headsets to date. I also make the case for it going down as one of the best PC gaming headsets, too. While the price tag is steep, it really is a case of you get what you pay for here, largely eclipsing the competition with very little I can fault it on.
Price and Availability
The Turtle Beach Stealth Pro launches on April 23 in the US and the UK for $329.99 / £279.99 / AU$599.95. There are two variants of the high-end gaming headset available, which are functionally identical except for the wireless transmitter. One is designed for Xbox consoles and the other for PlayStation with green and blue LED rings coming accordingly. Keep in mind that the Xbox variant works natively with PS5 and PS4.
Design and Features
The design of the Turtle Beach Stealth Pro is noticeably understated from what we generally see from the gaming headset manufacturer. The bright colors of the budget Recon line and the chunkiness of the Turtle Beach Stealth 700 Gen 2 Max has been replaced with something far sleeker and more premium in feel and finish. From the leatherette in both the band and the cups as well as the gray metal accents which give a finish closer to studio headphones than a gaming headset. It looks incredible, and is subtle enough that wearing them out doesn’t carry the same stigma as other times I’ve been in a pinch and left home without something to play music through.
What’s exciting about the Turtle Beach Stealth Pro compared to other high-end headsets such as the SteelSeries Arctis Pro and the Astro A50 is the approach taken with the wireless transmitter and docking station. With the former, it acts as a place to connect up to console as well as charge not only an extra battery pack, which can be swapped out in seconds into the left cup in seconds for another 12-15 hours playback, but also has USB charging. On my PS5, it meant I could keep my DualSense Wireless Controller charging without having to sacrifice that all-important front I/O. As a wireless transmitter, there’s a 50ft / 15m range, so I never had to worry about disconnecting or sonic interference.
The on-cup controls of the Turtle Beach Stealth Pro keep things simple. There are buttons for power, Bluetooth, and the Superhuman hearing (more on that later) on the right side, with a multi-purpose button and wheel able to be remapped through software on your smartphone or PC / Mac. It’s all incredibly intuitive and very easy to grasp for beginners. For the majority of my testing I found myself swapping the wheel between ANC levels, microphone monitoring, and volume.
Performance
The Turtle Beach Stealth Pro is the best gaming headset that I’ve ever used in all my years of testing console and computing hardware. The custom hand-tuned Nanoclear neodymium 50mm drivers truly sound incredible and eclipse similar-sized ones from companies such as Razer’s TriForce Titanium 50mm drivers as found in the Razer Kraken Kitty V2 Pro that I have used recently.
Gaming with the Turtle Beach Stealth Pro has been a significant step up from mid-range console offerings such as the excellent SteelSeries Arctis 7P+ in my experience. Whether I’m playing on my PS5 or gaming PC, I’ve been constantly surprised by the warmth, clarity, and faithfulness of the audio reproduction, especially when factoring in 3D Audio and other 7.1 surround sound options. I only had to look as far as a playthrough of Red Dead Redemption 2 to fully immerse myself in the Old West setting. Everything from the delicate trot of my horse around Rhodes, to the fierce gun battles of a heist gone wrong in Saint Denis was picked up incredibly well.
Multiplayer games are really where the Turtle Beach Stealth Pro gets to shine, though. This was especially apparent in Battlefield 2042 and Overwatch 2. Not only is there a dial to control the microphone monitoring, meaning you can hear yourself without needing to shout through the chaos, but also the “Superhuman hearing” function has three different intensity levels and is mapped to its own textured button.
Through this option, I was able to hear everything from the footsteps of the soldiers chasing me through the Kaleidoscope and Orbital conquest maps, and was even able to pinpoint exactly where I was being fired on from inside an office complex. At first, I thought it was just a gimmick, having used it previously with the Turtle Beach Recon controller, one of the best Xbox controllers, but having it mapped to a high-end headset made all the difference.
The active noise canceling, which can cancel out up to 25db of unwanted background ambiance, has to be the killer app here. It’s something that I initially didn’t appreciate when I was at my gaming desk or sitting on my bed, but when I started using the Turtle Beach Stealth Pro out and about as my main pair of wireless headphones, it really came in handy. As someone who commutes a lot, it’s great to have such excellent-sounding audio canceling available that genuinely rivals some of the best headphones I’ve used. I also appreciated the two noise-canceling microphones built into the headset which made answering calls on the go straightforward and got rid of the din of wind and cars driving by on my travels.
In the weeks I’ve been using the Turtle Beach Stealth Pro I’ve really been loving listening to music with it. Whether I’m working at my desk in the office with the ANC on, completely filtering out the frantic typing of my keyboard, or I’m on the move, those Nanoclear 50mm drivers mean that listening to all manner of tracks from some of my favorite artists came across strongly.
It didn’t matter what I threw at it, from Imperial Triumphant’s Metrovertigo or Vomitory’s All Heads Are Gonna Roll, these drivers know how to bring out the base and low end accurately. Not to say that quieter music’s neglected. The gentle guitar playing of Hozier’s Cherry Wine and The Lumineers’ Where We Are were pitch-perfect.
What I don’t love about the Turtle Beach Stealth Pro is the dedicated 3.5mm boom arm microphone. While it sounds serviceable, it’s just not as good as some other microphones that I’ve tested on headsets from Razer and SteelSeries over the years, sounding a little tinny and muffled in video calls with colleagues and gameplay sessions with my friends. Tweaking and balancing with the Turtle Beach Audio app on desktop and mobile helped, but I never quite found a balance I liked. It’s disappointing considering the asking price here, especially as headsets half the cost have sounded better but it’s not exactly a dealbreaker.
Should you buy the Turtle Beach Stealth Pro gaming headset?
Buy it if…
You want a premium-sounding and feeling headset
The Turtle Beach Stealth Pro sounds excellent whether you’re gaming or listening to music on any device you can throw its way.
You play on different consoles and PC
If you’re someone who enjoys gaming on PS5, Xbox Series X as well as PC then you’ll be able to make the most out of this headset’s capabilities regardless of platform.
Don’t buy it if…
You’re on a budget
There’s no getting around the fact that at $329.99 / £279.99, the Turtle Beach Stealth Pro is a steep price to pay for a gaming headset even at the top-end of the market.
How I tested the Turtle Beach Stealth Pro
I’ve been using the Turtle Beach Stealth Pro as my main gaming headset over the past few weeks on my gaming PC, PS5, Nintendo Switch, and gaming laptop. In that time I’ve played over a dozen different games and consumed many hours of music through streaming services.
