Bose makes awesome headphones. I know I know, “no highs no lows must be Bose” but I think they sound great and I’m a bit of an audiophile. I’ve found the noise cancelling function to be essential on long flights and train rides around the world. A little over a year ago I posted a love letter (of sorts) about my Bose QC15 noise cancelling headphones, which I loved dearly. Heck, I even made a video about how to replace the ear cups [affiliate link which may pay me a small commission] to make them feel new again.
Well, recently I had to replace them. It’s not that they stopped working, far from it in fact. So why, only a year after writing such an ode to their wonderfulness, did I feel forced to retire them?
So…I bought an iPhone 7. Jet Black, with 256GB of onboard storage. And I’ll be honest, it’s pretty great. But I hate it. Why? I’ll get to that in a minute, but first let’s talk about something pretty amazing.
The Amazing Bose QC35 Noise Cancelling Headphones
The Bose QC35s [affiliate link which may pay me a small commission] are the newest edition of Bose’s over-the-ear QuietComfort headphones family and they’re pretty incredible.
The headphones come in a case which is much smaller than the case for the QC15, it’s about the size of an adult human hand. This was essential for me, as the one thing I did not like about the QC15s was the size of the case.
How did they make the case smaller? Easy, the headphones now fold in order to take up less space.
Instead of laying flat and wasting case space you can see the headphone band folds where the ear cup meets the band. Bravo to Bose for thinking of a way to reduce the space needed to store the headphones safely. The black plastic Bose thing you see on the bottom left is the airplane headphone jack adapter (since many of those require two plugs).
On the side of the headphones you’ll find the power switch, which turns on the noise cancelling function and connects the headphones to a bluetooth device. Pairing your device to the headphones is easy and takes but a few seconds, after which it almost instantaneously connects when the power goes on. At the bottom of of the closest headphone you’ll see a micro USB plug. That’s right: the QC35s are rechargeable, no more carrying around AAA batteries!
The headphones also have an onboard microphone, so if a phone call interrupts your music you can answer the call and speak normally. The microphone also works surprisingly well for things like Snapchat and Instagram stories, you’ll really be surprised by the quality of the onboard microphone!
The headphones also come with onboard audio controls. Located on the left headphone, the outer two switches control volume (down and up) and the center switch can pause your music with one click, go to the next song with two clicks, or start over the current song with three clicks.
So to put it simply, I love my new Bose QC35 noise cancelling headphones [affiliate link which may pay me a small commission].
Wait, so what was the deal with hating the iPhone 7?
WHY DID THEY GET RID OF THE HEADPHONE JACK?! My phone’s battery was low last weekend as I boarded a plane to come back to Dallas and I needed to charge it on the flight, so I plugged it in. But, since the new iPhone uses the same port for the headphones AND the charger, I could listen to music or charge the phone, but not both. Why Apple didn’t release an adapter which allowed you to charge the phone and listen to headphones with the 3.5mm jack I’ll never know (actually I do know, they want to force you to get bluetooth headphones or their new easy to lose AirPods).
Yes, I know, buying a $350 set of headphones simply because I was too impatient to wait for someone to release a phone-charge-and-3.5mm-headphone-adapter dongle is kind of ridiculous, but I love my music and wanted to be able to listen to it while charging my phone!
So dang it Apple, you got me, congratulations I guess. Yes, I hate that part of the iPhone 7, but every other part of it is pretty amazing. In fact, whereas I’d normally use my a7rII and 90mm macro lens to take pictures like these, I was kind of lazy and decided to just use my iPhone 7. That’s right, the QC35 images were taken with an iPhone 7 and edited in Adobe Lightroom Mobile!
Google Pixel!!!!!! The Bose headphones are great though
The Pixel looks great! I want to get my hands on one for a comparison, hopefully that’ll happen soon.
#DongleLife
You’ll need one for the new MacBook “Pro” also to read SD cards.
Ugh, that killed my plans to buy the new MBP. I understand why they did it, but now I’m seeing an article from Fstoppers that the dongles are causing numerous issues, looks like a big mess for Apple: https://fstoppers.com/gear/apples-new-usb-cthunderbolt-adapters-are-extremely-unreliable-152877
Andy, if your new headphones have Bluetooth connectivity, and they’re easy to pair, why did it matter if they were wired?
With no wired option, they’d be useless on planes and you wouldn’t be able to use them with IFE systems.
Correct, they come with an airplane IFE adapter as well as an audio cable if you need them to be wired.
The old QC15s were wired, which meant I couldn’t listen to music and charge my phone at the same time. The QC35s are wireless, so I could listen and charge at the same time.
What’s up with this article? The Bose Q35 are wireless, so nonsense with your hatred.
Agreed, I just wish I could’ve used my old QC15s (which it turns out I could have with a third party adapter but I don’t like third-party things like that).
You could pick up this adapter from Belkin:
https://www.google.com/amp/www.theverge.com/platform/amp/2016/9/8/12852098/belkin-apple-iphone-7-plus-adapter-dongle-charge-music?client=safari
Absolutely John and thanks for posting the link to it (hopefully it’ll save a few readers from getting new headphones!). At the end of the day it’s such a ridiculous option to plug an adapter into an adapter that I imagine I would’ve ended up getting the new headphones either way.
+1
I truly hate that I cannot listen to music and charge my phone at the same time. It is a total PITA… I’m not carrying around yet ANOTHER converter so I can use my old headphones and charge my phone. I also don’t have and don’t plan on buying wireless headphones … wth was apply thinking!?!?
Hey Andy, Do you sense any noticeable difference in noise canceling quality between the QC15s and the QC35s? I almost never listen to music but use noise cancelling constantly. Worth the upgrade?
Not enough of a difference to upgrade, you’re probably all set with the QC15s.
It’s not going to be clear to some readers, but the “hate” is that the dongle issue “forced” him to buy the QC35.
The QC35 are awesome. I really can’t think of any improvements, other than I’d like to be able to adjust the amount of NC from the app.
I wish they offered less boring color choices, but that’s the headphone industry. I may take the caps off the side and paint them glossy yellow or something so I’m less likely to leave them somewhere. There is an outfit that will do pro custom paint jobs but I don’t want to mail mine off and be without them that long.
I like the Silver color but imagine it might not last as long as I hope, interesting that there are people who will do the custom painting! The only other time I ever heard of that was Casey Neistat turning a pair of Bose headphones into “Beats”: