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Updated January 10, 2024·
For superior music listening, the Sennheiser HD600 excels with high sound quality, but it's not ideal for exercise or travel due to its open-back design and lack of portability. If you're on a budget and need versatile headphones for noise-sensitive environments like travel, the Soundcore Life Q20 with active noise cancelling is a strong choice, despite having lower overall sound quality. The Soundcore also offers a significant advantage in battery life and comes with a microphone, making it more suitable for calls and long sessions away from a power source. Give Feedback
this description is based on the product variant with some specs and product variant with some specs. At the time of writing, the variant with some specs cost some dollars and the variant with some specs cost some dollars.
Advantages of the Sennheiser HD600
Excellent for music
Good for gaming
Very good for TV and video
Good for podcasts and audiobooks
Advantages of the Soundcore Life Q20
Excellent for air travel
Key differences
Music
9.3/10
7.0/10
The Sennheiser HD600 is excellent for music, while the Soundcore Life Q20 is good.
Gaming
7.0/10
5.2/10
The Sennheiser HD600 is good for gaming, while the Soundcore Life Q20 is poor.
Podcasts and Audiobooks
7.9/10
4.7/10
The Sennheiser HD600 is good for podcasts and audiobooks, while the Soundcore Life Q20 is poor.
TV and Video
8.9/10
5.3/10
The Sennheiser HD600 is very good for TV and video, while the Soundcore Life Q20 is poor.
Noise Reduction
2.5/10
8.7/10
The Soundcore Life Q20 is very good for noise reduction, while the Sennheiser HD600 is poor.
Battery
N/A
32.3 Hours
The Sennheiser HD600 does not have a battery. The Soundcore Life Q20 has 32.3 hours of battery life.
Cost
$350
$60
$50
$100
$150
$200
$250
$300
$350
$400
The Sennheiser HD600 has a price of $350 and the Soundcore Life Q20 costs $60.
Build Quality
9.0/10
8.0/10
The Sennheiser HD600 has excellent build quality, while the Soundcore Life Q20 has very good build quality.
"As far as headphones that cost under $100 go, the Anker Soundcore Life Q20 is a really solid option. Like any good tool, it does the job well without much guff, and it’s affordable to boot. Sure: it’s not going toe to toe with any of the higher-end models of ANC headphones out there—but the headphones do well enough for commuters that it’s a good stand-in if you were never planning on spending a bunch of money anyway."
Get a great deal on the Sennheiser HD600 or the Soundcore Life Q20
About Sennheiser
A family-owned company, Sennheiser is a German, high fidelity, audio equipment manufacturer founded in 1945. Their consumer audio division is now owned by the Swiss hearing aid and cochlear implant manufacturer Sonova. Sennheiser offers a wide variety of, very high quality, audio equipment solutions, from headphones to earbuds, full sets of monitoring speakers, amplifiers and microphones. They also make what is widely regarded as the best, and most expensive, headphones in existence, the HE-1 Orpheus, costing a whopping $59,000 dollars.
About Soundcore
Soundcore is a sub-brand belonging to Anker Innovations. Starting in 2014, initially marketing wireless, Bluetooth, speakers, Anker now offers an array of, budget-friendly, wireless earbuds and headphones that directly compete, especially in the Active Noise Canceling field, with other brands several times as expensive.
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This information was produced and vetted by the PerfectRec earbuds & headphones team. We are a product research and recommendation organization that meticulously reviews and evaluates the latest earbuds or headphones information and makes it digestible for you.
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About the Earbuds or Headphones team
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Joe is an entrepreneur and lifelong electronics enthusiast with a Ph.D in Economics from the University of Michigan.
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