Ylife’s under-the-radar TWS Bluetooth 5.0 earbuds are far from the flashiest true wireless earbuds on the market, but they might just offer the best value. To be perfectly honest, I don’t much about Ylife as a company, and even after a little research, it’s clear that their name is basically only associated with these earbuds. This leads me to believe they’re a mass-produced, brandless device you might find on a site like AliExpress.
Design: Boring and anything but premium
The biggest ding on these earbuds from my perspective is just how plain and cheap they look. The earbuds themselves are built of an all-black, all-glossy plastic that screams “mass production”. Each earbud does have a rubberized circular button on the outside, and through that button, you’ll see the LED indicator lights. These lights aren’t just a normal dot shape, but instead, feature a geometric line shape. This is a small touch that adds differentiation, but it’s only visible when the light is flashing, which happens rarely. The case isn’t much better on the design front. It’s a big and clunky rectangle about the size of an Altoids tin, where the base is made of a gray aluminum with a button and the top is a cheap, opaque black plastic. The size of the case does allow for a pretty massive battery, but it certainly isn’t winning any design awards.
Comfort: Simple, but workable
These earbuds are very basic from a construction standpoint. When held by the eartips, they look almost like a teardrop that is bent a bit at an angle. This actually means that the eartip extends a lot further into your ear canal than some other true wireless earbuds. And because the rest of the earbud extends so far horizontal, it presses snug against the top back side of your ear once you twist it upward. This helps to keep the earbud much more secure than I normally expect from earbuds that just rely on an eartip to stay in place. However, because the tip goes so far in, the seal is a little too tight and stuffy for my tastes. Also, because the plastic of the back of the earbud housing is cheap, it isn’t as comfortable on your ear as something with a silicone ear wing. The earbuds are really light, so if you get used to the fit (and select the right size of ear tip for you), they could be good for you—they’re just a little too tight for me.
Durability and Build Quality: Not very premium
Most consumers in the market for true wireless earbuds are also in the market for a tangibly premium product. We can thank brands like Bose and Apple for this, in part, because design features like a snappy magnetic case and fancy-feeling materials are really satisfying to interact with, and are therefore expected. The Ylife earbuds don’t provide any of this. The plastic of the earbuds is cheap, the plastic of the lid feels like it’d be more at home in a toy, and the closing clasp uses pressure stiff rather than a magnet. While there are some light magnets to grab the earbuds when you put them back in the case, make sure you’re putting them in the right slot because those magnets will hold the earbuds in either one. When I first put them away I inadvertently put them in the wrong slots, but didn’t notice, which resulted in the case not quite closing all the way. It’s these sorts of touches that really take away from an otherwise impressive pair of earbuds. One final note: Ylife has included IPX5 waterproofing, which is a nice feature to see if you’re planning to use these earbuds for working out or walking in the rain.
Sound Quality: Reasonable, especially for the price
I would put the sound quality of these earbuds right on par with the average wired earbud, from Apple or otherwise. The 6mm drivers included (an impressive size for the tiny enclosure) pump a lot of volume—so much so that I actually never need to push them above about two-thirds of max volume. However, this high output did lead to a bit of muddiness throughout the frequency spectrum. Because of the tight seal, there’s more bass than you get out of a lot of other earbuds, but you don’t get a lot of detail, particularly in the mid-to-high end of the spectrum. I think the key point about the sound is that it lacks warmth and presence. It feels just a little flatter than I’d like out of a pair of earbuds that get this loud. But if you’re looking for a powerful and affordable pair of everyday earbuds, for music, podcasts, and more, these sound perfectly serviceable. That said, call quality was more lacking than I’d hoped, picking up a lot more background noise on the microphones than most other earbuds. So if you want a phone call peripheral in your earphone package, then you’ll likely need to look elsewhere.
Battery Life: Basically the best I’ve seen
Because the manufacturer has opted for such a large battery case, it’s clear that they decided to go all-in on the battery. After all, if you’re already going for a bulky case, you might as well putt a massive battery in there. How big? The case features a 3,500mAh capacity, which is basically the biggest I’ve seen on a pair of true wireless earbuds. Ylife states that the earbuds play for about 5 hours on one charge, which is about what I experienced in my testing. However, the massive on-board battery purports to be able to recharge the earbuds a whopping 18 times, amounting to a ludicrous 90 hours of possible battery life. I didn’t come anywhere near this total, it seems like the battery was draining a little faster than that. But even if there’s less real capacity, these numbers are still leaps and bounds better than you’ll get from even the best options out there. Also, because the battery is so big, they’ve included a full-sized USB-A output port that lets you charge your phone from the case. This is a really smart idea because it lets your true wireless earbuds double as a portable charger.
Connectivity, Setup, and Controls: Not as bad as you might expect
One of the most suspect categories for a budget pair of true wireless earbuds is how seamlessly they connect, and I’m happy to say that wasn’t the case here. The setup is about as basic as it gets because the earbuds are supposed to be in pairing mode when you first take them out of the case. From there, you just locate them in your Bluetooth menu. It’s when you want to pair them to a second device that things get tricky. I had to actually unpair them from my first device to start anew—a fact that’s annoying when the Bluetooth 5.0 included on the earbuds is technically supposed to be able to handle two devices. The controls are pretty basic, too, as you just use push buttons on each earbud to play/pause music, answer phone calls, or call up your voice assistant. I did find that the buttons are too stiff for earbuds like this because they cause you to press the already tight ear tips further into your ear, which is uncomfortable. There’s no app to speak of, no sensor to automatically pause music when removing from your ear, and definitely not noise cancellation here. So, while the connectivity I experienced was pretty seamless (only a few stutters here and there), this package is pretty barebones.
Price: As affordable as it gets
Ylife TWS Bluetooth Earbuds vs. Anker Soundcore Liberty Air
I liked the Ylife TWS Bluetooth earbuds a lot better than I was expecting. Part of that is because I was lowering my expectations for the price. But with nearly unbeatable battery capacity and a surprisingly solid connection, these earbuds don’t actually require a whole lot of expectation-checking. They don’t feel premium, and they certainly could sound better, but for my part, I’d call these the best deal at the budget end of the true wireless earbud market.
