Bose QuietComfort Ultra Review: Best Cancelling, Worst Calls

The two numbers that define these headphones

TechGearLab scored comfort 9.5 and call quality 6.1 on the same pair.

That is the whole review. These are the most comfortable serious noise cancelling headphones any of our sources measured, and among the worst of the flagships for the person on the other end of your call.

Which number matters depends entirely on whether you mostly listen or mostly talk.

The cancelling is properly documented

Most headphone marketing gives you a percentage with no method attached. Here there are two independent measurements using different approaches, which is rare and useful.

TechGearLab measured over 30 dB average, split into 23.5 dB in the low frequencies, 28.6 in the mids and 40.4 in the highs. SoundGuys put the reduction at roughly 87 percent of perceived outside loudness.

The low-frequency figure is the one worth dwelling on. Rumble is the hardest thing to cancel and the thing you most want gone on an aircraft, and 23.5 dB is the strongest low-end result among the headphones we have covered.

Recording Now, who did not publish measurements, independently called it the best cancelling they had tested.

Comfort is not a soft claim here

Recording Now measured 254.4 g and gave comfort a flat ten out of ten. TechGearLab measured 252 g, scored it 9.5 and put the comfortable listening window at ten hours.

Both single out glasses wearers, which is usually where clamping pressure becomes intolerable first.

For context, the same TechGearLab methodology scored the Sony WH-1000XM5 at 5.9 for comfort and found narrower faces sore within an hour. These two flagships are not close on this axis.

The microphones

TechGearLab scored call quality 6.1, described the baseline voice as not the cleanest and slightly below average, and told frequent callers to buy something else.

Recording Now was gentler, noting ten microphones and quite decent performance, but the measured position is the one to plan around. On the same scale Sony scored 9.0.

If your headphones are also your conference call headset, this is the wrong flagship.

The tuning argument

Recording Now calls the stock sound disappointingly bass-heavy and muddy. TechGearLab scored sound quality 8.5 and describes it as full-bodied and well-balanced with tight bass.

Those readings are less opposed than they look. Recording Now's point is that the default is heavy and the app's EQ fixes it thoroughly, to the point they describe the result as audiophile-level. TechGearLab may simply be more tolerant of a bass-forward default.

Either way, plan to open the app. TechGearLab's complaint is that when you do, there are only four presets waiting.

Small things worth knowing

They fold. The Sony rival does not, and if you carry headphones in a bag rather than around your neck that is a real daily difference.

There is no IP rating whatsoever, per SoundGuys, on headphones many people will wear walking around a city.

And the cancelling cannot be switched entirely off. TechGearLab describes it as a sliding scale rather than a toggle, which is a strange decision on a product this expensive.