First of all, hopefully my review is fair but please read this with a grain of salt. I do consider myself an “audiophile” which frankly isn’t a status symbol of my knowledge on audio, it’s simply that I have hole in my pockets from spending on audio gear. I do own several high end TOTL IEMs and Headphones from the likes of Empire Ears, Unique Melody, Meze, Hifiman and Audeze, but I am also trying to be as fair as possible in my review here as I can’t compare any of these brands to JBL. But on the other hand, I do have other “consumer” headphones from Sony and Soundcore, so I’m trying to frame this review around that as a comparison.
I was looking for something simple that I can occasionally take with me to the gym, for walks, at an airplane, etc., where I wouldn’t be absolutely paranoid about dropping, scratching or breaking them in the process. From the reviews both within Amazon and other sources, it seemed like a “safe” bet with a 4.5 rating on Amazon and some mixed reviews from other sources. I’ve mainly seen these compared to the Soundcore Q30 (which I bought and returned), and folks seem to generally lean towards Soundcore instead between these two.
Let me start by saying there is NO comparison to the Soundcore Q30. In terms of build quality and sound quality, these JBL Live 660NCs are light years ahead. Compared to something like the Sony WH1000XM5, believe it or not, I actually prefer the tuning on the JBL, but the ANC and mic quality on the Sony is definitely better, and Sony of course supports LDAC which these JBLs don’t. Frankly, not a big deal, since if I really want to hear “HiFi” music I can simply plug these into my headphone amp with the provided wired cable (which I’ll get into in a bit).
Sound quality: Harman target, executed beautifully. You get the boosted lows, somewhat recessed mids and boosted highs, but they respond extremely well with EQ either through the JBL app or Wavelet for Android (which I’d recommend over any headphone manufacturer app anyways). Both female and male voices are clear, crisp, not too sibilant, instrument separation is fantastic, above average staging, and there’s zero “muddying” of the sound especially when EQ is applied to boost any frequency range. The bass has “rumble”, but again, doesn’t muddy anything – it’s thumpy and fast. Again, light years ahead of the “competition” such as the Soundcore Q30.
Build: Excellent. Sturdy. Doesn’t feel like “cheap” plastic. Light years ahead of the Soundcore Q30, but doesn’t even come close to beating the Sony WH1000XM5 in terms of comfort – the Sony headphones are like wearing “clouds” on your ears. Ear cups are a bit small (I’ll get into that later).
Where I was the most impressed with was when connecting these to a good quality amp. I run a Topping E50 and L50 stack, and I almost feel like they turned into a completely different headphone with a wired connection. The sound was simply fantastic, to the point where I can (and will) compare these to the sound signature and performance of the Meze 99 Neo (~$200), and frankly responds better to a Sony WH1000XM5 connected to the same source. So short version: If you can experience these with a good quality wired connection (DAC + AMP combo) I definitely recommend trying it out.
Now to the “bad” stuff: Small ear cups, or maybe I have big ears. Would be nice to have ear cups that are a tad bit bigger to fit bigger ears. Wired connection – I am trying to understand why JBL wouldn’t just provide a standard 3.5mm connector rather than a 3.5mm to 2.5mm connector – Why? For Bluetooth, the max supported codec is AAC, which again is fine considering the price and I wouldn’t expect LDAC at this price point so this really isn’t a negative call out to JBL.
Are these “audiophile” grade? No. But you can’t expect that for $99. What you get is an excellent pair of headphones packed with basic features, with excellent sound, portability, build quality, that won’t make you cry if they break.
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