Big sound at a small price

Most people don’t want to spend $100 on headphones, but you really don’t want to gamble on a cheap, no-name brand. Low-cost accessory giant Anker and its Soundcore brand offer an extensive lineup of wireless headphones with surprisingly consistent quality across the entire range. If you want a pair of convenient, affordable earbuds that don’t sound like tin cans, the Soundcore A20i might be the perfect choice.

Price, availability, and specs

They cost $30, or about as little as you can expect to spend on reliable buds from a reputable manufacturer. They’re even on sale sometimes; when mine arrived, they were going for $25 on Amazon.

Interestingly, they’re only available through Amazon, not Soundcore itself. Hopefully, that’s the result of an exclusive deal because it would be a shame if these were discontinued. Luckily for our non-US readers, they’re also available from the manufacturer in major markets worldwide.

What’s good about the Soundcore A20i?

Great all-around value

I stopped paying big bucks for them long ago after losing so many, and I just came from a $15 pair of malfunctioning JLabs that sounded more like $10. I do tend to be pretty forgiving towards affordable audio accessories.

But I’m also a musician who’s spent a not-insignificant amount of time setting up sound systems, recording in studios, and standing behind soundboards. I’m not a pro, but I can tell when something sounds good or like garbage. These inexpensive in-ears sound like anything but. They’re a far cry from high-end earbuds, and you can actually get features like active noise canceling on slightly more costly models like the Baseus Bowie MA10. But the A20i are as cheap as you should look for in headphones. In my experience, $30 is a good starting point.

They’re not large, but they lack the stems of alternatives like the Apple Airpods or OnePlus Nord Buds 2, so the bodies need a bit more bulk to house the battery and mic. But they’re also particularly lightweight, at just 5.2g each, rendering size a non-issue. Speaking of size, the case is the most compact I’ve ever held.

Their OK-feeling plastic doesn’t compare to premium earbuds’ soft-touch materials but feels fancier and grippier than the glossy, slippery polymer on similarly priced alternatives. The extra-flexible tips should, in theory, be pretty comfortable — but we’ll get into a couple of drawbacks shortly.

But, given the right size tips, they’re perfectly comfortable. An IPX5 rating means they’re safe from splashes and are suitable for use in the rain. They stay put relatively well, although I wouldn’t use them for vigorous exercise (lifting weights is OK, but running might not be).

I’d normally issue a major caveat before explaining how “great” such a dirt-cheap accessory is, but I don’t need to here. These legitimately sound excellent. They’re pretty bassy out of the box; I appreciate that, but not everybody does. Of course, you have options for fixing that, some of which (such as powerful Android music players or standalone apps like EQFY) are better than others (including many headphones’ app-based EQs).

The relatively crisp and clear highs contribute to the overall great sound quality, and casual users in this price range won’t mind the lack of any codecs other than run-of-the-mill SBC and AAC transmission. But AAC is essentially transparent when properly encoded, so you likely won’t even notice a difference using common streaming services.

If you forced me to criticize the sound, I’d say it’s slightly narrow — but in-ears with a wide soundstage cost a ton more. Instrument separation doesn’t compete with $100 models, particularly in the midrange, but dialing up those frequencies with an equalizer helps. And the truth is, most people probably won’t notice either issue.

So, I can’t argue with the sound quality. They deliver punchy bass, clean mids, and distortion-free highs. And they respond well to the various great Android EQ apps.

They last for about 9 hours of playback at a reasonable volume, and the case charges them well over three full times. That’s doubly impressive because they’re so small and light. Not much in this price range consistently comes close to this kind of longevity, especially while sounding so good.

The Soundcore app lets you customize the controls and toggle on or off a tone when you touch either bud. And the gaming mode cuts the latency from easily noticeable to almost imperceptible. It’s not as tight as a wired or 2.4GHz dongle connection, but it’s perfect for how most people game on phones and tablets. It (like the rest of the settings) even persists across devices, and this review marks the first time I’ve played a first-person shooter on a PC while wearing earbuds.

The A20i do a surprisingly good job of picking up your voice. Recording and messaging apps, as well as voice assistants on both iOS and Android, had no problem hearing me clearly (curiously, recordings on Windows sounded terrible). Given their small size and lack of down stems, this left me borderline skeptical at first.

But a call to a friend confirmed it. They’re nearly as good for voice calls as the high-end Sonys stolen from me last year. They don’t use noise canceling (although more and more phones and tablets do, on the software side), so crowded or windy places might pose a challenge. But they’re perfectly acceptable in the right setting.

What’s bad about the Soundcore A20i

Honestly, not much

While far from deal-breakers, I did pick up on two downsides. You’ll almost certainly find the ear tips too small. Typically, medium tips fit me perfectly, and a perfect fit is paramount to earbuds’ sound quality (because, in a way, earbuds use your ears as speaker cabinets).

But the tips Anker provides are tiny. The mediums immediately fell out of my ear, and the large size wasn’t quite large enough. They need a little extra wiggling to fit right and can’t compete with the wings offered with workout-focused models like the JLab Epic Air Sport.

Probably most importantly, their silicone isn’t as soft as I’m used to and can cause discomfort if you pull them out too quickly. This wasn’t the end of the world for me since I had the old tips from a busted pair of earbuds floating around, and you can find aftermarket options, including foam ones, in this relatively common size (approximately 4.6mm) for less than $10.

The Soundcore app and its 22 EQ presets sound like a good thing, right? It should be a positive, but they’re pretty extreme and don’t suit their genre labels well. The “Rock” preset pumps the treble too high, “Hip-Hop” often misses the intended vocal boost, “Piano” took four different piano tracks to sound good, and don’t get me started on Anker’s “Flat” EQ.

Anker and I have different definitions of the word “flat.”

Graphic EQs aren’t really difficult to use, and I wish more manufacturers would embrace them — but there are several great ones on Android instead. Unfortunately, Soundcore’s app doesn’t let you turn its EQ off, which caused the buds to redline and distort significantly when I loaded up my third-party EQ app. At any rate, I’ve mostly settled on the “R&B” preset and rarely notice anything out of balance to the point I need to change it.

Should you buy the Soundcore A20i earbuds?

Yes. If you have $30 and need headphones, you’ll be hard-pressed to do better. They beat many $50 earbuds and have no major drawbacks, especially for Android users. They’re even great for calls and gaming, which is extremely rare at this price.