Beats Solo 4 Review: Headphones You Choose With Your Ears, Not a Spec Sheet
The Beats Solo 4 aren't audiophile headphones — they're headphones for someone who wants to wear them all day, have them fit comfortably, and feel the bass in their chest. There's no active noise cancellation, and for this money you can find technically stronger options. But if comfort, battery life, and painless pairing with an iPhone matter more to you than a spec sheet, these are a solid, honest pick.
Picture this: you hop on the subway, head to the office, sit through a meeting, then commute home — and the headphones stay on your head the entire time. Not in your ears, but on top of them, on-ear style. Six hours in, most on-ear headphones start pressing on the top of your ears hard enough that you want to rip them off for a minute. With the Beats Solo 4, that thought never crossed my mind. And honestly, that's the main reason to pay attention to this model at all, rather than the feature list printed on the box.
What's actually new here
Apple — which, let's be honest, is the one really running Beats these days — reworked the ear cushions and headband so pressure spreads more evenly. Earlier Beats Solo models were known for sounding loud and bassy but starting to chafe after a couple of hours. With the fourth generation, that problem got a deliberate, focused fix — and a pretty good one. It's not Bose-level comfort, but for an on-ear design, it's genuinely impressive.
The second thing you notice in daily use is battery life. The claimed 50 hours on a single charge isn't a marketing number for the spec sheet — it's a practical one: you forget about charging for a full week of active use. Compare that to plenty of ANC competitors that top out at 20-30 hours, and suddenly you understand why people are willing to live without noise cancellation.
And that's the big trade-off. The Solo 4 has no active noise cancellation. None. There's passive isolation from the snug fit, and it's decent enough for an open-plan office or a quiet subway car. But compared to the Sony WH-1000XM6, which can drown out an airplane cabin or a jackhammer outside your window, the Beats simply can't compete. If your main use case is long-haul flights or working from home through a neighbor's renovation, this isn't the model for you.
Sound: plenty of bass, not much detail
Beats has always been associated with heavy bass, and the Solo 4 keeps that tradition alive, just tuned a little more tastefully than older models. The low end is punchy, the mids don't get buried, the highs don't turn harsh. For pop, hip-hop, and podcasts, it sounds fun and energetic. But if you're used to a neutral, "studio" sound signature, you won't find it here. That's not really a flaw — it's just a different philosophy: Beats builds headphones that grab you on the first listen, not ones that reveal themselves after hours of EQ tweaking.
Worth a separate mention: how well these play with the Apple ecosystem. If you've got an iPhone, pairing is instant, the connection card pops up automatically, and switching between Apple devices is about as smooth as it gets. They work fine with Android too, and there's a companion app with an EQ, but that one-tap magic disappears — you're back to digging through Bluetooth settings like it's 2015.
Microphone and calls
Not perfect here either. The mic handles calls fine in a quiet room, but outside or in a café your voice starts to sound a bit thin, and wind noise is noticeable. If calls make up half your workday, look at models with dedicated voice-isolation microphones — Sony's lineup, for one.
Who should buy these, and who shouldn't
Get them if: you live in your headphones all day, battery anxiety isn't something you want to deal with, you're on an iPhone or Mac, and bass-forward sound is a plus rather than a minus for you. Especially if your past experience with on-ear headphones ended in sore ears and disappointment.
Skip them if: you fly often and need noise cancellation in the cabin; you want a neutral sound for mixing music or listening to classical; or you're ready to pay more for flagship-level features — in that case, look at Sony, or consider in-ear models if on-ear simply isn't your format.
Street prices for the Beats Solo 4 vary a lot by market once you factor in shipping and import duties — check the full landed price to your country on dede.sh before you decide. You're paying for the brand, comfort, and battery life here, not the best sound or ANC in the world — and Beats Solo 4 know exactly what they are and don't pretend to be anything else. That, oddly enough, is their strength.
שאלות נפוצות
No, and that's the key thing to know before buying. There's only passive isolation from the fit. If ANC is a dealbreaker for you, look elsewhere — the Sony WH-1000XM6, for example.
They're built for different scenarios. Sony wins on sound, noise cancellation, and extra features, but costs noticeably more and gets heavier over a long day. Beats are simpler, lighter, with fantastic battery life and much smoother iPhone integration. For everyday office wear, I'd take the Beats; for flights, I'd take the Sony.
Yes, easily. With moderate use — a few hours a day — 50 hours stretches out to a week and a half or two. This is genuinely one of the model's biggest strengths.
Not really. The core sound and battery life are identical on both platforms, but perks like instant pairing and switching between Apple devices simply don't work on Android. If you're on Android, look for a model built with that ecosystem in mind instead.
