Sony has been pumping out bangers when it comes to wireless earbuds and noise-cancelling headphones, so we’re all anxiously awaiting the release of the Sony WF-1000XM5 wireless earbuds.
We haven’t gotten any official announcements from Sony just yet, but there are a few rumors floating around, not to mention some very credible patent filings. Keep in mind that we can’t confirm any of the information below, merely just curate it for your very curious eyes.
Here’s everything we know so far about Sony WF-1000XM5, from the release date and price to the design and features.
Sony WF-1000XM5 release date and price
We don’t have anything official for the Sony WF-1000XM5’s release date or price, so let's do some speculative math.
As pointed out by The Walkman Blog, Sony filed for a new pair of headphones with the FCC (Federal Communications Commission). It doesn’t mention the Sony WF-1000XM5, but we’re anticipating that it might be just that. These filings typically include a short-term confidentiality clause, which means that the details will become public knowledge at a specific date. And it lists the date as August 22, 2023. Now let’s take a look at the Sony WH-1000XM5 — its confidentiality end date was August 8, 2022, but it was unveiled May 12, 2022. It’s likely we’ll see the Sony WF-1000XM5 announced some time this summer
As far as the price goes, the Sony WF-1000XM3 released at $230 / £220 / AU$399, and the Sony WF-1000XM4 launched at $279 / £250 / AU$449, so it’s likely that we’ll see another price jump, as unfortunate as that is. We’re hoping that it won’t go beyond $299, to keep itself in that sub-$300 sweetspot.
Sony WF-1000XM5 design
We typically would just have to speculate here, but once again via The Walkman Blog, we have leaked images of the design of the earbuds and charging case. Keep in mind that these images are likely not final, and we cannot confirm their validity.
The Sony WF-1000XM5 appears to be more compact than the previous model. We can see a hole for the microphone on the left earbud, as well as a protruding dot below that. The earbuds look like they have a glossy black chassis, which doesn’t really scream premium. However, they are likely just pre-production models.
Looking at the charging case, the biggest difference that we noticed is the charging pins have been reduced from three to two. A nice design change is that the LED inside of the case has been moved to the front of the case, similar to the AirPods. It does look like wireless charging is present within the Sony WF-1000XM5 according to these images, but we’re hoping that the recharge time has been improved over the previous model.
Sony WF-1000XM5 features
We’re expecting a feature-packed pair of wireless earbuds when Sony WF-1000XM5 eventually rears its head.
Going back to that juicy FCC filing, it was stated that the Sony WF-1000XM5 will feature Bluetooth 5.3. Therefore, you could benefit from Bluetooth LE Audio — a new Bluetooth standard that provides “improved audio quality, reduced power consumption and improved interoperability,” according to Bluetooth SIG.
According to the FCC filing, there will also be a touch-enabled panel on the top of earbuds as well, which is likely the same touch control panel as the XM4. On the underside of the charging case we get some info about the recharge speed, as it's labeled 5 V = 230mAh as opposed to 5 V = 140mAh, which we had with the WF-1000XM4. I won’t complain about faster recharge.
Sony WF-1000XM5 — What we want
We loved the Sony WF-1000XM4, and we want more from the Sony WF-1000XM5. The biggest thing we complained about was the lack of a “find my earbuds” feature, which should be a standard for such a small piece of tech.
The Sony WF-1000XM4 is rated for eight hours of battery life with an additional two charges from the case, bringing the total to 24 hours. That’s nice and all, but I want to see more power from the Sony WF-1000XM5. If we can bump those numbers to 10 hours of battery life, we’ll have an even 30 hours at the end of it all.
Sony loves messing with its 360 Reality Audio technology to create a spatial 3D audio soundscape, and while it sounded great on the Sony WF-1000XM4, it could stand to use some improvement. When we listened to Doja Cat’s “Streets,” the rapper’s vocal wasn’t as prominent as we expected from 360 audio.
I have to say this because otherwise it’s going to keep going up — stop hiking up the price of these things. People want to be able to listen to quality audio without having to pay out of their butts for a pair of earbuds that you could lose faster than a quarter. Keep the price $279, please and thank you.
Outlook
The Sony WF-1000XM5 is likely to show up sooner rather than later. I wouldn’t be surprised if I had to update this article shortly after publishing it. You could argue that Sony wouldn’t do that to me intentionally, but I’ll always think so otherwise.
Anyway, Sony WF-1000XM5 is probably going to be another bangin’ set of earbuds, so stay tuned for more news on that and a full review down the road.
