Audeze Maxwell Wireless Gaming Headset for PlayStation, Mac, PC, and Switch

Awesome. Has a tight grip and the headsets is a bit heavy so it can be somewhat uncomfortable for long periods of time, but I knew that before buying and I prefer that at the beggining, so after some time the headsets still grips nicely (You won't be able to tilt your head down without the risk of them falling tho). The head band has 3 positions on each side but that means it has 5 positions overall. The battery life is crazy, I play at night a couple of hours and miltiple hours on the weekends and it lasts for 2 weeks easy, sometimes 3. Audio Quality is great. Mic is super clear for gaming but it's pretty flat, depends on what you are going to use it for. I bought the version that comes with Dolby Atmos to listen songs on Tidal, but I found out Tidal doesn't support Dolby Atmos in It's desktop app, just Mobile bluetooth and your phone has to have that function as well. The materials and finish quality is crazy good. The only thing I guess could have been better is making the scroll wheels for volumen and sidetone in metal, those are plastic.

I don’t buy anything expensive without a deep dive. Hours of research, endless comparisons, maybe even a spreadsheet. But after scrolling through reviews, now that I actually have it I’ve realized a lot of the important details get lost between the hype and the half-baked opinions. So, for my fellow overthinkers, buckle in, and prepare yourself for my ADHD powered review I wish had been here before I bought these. No fluff (mostly), no buyer’s remorse rant, just what actually matters. Let me preface... If you are trying to find a pair of headphones you can unbox and be blown away immediately, these headphones are not it, at all. Why did I rate them 5 stars then? It's quite difficult actually. Right off the bat this is what I will be covering. (Locate the corresponding emoji for specific information and try not to judge how long I spent on this): ❓-What are these headphones meant for? What would they not be for? Are they for you? ⚠️-How is the sound quality? (actually) •Not the: oMg bEsT heAdphOnes evErrr!! •Or the: these suck don't not sound good at ⠀⠀all not. *insert more lovely grammar here* 🚫-How is the noise cancellation? Is it active, passive? How's the "transparency" mode? 🎮-What's the difference between the X-box and the PlayStation version? 🤓-Annnd what should your decision be? The biggest pro, the biggest con, and my personal suggestions and reasoning. ❓What are these for?❓ These headphones strike a solid balance between gaming and music. For gaming, they’re decent, maybe not as pinpoint-accurate as dedicated high-end gaming only headsets, but still impressive. In some games, I swear I heard in-game voices in an entirely different way, it was scarily good and weird. That said, they lean more toward music than gaming. They’re well-built, not cheap-feeling, and deliver great directional audio. But if you’re looking for a lightweight, on-the-go pair, these aren’t it. They’re heavy (well-balenced and comfortable), but definitely more of a “wear at home” situation. ⚠️The sound quality.(Most important part)⚠️ Here we go, the elephant in the room. If I had to sum up the sound quality in 3 words it would be "jaw-dropping beautiful" but if I had to sum it up in 1 word it would be "ugh". What does that mean you ask? They have the POTENTIAL to sound amazing. But when you first put them on, start playing your favorite song, get ready to be underwhelmed. My airpod pro 2's sounded better, no joke. Why? 1) These headphones require immense amount of EQ work. I'm a bass lover, and if you are too, get ready to cry with disappointment when you first try them. Then after being sad, open the Audeze EQ and put in the preset I attached in my pictures. That's my bass preset. Gives you an idea of the potential these have, get ready to cry again, and in the best way possible this time. 2) Dolby Atmos on PC. Let me save you some time, when you download "Audeze HQ" go ahead and just download "Dolby Access" along with it. It entirely changes the game with these, makes them worth the money. Without it they sound pretty dull and there's less separation of sound profiles. ⠀3) Ear pads. This one may be opinion, but the default ear pads do not give your ears much room. Your ears are RIGHT by the drivers, and it can be intense especially for the highs. I bought the Wicked Cushions cooling pads, and it made it more comfortable AND more importantly changed the sound profile entirely. It gave the frequencies room to work their magic, especially with bass. Mess around with this because it could make or break you keeping this headset. That was a long one, but if you're going to take anything away from this review: These have some SERIOUS POTENTIAL, you just have to work with them. It WILL take hours upon hours of messing with EQS, to find or make one that works for you. If you are a music enthusiast this is a phenomenal next step in leveling up your music. Once you get everything situated, it's a beautiful experience, truly. The 90mm planar magnetic drivers are other-worldly when configured right. Good things are never easy am I right? 🚫Noise cancellation.🚫This is actually pretty simple. No, it does not have active noise cancellation, yes it has passive noise cancellation. This was a hard one for me to swallow before purchasing. Airpods pro 2 changed my idea of what I require a headset to have (Noise cancellation is close to the top) I'm a pretty little princess now, great. Before these I thought of passive noise cancellation as a joke, but it actually does what you would think passive noise cancellation should do. I'm satisfied which is saying something since I'm so picky. They additionally have "side-tone" which is good for hearing things around you, but it's not amazing at higher volumes (gets too harsh), I prefer it off, or really low. 🎮The difference between the Xbox and PlayStation versions?🎮 A LOT. Yet no one talks about it. The Xbox version is the only real choice for PC users, especially if you want Dolby Atmos (which I wouldn’t recommend these without). The PlayStation version can connect via Bluetooth or wired, but you’ll need to buy a Dolby Atmos license and use it wired to get decent sound quality. Bluetooth sounds great but has a noticeable drop in volume and quality. If you’re mostly on PlayStation and occasionally on your phone, the PlayStation version works. But if you’re planning to use these on PC, do NOT buy the PlayStation version just because it’s cheaper, you’ll regret it. 🤓Annnd what should your decision be?🤓 I want you to ask yourself these three questions. 1. Are you okay and willing to spend a considerable amount of time setting these headphones up and messing with custom EQS? 2. Are you looking at these more for music than competitive gaming? 3. Are you looking for portable headphones you can use anytime, on the go? If you answered: 1. Yes 2. Yes 3. No I would rate these headphones a 9.5/10, for anything else I would honestly only give these headphones a 6/10. These are for a very specific person, if you're willing to learn, or you knew these answers right away; these will be the absolute best headphones you've ever used. That's a guarantee. (Biggest pro is superb sound quality) If you're not sure this is you, I still think they are really good, I'm truly just trying to help set your expectations. These aren't the most intuitive or easy to set up (biggest con), but I think they are worth learning. Just be careful! Hope this was helpful.

Let me start by saying I was SO excited to get these after researching and seeing the reviews about how great they are. I wanted to drink the Kool Aid and I was not able to. In fact, I'm very wary of the articles I read saying these are good. I bought TWO PAIRS for my partner and I. Here was my experience: THE GOOD: -The sound quality is pretty much as good as they say. Crystal clear with nice heavy bass. I'm not an audiophile by any means but it just sounded good. I'm happy to give credit where it is due. -Battery life: I didn't use them long enough to benefit, but it's hard to beat 80 hours. -That's literally it. THE BAD (here we go): -The software on these things is so bad that I gave up using them after 20 minutes of trying to get by with them. The firmware included in the headset cuts out the first second of audio from any "new" source. Youtube Video, Discord call, Spotify, etc. It seems to want to "fade in" new media sources, but you just end up missing the beginning of whatever you're trying to hear. There is no setting for this and Audeze literally won't even acknowledge this if you email their support. -I know, who really cares about the mic on a high end pair of gaming headset? As long as people can understand you, it's fine, right? Well, that was too high a standard for the Maxwells, I guess. The mic quality is about the same as the $15 office headset you might use at a call center in Mumbai. It really is that bad. Condensed and muffled to the point that my friends on call were asking if maybe my input had defaulted to my webcam that was 15 feet away. (Ironically, that actually sounded better.) I thought maybe I just got a bad set but I looked up a Youtube video of comparing mic quality (Hardware Canucks has a great video showcasing what I mean) and that is just how they sound. Audeze Support says this poor sound quality is "designed to make your voice sound more natural," when I emailed them about this. -Enabling sidetone (which is helpful since they are noise cancelling) introduces an extremely loud hissing noise in a dead quiet room. Turning it down enough to a tolerable level means the sidetone is not really hearable. Furthermore, you can hear the terrible sound quality of the mic in your ear if you can manage to tune out the loud everpresent hissing. Audeze Support says "All headsets do this!" (My 4 year old Arctis headset did not do this, nor do the Razer Blackshark V2 Pros I got to replace my Maxwells, so I almost don't believe them!) -Chat app instability (at least in Discord): Many random things just cause the mic to stop sending audio altogether. Turning on your video, deafening briefly, locking my PC would cause the mic to stop working. Audeze has an article on what settings to change for Discord (because why would I want a headset that works out of the box?) and I followed the instructions and then emailed Audeze Support that it didn't make a difference. They said, "Have you read our article about changing the settings on Discord?" TL;DR: If you want to use these for console I hear they're pretty good other than the mic quality. If you are going to just use them for headphones, they're probably fine (though for 300 USD you can probably find better). For PC gaming, you will be disappointed and your friends will ask why your microphone sounds so bad, and then they'll say "Why did you stop talking?" If you email support, they will give you a copy/paste response and make you pay to ship them back and send you a pair with the same set of issues. My advice: Don't bother.

As soon as you touch them, you feel they're very good quality, quite heavy, made of very good materials, and the sound is the best you can find, even above this price point. Now, none of the reviews mention the drawbacks of these headphones, which are no small feat. They have one problem: after using them for a while, the drivers become damp, and they start to make a clicking sound when they're silent. The headphones go into standby mode every 5 seconds, so if you're watching YouTube videos, when you start one, you'll miss the first second until it starts playing again. Sometimes you hear several cracking sounds through the planar headphones when you suddenly turn the volume up too high, but this is normal for this type of headphones. They're very heavy. They gave me a headache until I found the perfect weight distribution, but some people may find it very uncomfortable. They come from the factory with a slightly low volume, but nothing that can't be fixed with a preamplifier. The software often doesn't recognize the headset, and you have to reconnect it. Sometimes you experience random disconnections, especially if the dongle is near the router. Anyway, if you're going to use them all day, even with the desktop on silent, just to watch YouTube and the like, I don't recommend them at all. If instead you use them to play games, watch movies, or listen to music, they are highly recommended. If you are willing to pay the price for all the other inconveniences, they are definitely a great headset.

These headphones are absolutely insane... In my opinion these are the only "gaming" headphones you should buy if you also care about sound quality (I'll also mention why those two go hand in hand) as nothing at this price sounds as good as these do. These sound like a pair of $800 headphones no joke and beat everything in this price range. Oh and did I mention they are wireless! Yes the best way to listen to these headphones is using the dongle and you get nearly zero latency that's imperceivable and very usable for competitive gaming. The magnetic planar drivers are otherworldly. You can hear every little detail its amazing and while you can just take these out of the box choose a preset EQ in Audeze HQ and Dolby access I highly recommend playing around with the EQ to find what YOUR ears like because these headphones in my opinion can satisfy 99% of users once tuned to the way THEY like listening to music. But anyways whichever route you go once you put these on you will never be able to listen to music or play a game the same way again its truly life changing. Its like going from a 360p monitor to a 8kUHD 100" TV. While I'm new to this I would still consider myself an audiophile as I love music and sound and these tick every single box. So if you are looking for a wireless headphone that has insane sound quality, ultra low wireless latency, is comfortable, and doesn't look like a tacky gaming headset then get these as nothing even comes close to having all of those things I just mentioned. I will also mention that the build quality is incredible. very little plastic super solid you feel like you are holding a premium product in your hands and when you put them on your head. Now they are heavy but this design takes that into account. The weight distribution is phenomenal on these I can legit wear them all day without fatigue. On that note I would highly recommend getting the Wicked Cushions cool cushions and the v2 headband as those make these way way better for comfort and sound. The battery life is also very close to the advertised 80 hours I can wear these things for days and still have charge and the ability to fast charge and get 20hours in 20 mins is crazy. So if you couldn't tell so far I really really like these headphones and no I'm not being paid to say any of this I just love the product and think others would benefit from my experience. So I hope I was able to help you in making a purchasing decision. Happy listening and gaming! PS. I attached pictures of my settings for both Audeze HQ and Dolby Access if you wanna try them out!

I have owned every headset known to man that has been labeled “gaming headset”. I’ve always been disappointed despite the reviews on the internet that state it’s the #1 headset on the market. The audio is always muddied and the volume is never high enough. Even after hours of messing with eq settings the headsets remain muddied. Steelseries, Astro, Corsair, whatever. All muddied. During one of my “best gaming headset 2024” internet searches I came across these. Never heard of it before, but I saw the price and the purple headset, so I went for it. Price = quality right? I was blown away the first time I played a game with these on my head. The immersion was insane. The audio, for the first time in my life, was not muddy AT ALL. It was crystal clear. The bass from explosions was immersive. It didn’t rattle my ear drums at all, but boy did it make the most amazing explosion concussion bass noise I have ever heard in my life. The direction of everything around me was on point using the included Dolby atmos on windows. There was no doubt where the gunfire, explosions, and vehicles were. I knew exactly how far to move my mouse to see what I was hearing. I was doing 180 degree turns to shoot the player running up behind me with a knife. But after saying all of this I ended up returning them for personal reasons. The quality is phenomenal. The build is solid. There’s nothing wrong with them. The best headset I’ve ever owned. Reason for returning: While the direction of sound was amazing in 360 degrees I couldn’t isolate foot step sounds enough. I can’t state this is a con because I do have some hearing issues (small). The steps could have been there but I couldn’t isolate them with eq enough or turn the volume up higher. I considered getting an amp for them but apparently they have a built in amp and hooking an external amp up to them would blow up the headphones. So I returned them despite being the best headphones I’ve ever owned. I’ve since ordered a Hifiman xs with Schitt stack. With the amp I should have all the volume I need, and be able to isolate the footsteps based on my hearing needs. Pros: - the best headset I’ve ever owned -phenomenal sound -crystal clear audio right out of the box - directional sound is flawless -immersive. You are in the game. -Dolby atmos brings these to life. They were made for eachother. -the purple color is gorgeous in real life and worth the extra $ - plug and play. Dongle and headset already paired just turn on - download Dolby atmos for windows. Once installed the Dolby app auto recognizes Maxwell. No authentication codes or registering required. Cons: - when you turn the headset on it announces “headset on” in a female voice. Depending on your volume setting this could burst your eardrums, or trigger your ptsd. “Who you screaming at, lady?! Jc!” - they are very fragile. - no clamping force on head - tilting head forward or back will cause the headset to slide. -the ear cups are heavy. If they slide off your head they will hit the floor very hard -despite the heavy weight they are not uncomfortable to wear for long periods of time. -be very careful when removing these from your head. Youre swinging around a sledge hammer. Games played: Star citizen - space never sounded so good Mw3 - not sure it wasn’t real life Ffxiv- music sounded good. Full body rpg. Music: not my headset of choice. I like lots of bass. This headset has amazing concussion bass for games, but not for music. Audio: movies and YouTube videos I wasn’t a fan. Best gaming headset. For everything else have a different one. Imo.

Before buying a pair of Maxwells, I did extensive research on the headphones and decided they’d be a good fit for me. But when they arrived I sadly realized that this product is WAY to overpriced for the product it is. For starters, the sound quality is immaculate, the sound is rich and the bass punches through so you hear any type of sound Ina game, and instruments in songs you didn’t hear in previous listens. As far as being an audiophile headphone, it’s top notch. But my issues lie with the quality of the build of the product, the 90 MM planar magnetic drivers in the headphones cause them to be a bit heavier, which for extended periods of use, can be uncomfortable or “annoying” but this wasn’t the biggest issue of all. The setup for these headphones was a bit complicated, as the software for them wouldn’t update so the headphones weren’t working correctly (the headphones failed to connect via Bluetooth due to the software not updating, which I came to learn was a problem with Audeze, not my PC) and even after I had connected the headphones via USB, they would fail to work or connect. After a couple restarts and workarounds I was able to get the software updated and the headset connected via Bluetooth (although it took almost 30-45 minutes, not including update time for the software) and even then, the software didn’t work, the EQ changes wouldn’t save, and it seemed none of the software options would save or change. So I resorted to just using it via USB. They are EXTREMELY sensitive, I didn’t read the reviews about the headphones being extremely sensitive due to the oversized drivers, meaning a small bump or bang can cause the headphones to break or not work correctly, my problem specifically was a clicking sound coming from the headphones even tho no audio was playing, and then when audio was played the clicking got even worse, I was advised to turn off mic monitoring which didn’t work, after following multiple FAQ’s on the internet I came to learn that the drivers just ended up being damaged due to whatever bump or drop. (Although I didn’t drop or bump them, past reviews saying that even setting them down the wrong way can cause damage to the drivers or cause them to move out of place, causing sound issues) I could not find a solution to the clicking sound and after unplugging and trying a completely separate headset, I came to the conclusion it was the headset that was damaged. Now that’s where I thought my troubles ended, but after more research I had learned that Audeze themselves will NOT replace headphones that are damaged or have issues with the drivers as they say (not exact quote) That damage to the drivers is not covered by the warranty, and that audeze would need me to send the headphones to them in order for them to troubleshoot them and POSSIBLY see if there was an issue with my headphones (all of which I would have to pay for in shipping) there are multiple bad reviews with the same concerns throughout the internet and considering the price point of these headphones I’d assumed they’d have better customer service, but I guess not. Since I had ordered the headset through Amazon and not Audeze Directly, I was able to just return them for a full refund (THROUGH AMAZON) but that wouldn’t be the case for if you had sent them back to Audeze (apparently the case, which I had read on FAQ’s and Forums) Overall, the headset is ok, you get the sound quality you expect, but the hiccups in terms of setup and the fragile damaging issues are what made me shy away from this product, I didn’t have the product for more than a week before I started seeing issues. Which apparently according to Audeze, is something they can’t and won’t fix, and are hesitant to offer a refund on. So I would NOT recommend this product to anybody especially for the price point, there are far better options for gaming headsets and headsets in general that are not 300-350$ and that have way better customer service than Audeze offers. Overall 2 out of 5 stars. 3 out of 10 Do not waste your money on this product

The good: • The build quality is great. • I can hear the game sound in great quality. People can hear me which was my main issue with the Xbox brand headset. • Connects wirelessly flawlessly every time. I keep the dongle connected to the Xbox and it’s never been an issue. • Great battery life. Neutral: • The original earpads were leathery and HOT AS ALL HELL. My ears would be baking like cookies in minutes. However, some 3rd party pads completely fixed this. So now it’s very comfortable. • Needed a separate stand but looks great on it. The bad: • After a few months of use, mine has got in this weird state where if I remove the mic, it amplifies all outside noise. A touch on the outside of the headset sounds like a baseball bat hit it. It’s very annoying and forces me to keep the mic attached at all times. Still looking for a solution to this. • I wanted to just for my xbox so requiring extra apps to set it up was annoying. • It’s heavy. • The metal parts outside gets fingerprints very easily, so even with clean hands it looks dirty.