For the last 3 months, I wanted to find a pair of wireless earbuds that were, at the very least, comfortable. My previous pair of wireless earbuds, Sony's WFSP800N were, by far, the most comfortable wireless earbuds I have ever experienced. That being said, they're going on four years old. They disconnected randomly from my phone, they often remained on when I put them in their charging case, and on a few occasions, just my sweat would be enough to trigger the touch sensors and either skip or pause whatever song I was listening to. So, I set out to try just about every major brand that *wasn't* Sony this time around. I tried the top of the line in the $200 price range from Jabra, Beats, and Sennheiser. Jabra was by far the one I wanted to succeed the most. I picked up the Jabra Elite 8. The sound was good. Noise cancelling was automatic and easy to cycle. And the fact that the materials were military grade and built to withstand just about anything really sold me. Unfortunately, prolonged wear hurt my right ear. I returned them a few days later and tried the Beats Fit Pro. I thought that the wings would provide stabilization and comfort. I was wrong. I didn't even get a chance to really try them out. My ears were in agonizing pain due to the rigidity of the wings. I returned them the same day I bought them. I had high hopes for Sennheiser, and though they sounded amazing, they hurt in the same way that Jabra did. Cue Bose to come in. The thing that set them apart from the competition were the comfort wings. They come in three different sizes. I tried using the medium wings first, but prolonged use still caused pain in just my right ear, even though my left was fine. The small wings though fit perfectly in both, and have not created any issues of discomfort or pain. They're actually on par comfort wise with the Sony earbuds I got almost 4 years ago. Now, the sound was night and day to anything I have ever tried before. The sheer depth of everything was immaculate, and with the app you can adjust the different tones accordingly. But the features that won out was the noise cancelling "quiet" mode, the sound heightening "immersion" mode, and the all around "aware" mode. These are the best noise cancelling earbuds I have ever experienced with the quiet mode. The immersion mode let's you listen to music in all levels around you as if you're sitting in the middle of an orchestra. The aware mode transfers sound from the outside to you as if you aren't wearing headphones at all. All three modes are miles above the other competing products I have bought. But the Aware mode is absolutely amazing as any other version of this sounds Tinny or Electronic. This was the first time I have ever forgotten I was even wearing headphones. The music may not have been playing, but the background noise was so clear that I just didn't need to take the headphones out and put them away. This actually made it easy to listen to music at a low volume and still be able to keep up with concentrating on conversations or work place activities and lectures. The case uses the USB C charging cable, and you get a full charge if it's completely dead in about 2 hours. That being said, I probably get about 6 to 8 hours with consecutive use of the earbuds on a single charge. With the charging case, I can probably go 20 to 25 hours without needing to recharge. But what I love is that not only will the earbuds audibly tell you when they are low after they've been sitting in the case, the case itself has a light indicator to tell you when the charging battery is drained. Overall, is this worth $300? Considering it blew every other $200 competitor, including my original earbuds out of the water (which I paid $250 for when they were released near 4 years ago), I would say that TO ME, they are worth the money. I'm not comparing them to current Sonys on the market, nor have I ever tried the Quiet Comfort 2s. If you feel that it isn't big enough of a jump, then cool. But to me, comparing them to all of the earbuds that caused me pain, I do feel like this is a case of "Getting Your Money's Worth." I sincerely like these, and I am happy I spent the money for the sake of impressive comfort and impressive sound quality. 11/14/2023