I am such a sucker for common gaming tech with fancy shmancy bells and whistles. If you tell me your gamepad is the first controller in the world powered by NASA, don’t even bother explaining what that means – I’m already sold. LG invited me to test drive the latest and greatest in wireless earbud technology with the LG Tone Free T80s, the first-ever Dolby Atmos-enabled earbuds. It sounded like the ultimate gaming earbud, and it turns out it kind of is, just not in the way I expected.
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LG TONE Free T80S Wireless Bluetooth Earbuds: A Lot Of Words For A Tiny Product
I’m going to start off with everything I love about these earbuds. The T80s comes in a tiny porcelain-colored charging case that’s a bit taller than it is wide, and I found it fit easier into more spaces in my clothes and bags than the traditional square charging cases. It’s got a nice rubbery pad on the bottom so I can set it on my dashboard without worrying it will slip off, and it also supports wireless charging. It’s got a strong hinge, a color-coded charge indicator light, and magnetic earbud slots. Great charging case.
The buds are unbelievably comfortable. The medical-grade ear gels come in four different sizes and are better suited for long listening sessions than any earbuds I’ve used before. These are active noise cancelling headphones, so it’s imperative that they create a strong seal with your ears, and these do. They’re fairly easy to remove and clean – though the tiny spongy filter inside could get lost if you’re not careful with it. They’re water resistant, the touch controls are fully customizable, and LG boasts up to 36 hours of play time when including the charging case. I usually get about 4 hours when I use the ANC, which is still really great.
I’ve mentioned it twice now, but the Active Noise Cancellation is really the star of the show here. I’ve tested a lot of headphones over the years and I’ve learned that not all ANC is created equal. LG’s is the best I’ve ever experienced, and it’s the reason this pair of earbuds have become my daily drivers over the last few months. The way it almost completely mutes the outside world is incredible. Sometimes I just wear them like earplugs with no sound just to help me concentrate, and they help a ton. You can instantly swap to either listening mode (ambient sound) or conversation mode (enhances voices) when you need to hear what’s going on around you. If all you want is a good ANC, these buds are perfect.
You can customize the earbuds using the Tone Free app, which has a lot of really nice features. It will automatically reconnect the buds to your phone when you put them in, and you can use it to adjust all kinds of things like the listening mode, sound effect, touch functions, enable multi-point to pair multiple devices at the same time, and activate the Dolby features. It has Find My Earbuds and Game Mode to reduce latency, which is actually a lot more useful than it seems at first. Some devices don’t play well with Bluetooth earbuds, and this feature can reduce or eliminate sync issues. It worked great with my AWOL projector.
It has a cool experimental feature called Whisper Mode that lets you hold down on the right bud to talk quietly on phone calls. It makes me feel like a spy.
The sound quality is far better than I usually expect from a wireless earbud. It has a pretty incredible range and a surprising amount of oomph, especially with the bass boost toggled on. Some earbuds that are phenomenal for music don’t perform quite as well for gaming, but that’s not the case here. I use these earbuds for watching movies and playing games, and with a few tweaks to the sound profile, they sound great for both.
What’s Up With Dolby Atmos?
I started this review by explaining what made me interested in these buds was the Dolby-of-it-all, but that has turned out to be its weakest feature. Yes, the headphones are Dolby Atmos enabled, but that doesn’t mean everything you watch or play is going to have Dolby Atmos too.
Dolby Atmos content is pretty hit or miss. Netflix has a nice variety, but you’ll only have access to it if you subscribe to the premium 4K tier. There’s some on Amazon Prime and a lot on Disney Plus, but it’s not always easy to find. Music apps like Tidal and Apple Music have it, Spotify doesn’t. PS5 has it, the Switch doesn’t.
That’s fine, you can’t expect every platform to support niche high-end audio formats. But what really irks me about these headphones is that you need to enable its Dolby Head Tracking feature in order to get that signature big stage sound Atmos is known for. Head tracking takes whatever you’re listening to and gives it a fixed spatial position, so that when you turn your head, the sound changes as though it’s coming from an actual source.
I don’t get this feature. It doesn’t make watching things more immersive for me. If anything, it makes me want to focus on keeping my head perfectly still so the audio doesn’t get funky. This feels like a weird gimmick, which is disappointing considering everything else about the buds is so great. Ultimately you’re only getting a real Dolby Atmos experience from an actual surround sound set-up. There are some marginal benefits in these earbuds, but more than anything it’s just a marketing tool.
That disappointment hasn’t stopped me from loving the LG T80s, and adopting them as my full-time gaming earbuds. They’re extremely comfortable, have decent battery life, and better ANC than I’ve ever experienced in a wireless earbud. I recommend them if you’re looking for noise cancellation, but if you’re expecting to be wowed by the Dolby Atmos, you’ll probably be disappointed.
You can learn more about the T80s wireless bluetooth earbuds and all of its unique features on LG’s website.