Samsung Galaxy Buds2 Pro: 24-bit with asterisks

The Samsung Galaxy Buds lineup is unlike any Apple’s AirPods, with an over-the-ear body and noise canceling and custom fit reserved only for the Pro version. Samsung’s headphones are earplugs that you place in your ears, all with replaceable rubber tips and noise reduction. As a result, Pro versions seem a little harder to distinguish from regular Buds.

The second version of the Galaxy Buds appeared last year at the same time as Samsung’s latest foldable smartphones and smartwatches. The new Pro earbuds were introduced in 2022 alongside the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip4 and Galaxy Z Fold4 foldable smartphones and the fifth-generation Galaxy Watch.

The regular Galaxy Buds2 can be distinguished from the new Buds2 Pro as they have a matte finish on both the ears and the box. There are also slightly larger dark mesh surfaces for the microphones on the headphones. These microphones provide noise reduction and enable phone or video calls, among other things. The matte finish gives the Pro ears a class compared to glossy normal ears. The design is also pretty similar though, especially with the rectangular charging case.

Of course, the finish isn’t the only thing that makes Samsung’s Buds2 Pro different. Besides the improvements to the noise reduction and playback mode that let the sound quality pass, Samsung headphones can now handle 360 ​​audio as well. It’s a kind of spatial sound that other manufacturers like Apple and Sony are working on in their own way. However, these producers often use music in their demos to demonstrate this sound experience. Samsung seems to understand this better by properly connecting the headset to a (Samsung) television so you have a kind of surround experience with your headset.

The most striking new feature is that the headphones can now play audio in 24bit instead of the usual 16bit. In short, better sound quality. That’s interesting because the wireless in-ear sound quality could be improved a bit. The challenge lies in the bluetooth connection, in addition to the small size of the speakers. Because high data rates are not possible, it must be compressed. This compression is done with codecs.

Apple uses its own codecs for AirPods to provide the best sound quality on iPhones. But headphones from other brands have another interesting feature: LDAC. This codec provides the highest possible audio quality and was developed by Sony, which uses it in their (extremely popular) headphones. Sony made sure that all modern Android phones support LDAC by submitting it to Google. This ensures that other brands’ headphones support LDAC.

Galaxy Buds2 Pro does not support LDAC. Samsung developed its own codec to produce this 24-bit audio quality. But Samsung (like Apple) keeps the codec only for its own equipment. Therefore, if you want to enjoy optimum sound quality, you need to connect the headset to a Samsung Galaxy device or other Samsung equipment such as a television. Are you using an iPhone or Android smartphone from another brand like Google Pixel, OnePlus or Motorola? Then you cannot use 24bit audio quality.

When asked, Samsung said that it has not yet planned to release the codec for Android or other manufacturers. However, Samsung did not want to exclude this either.