ARC 3 GAMING Open Ear Gaming Earbuds

My attempts over the years to find a good quality headphone set have seen many variations. I don’t like earbud earphones as they don’t stay in my ear. I like over-the-ear, but find them impractical when outside the comfort of my own home or spaces. I enjoy outdoor activities and sometimes need spatial awareness to protect myself and others. As a result, I recently looked into open-ear technology to see if it suits my applications and needs. After a bit of research, I came upon the Cleer brand. Before this product, I did not know this brand so I was very skeptical of its overall quality, but was pleasantly surprised upon its arrival. The eco-friendly packaging is nice and secure. It makes you feel good about purchasing such a small product for the hefty price tag. They’re extremely easy to set up, simply open them out of the package, plug in the case, and then open and sync the headphones with your desired device. They also come with a USB charger and USB C dongle for additional connection options. These earphones feature a lot of cutting-edge technology including Dolby Atmos and head tracking which means when you move your head or your surroundings change, the headphones adjust the sound to meet the new environmental factors. It’s convenient when running or performing outdoor activities. The case itself is phenomenal. It features a full-color LED touch screen which allows you access to multiple features including Song selection and control, Dolby Atmos activation and adjustment, EQ selector, hearing care, a step counter, screen timeout selection, a timer, Find my Earbuds, camera control, brightness, screen saver (with custom uploads via the app), case controls and settings, earbud paring and more. They are also voice control, so simple commands like volume up. down, and the next song, make using them when your hands are occupied, perfect. Although these are intended for gaming, I plan to use them a lot when outdoors doing activities such as bouldering, bike riding, and hiking. There’s also a mirror within the case to assist with putting them on and adjusting them correcting. the earphones have two points of adjustment to assist with a better fit. Initially, they felt a little insecure. Because they don’t go into the ear, they can sometimes move or bounce off the ear, however, they have yet to fall and feel far more secure than most earbud-style earphones for me. Battery life seems pretty good so far, although I have yet to let them fall below 75%. Overall I’m extremely impressed with these headphones While there are some minor inconveniences like the coordination of the app to access full options and the fit to a certain degree, I’m still very happy with these and recommend them.

I can’t wear big over the ear headsets. I’ve tried multiple different brands and models and prolonged gaming with them on gives me a migraine.These arc3 buds work excellent right out the box. Didn’t even have to update them. Haven’t tested mic quality but the sound is great. They fit really good, but am probably going to get memory foam tips for a better fit.

Great set of wireless earbuds, as long as they’ll work for your personal devices. I picked these up along with some Soundcore VR P10’s and the JBL Quantum TWS’s to have an easy solution for on-the-go gaming and conference calls while I travel. The arc3 Buds sound amazing, using the same top-end driver that are in the Sony MX5’s, but at a much lower cost. So yes, they sound incredibly good for bluetooth earbuds. Definitely better than the Soundcore P10’s (which is fair since those are like a quarter of the price).Battery life is insane- 12 hours on the dongle, and I think twice that for bluetooth. The Soundcore P10’s get something like 4.5-6 hours on the dongle. I found out that the JBL Quantums only get 3 hours on the dongle so I ended up returning them without opening them up since that’s just way too short for me.Caveats-First to address using these via dongle (and at least on a Windows laptop)- the dongle actually makes TWO different audio outputs on your machine. There’s the “Chat” output that is designed to drop off high and low frequencies to make speech clearer, and this is unaffected by any EQ and makes any music, movies, or games sound very thin and anemic, and overall terrible. It’s only meant for things like Discord, Zoom, etc., so you can set an output in those apps that are primarily for voice chat. For some reason this is the default output when you first plug them in on a Windows laptop. You have to go to your audio output and change it from “arc3 Buds – Chat” to the real output, “arc3 Buds – Game”. The “Game” output is the full-quality sound that you can tweak with the feature-rich Sony software. This threw me off until I noticed it, and I thought I’d dropped a bunch of money on disappointment. But then after setting it up correctly, these are fantastic for media AND gaming. They’re full and clear at all frequencies and have solid directional sound so you can tell where footsteps and shots are coming from in game.Caveat #2 is that these might not work on your devices when using them as regular bluetooth. They use Bluetooth LE Audio, which is a low-power audio codec that isn’t supported by every device quite yet. Bluetooth LE has been around for a long time, and is great for things like smartwatches that just need to get notifications pushed without draining the battery quickly. But LE Audio came out a few years ago, and with years of R&D and testing that go into mobile devices, a lot of phones and tablets don’t support it yet. My Galaxy S23 Ultra works just fine as well as my Tab S9 ultra, and the past couple generations of Xperia phones have it as well. But if you’re an Apple user, even the iPhone 15 doesn’t have it yet since Apple is very careful about incorporating new tech. Maybe next year. So that’s something to be very aware of before buying- make sure Bluetooth LE Audio is listed in your device’s compatible Bluetooth connections, or else it won’t even see the earbuds without using the dongle.And the only thing I consider as the real Con – the mic. Sony has never made a set of earbuds with a good mic for some reason, and these are no exception. Absolute garbage mic, people had a hard time understanding me calling from a dead quiet room. I bought a set of Lark M2’s as a mobile mic for conference calls while traveling and talking to friends on Discord because of this. No idea why Sony can’t get their act together and realize that people use bluetooth earbuds for more than just listening to music and videos.But other than the microphone disappointment, these are definitely worth the price. Top-quality sound, lag-free audio, and the best battery life I’ve seen on any true wireless earbuds out there. Recommended!