There are few brands as synonymous with rock and roll as Marshall, whose amplifiers are as iconic as a Fender guitar. The company has transformed its recognizable name into a line of consumer audio products, including headphones and wireless speakers, but Mode II is your first pair of truly wireless headphones. The buttons sound good and are well designed, but without ANC, its price makes it look like you are paying too much for that iconic Marshall “M” on each button.
Marshall is far from the first company to take a well-known and respected brand by professionals and use it to sell more affordable consumer-oriented products. You won’t see any musicians playing on the stage with a Bluetooth wireless speaker like the Marshall Emberton, but the company’s consumer hardware still delivers great sound with a design that looks as cool as Marshall’s professional equipment. It appears that there is a Marshall tax, however, similar to Apple’s tax. Sure, many people are happy to pay for the company’s largest wireless speakers, but that makes the company’s first wireless headsets difficult to sell.
Bringing Marshall’s recognizable design language to wireless speakers was not terribly difficult – the company simply had to miniaturize its guitar amps and keep that unique grille up front. The headphones were more resistant, but making wireless headphones differently from Marshall had to be the biggest challenge. To the company’s credit, Mode IIs look a lot like a Marshall product.
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The Mode II charging case is one of the smallest charging cases available for wireless headsets and may even be the best charging case that Apple includes with the AirPods Pro for your pocket. Instead of a glossy white finish, the Marshall case boasts a faux leather texture similar to what you’ll find in a guitar case or Marshall amplifier, which I admit has grown in me. It is a distinctly Marshall product without feeling very enigmatic.
The case can be charged with a USB-C port, but it can also be placed on a wireless charging cradle, which should be a standard feature for wireless headsets at this point. Battery life is promised at around five hours and, with the case being able to fully charge the buttons up to four times, Mode IIs should provide a total of 25 hours of wireless playback before you need to find a power supply . That’s more or less what Apple promises with AirPods Pro.
Three LEDs are used to indicate the charging status of the case and the internal headphones, while a single button is used to place the buttons in their Bluetooth pairing mode, indicated by the internal LEDs flashing blue.
If there’s a reason to choose Marshall Mode IIs over the competition, it’s because they’re some of the smallest wireless headsets I’ve tested. Marshall includes four different tip sizes, although no memory foam option, which several wireless headset manufacturers are starting to include. Mode IIs are incredibly comfortable to use because they are very small and light, which also means that they are a little less susceptible to the forces of gravity and, at least in my tests, will not fall as easily as the others.
But instead of using shortcut buttons on the sides of each button that can be activated with gentle presses, Mode IIs feature taps that require more power to activate than you expected more often. Often, you will have to repeat a ring pattern to skip a track or pause your music, which can also serve to dislodge the buttons. It works, but my recommendation is instead to rely on a smartwatch to control your music if you don’t want to be constantly pulling on your connected phone.
A smaller, lightweight wireless headset doesn’t come without sacrifices. The rechargeable battery is always the priority, which means that there is generally less space available for a larger driver. This is immediately obvious when you place Mode IIs in your ears. They sound great and can easily compete with AirPods Pro, but they don’t offer the sharp, distinctive treble and deep, satisfying bass that Klipsch T5 II True Wireless Sport headphones (my favorites at the moment) can produce. For most users, Mode IIs provide a pleasant listening experience, but there are many alternatives that outperform them, and in a much cheaper price point.
You can compensate for the Marshall Mode IIs default sound profile using a free tracking app that provides access to a limited EQ with adjustable sliders, but you can really only change the sound balance. Pushing the far left slider up will make the lower frequencies more prevalent in the mix, but it still won’t produce that satisfying thump in your ear.
The app can also be used to activate and adjust the Mode II transparency mode, making you more aware of your surroundings while listening to music or allowing you to have a conversation without first having to remove the buttons. It works, but Mode IIs are missing microphones and everything that happens around them is muffled and a little unpleasant for the ears. It is a useful feature, but not the one you really want to use.
Marshall is a company well known for its iconic and distinctive musical equipment, and its commitment to design is evident with Mode II wireless headphones. I really like the physical design of the headphones and the charging case, and I would be tempted to reach them through my AirPods Pro all day if the Apple buttons weren’t so integrated with iOS. But for $ 179, the design is not enough to make up for the lack of active noise cancellation and the disappointing performance of the transparency mode. If you can live without any of these features, you can save $ 70 and opt for them instead of AirPods Pro, but there are more affordable alternatives available, like (admittedly more robust) Sony WF-XB700 Headphones, which offers better sound with limited features for $ 130.