The Suunto Sonic is a affordable variation of the Suunto Wing headphone that drops the extra features such as LEDs, gestures and power bank for a $50 price reduction. Despite the lower cost, the Suunto Sonic retains the bone conduction design and high quality speaker and microphone setup. Retail price on the Suunto Sonic is $149 and they are now available in multiple color options. The headphones use a unique open ear design with bone conduction which allow you to listen to music or make phone calls while still being aware of your surroundings. The anti-slip coating, sweatproof and water resistant IP55 rating make the Sonic headphones perfect for high-intensity sports such as running or cycling.
The Suunto Sonic are lightweight and comfortable open-ear headphones that let you listen to music while staying aware of your surroundings.
| Retail Price | $149 |
| Rating | 8.9 / 10 |
| Measured Weight (in g) | 31 |
| Likes | + Open-ear design lets you remain aware of your surroundings + Non-slip coating and lightweight construction + Clear audio quality with built-in mic for calls |
| Dislikes | – Small volume buttons can be hard to feel with gloves – Lacks battery status indicator on headphones |
| Where to Buy (US) | Suunto |
UNBOXING
The Suunto Sonic comes in a sleek white cardboard box with silver Suunto logos printed on it. It’s clear Suunto has thought about the presentation as the box has a multi-piece design with an outer sleeve and a separate inner box. Inside the box you’ll find:
- Suunto Sonic headphones
- Magnetic charging cable
- Fabric carrying bag
- Getting started + user manual pamphlets
The headphones sit in a custom formed tray with all the additional contents organized in separate black holders which gives the packaging a premium look and feel.
FIT & FINISH
Visually, the Suunto Sonic has a wrap around design with the open ear bone conduction speakers. That means the speakers sit in front of your ears instead of over or inside your ears. The main speakers rest against your face and direct the sound backwards which allow you to maintain situational awareness. It’s a critical feature that allows you to listen to music or take calls while still being able to hear sounds around you to remain aware and safe. Suunto has recently expanded the color options to three options for the Sonic model: black, lime and coral red which are shown in this review. The Sonic headphones have a solid color scheme with the entire silicone exterior being a single color with a slightly darker rear hoop. It’s an attractive design with minimal branding and has great visibility with the brighter color schemes.
We have the coral red version in this review which is a bright red that makes them stand out and provide extra visibility. There is also a slightly darker red color accent around the rear hoop that adds some contrast. Branding is limited to a white Suunto on the edges which gives the headphones a premium look. The headphones have a rubber non-slip texture that helps stay in place while sweating or running. Like other sporty over-ear headphones, the headphones are held in place by small hoops that go around each ear. The rear hoop doesn’t actually touch your head or provide any support, it simply connects the two sides of the headphones together. When you are wearing these they actually tilt downward a bit as well which helps them stay out of the way of bike helmets or hats.
There is one small LED indicator on the side that is illuminated to indicate Bluetooth connecting status and charging status while plugged into a power source. To check the battery status, you’ll need to use your phone’s Bluetooth page or the Suunto app. The headphones will play a critical battery status audio notification when the battery gets down to 5% though. Note, the Sonic headphones are also not compatible with the Wing headphone’s power dock base. That means if you want to charge it on the go, you’ll need to remember to bring the magnetic charging cable and some sort of power bank.
USER INTERFACE
The Suunto Sonic headphones have a three button interface that incorporates a “multi-function” button on the left speaker and a up/down button on the right edge. This means you have straightforward actions to increase or decrease the volume using the dedicated buttons or a single press of the multi-function button to answer or end. The multi-function button is also overloaded with more features that let you do a single press to start/stop audio playback, double press to skip or triple press to return to the previous track. Audio tones provide feedback when you press a button and have slightly different tones for increasing and decreasing the volume to help differentiate them. The buttons themselves are quite small and can be difficult to feel with gloves on. That means you may have to stumble around to find the right volume button as they can be easy to mix up.
SUUNTO APP
As with most devices these days, Suunto also supports the headphones with their Suunto app. It’s a fairly advanced app as it’s primarily designed for activity tracking and analysis for the Suunto watches. For the headphones you have to click “my headphones” on the user profile to pair with the headphones. Once paired there are very few options to select from: dual device connection (on/off), sound mode (normal / outdoor) and a link to the Suunto website to view the manual. The sound mode is defaulted to “normal” while the “outdoor” option boosts the volume to account for noisier environments. Additionally the battery status and firmware version are displayed on the page with an option to install updates when they become available. Aside from the firmware update, there is little incentive to use the app as the other options are accessible via the headphones directly.
IMPRESSIONS
As with most bone conduction headphone designs the sound quality takes a bit of time to get used to. The directional design makes it feel like you’re listening to surround sound speakers or at a live venue but without any actual real bass. Compared to even midrange in-ear headphones, the sound quality is a disappointment as the lack of isolation gives the audio a flatter sound without any of the deeper tones. While you lose bass with these headphones, the Sonic does have great clarity which lets you hear background instrumentals and vocals that cell phone speakers usually can’t reproduce. That’s why we’d say the sound quality from the Sonic headphones is an upgrade from using cell phone speakers but a downgrade from in-ear headphones.
It’s a sacrifice that most bone conduction headphones have to make it possible to still hear your surroundings. Aside from the lack of bass, we were impressed with how comfortable and easy the Sonic headphones were to use. Pairing takes a few minutes and the pause, skip, rewind functions all work right out of the box with most streaming apps like Pandora. We primarily used the Sonic headphones for running and enjoyed the crisp audio quality and non-slip design. Even with a hat and sunglasses, the headphones felt comfortable with no pressure points. On quieter trails we rarely had the volume above 40% but found the open ear design would make it harder to hear the music at noisier locations. Again, that’s part of the sacrifice with this open ear design which emphasizes ambient noises over the speakers.
THE VERDICT
Overall, we found the Suunto Sonic to be comfortable and well designed open ear headphones. Whether you’re running or riding, it’s always more fun to have a musical sound track for some additional encouragement. That’s why the open ear design of the Sonic is a great choice as they let you enjoy music or take calls while still being aware of your surroundings. Suunto has designed the Sonic to be lightweight and relatively easy to use with a multi-button interface. Even without the extra features of the Suunto Wing headphones, the Sonic has nice audio quality and a lightweight design that is comfortable to wear during high intensity sports. As far as negatives, we found the volume buttons to be difficult to use with gloves on and would have liked to see a multi-level on-device battery status indicator. That said, the Suunto Sonic are a great pair of sports headphones that let you enjoy music while still being aware of your surroundings.
Disclaimer: The product for this review was provided by Suunto. The views expressed on this website are solely those of the authors and are here to help people make an informed choice before a purchase. The authors or the blog itself does not get any monetary compensation from the product manufacturer or third-party websites/vendor links that are posted here.