At its Galaxy Unpacked event last month, Samsung unveiled its brand new flagships for 2020 — the Galaxy S20 series. While the smartphones understandably hogged the limelight (what with the 108MP primary camera, and 100X Space Zoom features on the S20 Ultra), the South Korean giant also launched the new Galaxy Buds+ which are supposed to be an improvement over the regular Galaxy Buds that were launched alongside the Galaxy S10 back in 2019.

Right out the box, it’s obvious that these are an iterative update to last year’s Galaxy Buds. It’s right there in the name, and once you unbox these earbuds, it pretty much throws that in your face. The case is almost exactly the same as the one for the Galaxy Buds, except it now has a glossy look which some people prefer, but I really like the matte finish of the original Galaxy Buds.

None of that is a bad thing by any means, and I’m not complaining. People really appreciated the design, the build, and the fit of the original Galaxy Buds, so it makes sense for Samsung to stick to its guns and just improve what it can improve.

The design is alright, it was good last year, it’s still good this year, I don’t see the point of really exploring it beyond that point. What’s more important to me, are the things Samsung has improved; or at least the things Samsung says it has improved — one of which is the sound quality.

I’m gonna be honest, as much as I love using my AirPods Pro as my daily drivers (because they’re just too seamless with the Apple ecosystem, and they have noise cancellation), I’ve so far not heard any pair of truly wireless earbuds that beat the Galaxy Buds I got with the S10 last year. Which is why I was kind of skeptical about Samsung’s claims with the Buds+. How much can you really improve something if it’s already really good, right?

Okay, the one thing I felt Samsung should improve when I was using the Galaxy Buds was the battery life. It’s not that the battery life was terrible, and most of the time I didn’t really face any battery issues because I kept randomly charging the case through the day, so the buds were almost always charged when I wanted to use them. Still, a 6-hour play-time on a charge which goes up to 13 hours with the case isn’t the best.

Here too, Samsung truly delivers. The company claims a battery life of 11 hours on the Galaxy Buds+ on a single charge, which can be extended to 22 hours with the case — that’s good. It’s great.

In terms of features, the Galaxy Buds+ kind of feel like Samsung didn’t really take any steps forward. The Buds+ bring the same tap-gestures with a single tap to play/pause, double tap to skip forward, and triple tap to skip back, along with a long-press action that can launch the assistant on your phone. All of that is the same for the Galaxy Buds.

Truly wireless earbuds are hard to get right. That much is obvious to me now that I’ve used a lot of truly wireless earbuds across price ranges. Making things that fit in your ear without falling while also ensuring they have enough battery without being way too heavy is difficult for sure, but if there’s any other company apart from Apple that I would trust to somehow figure this out, it’s Samsung, and they have failed.

What’s more, and this is something Rupesh pointed out to me, is that taking the earbuds out of the ears (or putting them back in) can be frustrating because the touch pad on the earbuds always gets in the way, so you end up inadvertently tapping it and playing or pausing music, or worse, hanging up on someone you’re really not supposed to hang up on. Cue catastrophe music in the background.

So yes, Samsung did a bang-up job with the Galaxy Buds+ in areas that Samsung thought it needed to improve. The audio quality is great, it’s one of the best out there, the design is functional and fine, and even the new finish is something a lot of people like. However, Samsung really dropped the ball when it came to adding features like active noise cancellation, or more importantly, making sure the earbuds wouldn’t make your ears hurt within an hour of use.

  • You’re a Samsung user, and you don’t own the Galaxy Buds. In this case, you can get the Galaxy Buds for ₹9,990, or if you’re comfortable with it, spend ₹13,990 to get the Galaxy Buds+ which will give you not only the bragging rights, but better battery life and audio quality.
  • You’re an non-Samsung Android user. In this case, you have a lot of options to go with. The Realme Buds Air come to mind, which, at ₹3,999 offer wireless charging, a good design and decent fit with nice all around audio quality. The Noise Shots X5 are also great, and so are the JBL C100 TWS (₹3,999) earphones. All three of these are more affordable than the Galaxy Buds or the Buds+.
  • You already own the Galaxy Buds. If that’s the case, you don’t need to spend all that money all over again. The improvements with the Buds+ are surely there, and they are noticeable, but they are nowhere near worth a ₹13,990 upgrade from the Galaxy Buds.

However, there is one thing you need to consider. If you’re pre-ordering the Galaxy S20, you can get the Buds+ for just Rs. 2,000 and I mean, just get them in that case, okay?