Bowers & Wilkins is on a roll. The company has unveiled two great-sounding headphones: the Px7 S2 and the Px8. To launch it unveiled revamped versions of its true wireless headphones. The more high-end Pi7 S2 is located above the Pi5 S2 in the company’s product range and supports aptX Adaptive and 24-bit/48 kHz broadcasting from compatible devices and services. The redesigned Pi7 also features adaptive active noise cancellation (ANC) and matter-compatible audio retransmission to stand out from the new Pi5. However, the S2 variants of the company’s top-of-the-range model are considerably more expensive than the best wireless headphones we’ve reviewed and lack brilliance in several key areas.

Design

Bowers & Wilkins did not reinvent the wheel in the design of the Pi7 S2. The company has remained faithful to the general appearance of the Pi7 but has changed its color. Like the previous model, this IP54-certified S2 version is available in black and white options, but the previously copper-plated components are now silver-plated. This change mainly affects the round exterior trim, which houses the brand and the company’s touch controls. There is also a new third color – dark sapphire – with gold accents. Bowers & Wilkins calls it midnight blue, but personally, for me, it’s more purple than blue.

Overall, the Pi7 and Pi7 S2 have a unique shape which is a flat oval with a round touchscreen on top. These are not the most comfortable headphones that you can wear for long periods of time, but they stay in place when you move around. As for the built-in controls, there are basic playback functions that are reflected on both sides. A long press on the right side will bring up your voice assistant while you do the same on the left cycles in the middle ANC and Aus. The Pi7 S2 remembers whether you have set the headphones to normal noise cancellation or to the company’s automatic adjustment option. However, there is no way to trigger transparency mode on the headphones themselves, and there is no volume control option. Both are pretty significant omissions for a 400 set.

Software and features

As with the recent Bowers & Wilkins headphones, the Pi7 S2 settings are available in the company’s music app. Here you can select your noise cancellation mode (enabled, automatic or disabled), enable the relay (transparency mode), Manage connections (Multipoint available for two devices), disable the wear sensor (Automatic pause) and determine the Streaming quality. The Pi7 S2’s main view also shows the battery life of the headphones and the matter separately, but you only get a single figure for the headphones – not an individual percentage for each. The application also allows you to connect a handful of music services to use the Software as a media player. Qobuz, Tidal, Deezer, TuneIn, SoundCloud and NTS are the supported options here.

And that’s really it. There is no way to adjust the equalizer to choose from the presets that the company has created for the Pi7 S2. Even on the most recent headphones, Bowers & Wilkins has integrated treble and bass controls so that you can make adjustments. Of course, the changes made to these controls are simple and quite subtle, but The Option is there. You also cannot toggle built-in commands, such as reassigning the long print action. This means that you are stuck with the left side in the middle the activation and deactivation of the ANC and that you do not have quick access to the transparency mode.

Sound quality

The PX7 S2 headphones from Bowers & Wilkins were among the best we tested last year in terms of pure sound quality. The company has gone a step further with its top-of-the-range Px8, continuing its track record of balanced tuning with exceptional clarity and detail. Although the Pi7 S2 doesn’t quite compete with the company’s headphones, the overall sound is still very good here. I wouldn’t put these headphones before Sennheiser’s Premium True Wireless Option, but Bowers & Wilkins is not far off. In fact, when it comes to reproducing subtle details, I would say that the Pi7 S2 is slightly superior than the Momentum 3 – but only in this particular criterion.

The stunning detail becomes obvious when you listen to Makaya Mccravens in These Times and other jazz albums. The same goes for multi-instrumental Bluegrass. These Genres show what the Pi7 S2 is capable of in terms of clarity and subtlety. In McCraven’s matter, it’s not just a kick drum, you hear the Nuance that it’s the trademark, a kind of muted kick drum that is a mainstay of the musical style. The horns float above everything else when present, giving the instrumental tracks a vocal cadence, even if there are none.