Shokz OpenFit Air Review

The Shokz OpenFit Air. All photos: iRunFar/Eszter Horanyi

While several different styles of headphones excel in multiple situations, the Shokz OpenFit Air ($120) trade everyday versatility for being ideal for runners — or mountain bikers, hikers, and other outdoor enthusiasts — wanting to listen to audio while still being situationally aware of their surroundings. The open-ear style of these headphones means that they don’t provide any sort of ambient noise canceling, and they keep your outer ear open so that you can hear what’s going on around you. We’ve all been stuck behind someone who has headphones in and won’t move out of the way because they don’t know you’re trying to pass, and these headphones ensure that you can listen to music or a podcast without being that person.

These aren’t bone-conduction headphones, and they transmit sound via airwaves into the ear. This is the same way that earbuds and over-ear headphones transmit sound. Unlike earbuds, though, they don’t plug up the ear, and unlike over-ear headphones, they don’t cover the entire outer ear. They are small, light, and comfortable enough that I often feel like I’m not wearing anything on my ears, while with earbuds, I’m always acutely aware that something is sticking in my ears. They weigh only nine grams each and are essentially unnoticeable, even if I’m wearing sunglasses over top of them. The wrap-around securement system is solid, and try as I might — both on bike and on foot — I can’t dislodge these headphones.

With six hours of battery life and an additional 22 hours of charge in the case, these headphones are ideal for nearly any runner. That said, their lack of noise canceling makes them less useful for everyday use, including in coffee shops, airplanes, and other places where you want to block out your surroundings, so these probably wouldn’t work for someone who only wants to own a single pair of headphones.

These headphones tick the boxes of being ideal for running and can be found in our Best Running Headphones guide.

Shokz OpenFit Air Sound

A close-up view of the Shokz OpenFit Air.

The Shokz OpenFit Air offer as good of audio as any similarly priced headphones. I’ll be the first to admit that I’m not a music or sound snob, but I’ve had my fair share of cheap headphones that sound awful. These provide a clear and crisp sound, both when listening to music and podcasts.

As someone who has mostly used noise-canceling headphones in recent memory, I find the open-ear style takes some getting used to, and I found the same to be true with bone-conduction headphones. It’s almost as if when the brain receives sound from both the headphones and the outside world simultaneously, it can’t immediately differentiate between the sources. The audio from these headphones sounds so much like ambient music that my brain has difficulty determining which audio is coming from where. What I don’t have a hard time with is hearing people or cars around me.

I’m a runner who probably has headphones on for 95 percent of my solo runs, and I’ve always found that noise-canceling headphones left a distinctly echo-y feeling in my ears, especially when running fast downhill. I’ve also never been a fan of not hearing what’s happening around me clearly, so I quickly adopted bone-conduction headphones when they came to the market. From a sound and comfort standpoint, I’d argue that the Shokz OpenFit Air headphones are a step up from bone-conduction options.

Like nearly all headphones these days, you can use these to make calls. Four different microphones capture your voice, and the brand claims their technology reduces background noise by 96.5 percent. I’ve had conversations on the sides of busy roads and in public spaces with music playing, and the person on the other end of the line hasn’t picked up on the noise. On the other hand, birds singing in the background do seem to transmit very well.

Shokz OpenFit Air Fit

The wrap-around style of the Shokz OpenFit Air keep them securely in the ear.

It’s the fit of the Shokz OpenFit Air that puts them above bone-conduction headphones in the rankings of my favorite ways to listen to music on the trail. The two earphones are independent and fit snugly over the top of the ear, almost leaning into the ear with the speaker without obstructing the ear canal.

At only nine grams, each headphone is incredibly light. The wrap-around portion of the headphone has a flexible wire covered with a soft silicone finish that doesn’t catch in my hair. The top fits snugly over the ear, and the speaker reaches just slightly into the ear opening. It’s the lightness of these headphones that is really astounding. Even though I’m still listening to music or a podcast during a run or mountain bike ride, I find myself reaching up to my ears to make sure that both headphones are still there because I can’t physically feel them. I accidentally wore them for hours after the battery ran out in the middle of something I was doing, and I didn’t realize I’d left them on until much later.

For how lightly they sit on the ear, they are incredibly secure. I’ve run and mountain biked on all sorts of terrain with them on, and I’ve never sensed them coming off my ears. I’ve worn them with sunglasses, hats, and both a hat and sunglasses, and it never feels like there’s excess pressure on my head from them.

Shokz OpenFit Air Battery Life

The Shokz OpenFit Air headphones in their case.

The Shokz OpenFit Air have a claimed battery life of six hours, and while I haven’t explicitly measured it, I can get through several longer runs between charges. One major qualm I have with these headphones is that they don’t turn off automatically when removed from the ears, unlike some other earbuds. As someone who occasionally takes them off and shoves them in my pocket with the intention of putting them back on in short order — and then forgets about them — I’ve unintentionally run the battery down several times. However, if you’re diligent about putting them back in the case or simply turning them off when you take them off, the battery will last through many long runs.

They charge quickly in the case, which holds an additional 22 hours of charge. Just 10 minutes of charging in the case will provide an extra two hours of listening, and the headphones take only one hour to fully charge. If both the case and the headphones are completely drained, they’ll both charge in two hours.

While this battery life is on the shorter side of many earbuds on the market, it’s still plenty for nearly anyone as long as they’re diligent about charging between uses.

Shokz OpenFit Air Ease of Use

The Shokz OpenFit Air case holds an additional 22 hours of charge for the headphones.

I love the fit, feel, and sound quality of the Shokz OpenFit Air, but the on-headphone controls leave something to be desired. The volume is changed by holding down the button on each headphone for two seconds — the right button for increasing volume and the left button for decreasing it. This works well enough unless you’re trying to make a rapid volume adjustment to stop and talk to someone.

The button isn’t an actual physical button that compresses, so I found it hard to tell if I was actually hitting it. I’m sure there’s something I’m pressing inside the headphone, but there’s something satisfying about feeling a button physically compress to know I’m achieving the desired result. Turning the headphones on and off is as simple as a single tap, while changing between songs requires a complicated dance of double and triple taps. For the sake of my sanity, these are headphones that I don’t try to skip between songs with. I also can’t reliably turn them on or off when they’re in my ears, so I go into a run knowing that if I want to adjust what I’m listening to, I have to pull my phone out to do it.

An associated app accompanies these headphones, which can be used to adjust various equalizer levels and install firmware updates. It also allows for customized controls for what single and double clicks control.

Shokz OpenFit Air Overall Impressions

The speaker of the Shokz OpenFit Air sits comfortably on the outside of the ear.

As someone who often doesn’t want to spend a run listening to the voices in my head but still wants to be situationally aware of what’s going on around me, the Shokz OpenFit Air provide a great solution. The open-ear technology allows me to listen to music or podcasts while still hearing other trail users approaching from behind. While I was a quick convert to bone-conduction headphones, I found that unless I had my long hair in a ponytail, I couldn’t get the back wire of that design to fit comfortably. They would get tangled in my hair easily and look weird whether I wore them on top of or underneath loose hair.

All the other features of these headphones are solid. The battery will get me through all but my really long runs, the earpieces are comfortable enough that I forget I’m wearing them, and the audio sounds good.

As for the controls, I mostly just make sure I have a well-curated playlist when I head out so that I don’t have to fiddle with the controls to skip between songs. It’s a price that I’m more than happy to pay for a pair of headphones that meet all of my other needs impeccably.

For all these reasons, these headphones have earned a spot in our Best Running Headphones guide.

Call for Comments

• Have you run with open-ear headphones?
• What’s your favorite style of headphones for running? Why?

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Check out some of our other favorite options in our Best Running Headphones guide.