When I first saw the Galaxy Buds3 Pro, the immediate impression I had was why did Samsung ever move away from its pebble like buds design and resort to an AirPods Pro design, aside from having a flashy white LED on its stems that flashes?
However, once I put it on, I was truly impressed with the sound improvements Samsung made over the previous model, it doesn’t matter whether it looks like an AirPods Pro.
The Galaxy Buds3 Pro is a far departure from the very initial model, instead of a compact squarish case that we are familiar with, it now comes with a semi-transparent pebble shaped case that once again, looks like its direct competitor. With that said, I won’t consider this as a blatant copy of the AirPods Pro, but it does at least look nicer with a grey color case and is less scratch prone than the AirPods Pro glossy white case, I’ve placed the earbuds in my sling bag alongside with other stuff for almost two weeks, and it has so far survived without a scratch.
Once you take a closer look at the earbuds, it has a distinctive design from the AirPods Pro despite having the same form, the stems have a sharp and bold blade design, it extends to the top part with a sharper curve that houses the drivers. Unlike the Galaxy Buds2 Pro, which I sometimes have a problem of tapping on the controls for controlling music playback, I prefer the pinch controls on the stem, adjusting playback volume is simple swipe up and down gesture on the back of the stem which is really intuitive.
Unless you want to use it as a language interpreter, the Galaxy Buds3 Pro will work with any Android devices just fine as long as you install the Galaxy Wearable app – sorry iPhone users, no app for you -. What I immediately noticed in the app is the ANC level control, which is an important feature as it allows you to control how much noise you want to cancel to not make your ears feel pressured for long listening hours, you can also change it to adaptive noise cancellation if you prefer.
Samsung says that the Galaxy Buds3 Pro has been infused with Galaxy AI for its audio performance, as the earbuds can now analyse the response on your ear canals to offer better ANC performance and audio quality, it also enables automatic switching to ambient sound mode when it detects a siren, which is super useful if you are walking on the streets and be aware of any emergency services happening.
But aside from its Galaxy AI enhancements, what makes the Galaxy Buds3 Pro different from the previous model is the new dual drivers, the tweeter and woofer are now independently controlled by dual amplifiers, this enables a broader frequency to be played on them which allows you to hear more details, although Samsung didn’t specify the frequency range of the Galaxy Buds3 Pro in the specs sheet, the audio performance is immediately perceivable when I compare it to its predecessor.
The most noticeable improvement is audio separation, which you can properly differentiate vocals and acoustics clearly in a song, there’s an amount of crispiness in high frequencies which I enjoyed a lot, while bass thumps are presented in a very comfortable level that doesn’t strain my ears, the soundstage is noticeably wider than the Buds2 Pro, which gives it a really nice spatial effect, some songs I recommend to experience the improvements on the Galaxy Buds3 Pro are The Greatest Show by Hugh Jackman, GODS by New Jeans, Flower by JISOO and Here Comes the Sun – Remastered by The Beatles.
Battery life is one of the issues I complained about the Galaxy Buds2 Pro, and I believe the switch to a stem earbuds form factor has allowed Samsung to increase the battery size and thus, the earbuds have up to 7 hours of listening time without ANC on a single charge and 6 hours with ANC, which considering that it has dual amps and a suite of AI features, such battery life is pretty impressive and I managed to get close to the claimed hours.
While I do miss the form factor of the Galaxy Buds2 Pro, nothing lasts forever and I’m glad that Samsung made great sound improvements on the Galaxy Buds3 Pro, it is easily the best sounding pair of earbuds for under RM1000 that has excellent ANC performance, complete with Galaxy AI features you can enjoy if you pair it to a Samsung smartphone. The Galaxy Buds3 Pro will put a smile on your face once you start playing your favorite song.
The Samsung Galaxy Buds3 Pro can be purchased here.
