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Although the Oppo Enco Air5 checks most boxes, it doesn’t support any Hi-Res codecs like LDAC, or even LHDC. And in order to get spatial audio, you must have an OPPO device running ColorOS 12 and newer.

But it’s got a few things going for it. First, its battery life is pretty decent, up to 6.5 hours from the buds and 27 hours with the case.

It also does have large 12mm drivers, and its sound is very customizable because of that 10-band graphic EQ, which I think is pretty well implemented because it’s set to have a large Q-factor. So adjusting the bands doesn't really affect the adjacent frequencies. So if you don’t like its sound out of the box, it’s easy to fix it, which is what I did.

But before we discuss more about its sound and EQ, we’re going to look at their performance in terms of microphone pickup, noise canceling and transparency. So buckle up!

Microphone Quality

Their microphone quality is not bad at all. Though it’s got that typical robotic voice capture of such TWS earbuds, its background noise reduction and voice filtering is pretty decent. (Tested in both quiet and noisy conditions using really loud cafe noise, and wind noise from a fan.)

👉🏻 Have a listen to the mic quality samples

Active Noise Cancelling

As for active noise canceling, it’s pretty decent for just dumbing down the noise of human chatter and general everyday sounds, but it’s not powerful because I’m not getting that deep sense of silence, especially in the lower frequencies. So I would describe it as being effective enough for not having to raise the volume of your music in noisy places, but you’ll still have awareness of your surroundings.

👉🏻 Have a listen to the ANC quality samples

Transparency Mode

As for transparency, the passthrough is good enough for general awareness, even face to face conversations. But it doesn’t sound very natural because it doesn’t amplify the upper mids and highs above 2khz. So the transparency feels pretty occluded even though you can hear your surroundings. So I would rate it as average transparency, not great transparency.

Sound Quality

Out of the box, I’ve got to admit that I wasn’t so impressed with its sound. It’s mid-focused, but it sounded rather thin in the bass, and there was quite a bit of sibilance in the upper mids. The Thunderous Bass setting did boost the bass as you can see from these frequency sweeps, but it didn’t hit the right spot for me. But with the 10-band EQ, I fixed it by boosting the bass quite significantly, then reducing the 250hz to clean up the bass separation.

I also tweaked the mids to keep the emphasis on vocals but reducing the sibilance, and then added more air in the soundstage by maxing the 16kHz. The result is sound quality that’s quite enjoyable to listen to, whether it's rock, synthwave, classical or R&B.

👉🏻 Have a listen to the sound quality

Sound Space and Game Mode

Another thing you might want to check out is Sound Space mode. If you just want some white noise, some ambient sound effects, you don’t have to play 10-hour loops on YouTube anymore because OPPO’s got a collection of looping ambient sounds in the HeyMelody app. It also has a gaming mode that combines low latency and a unique tuning for games.

To be honest, although I can see what they’re trying to do with that tuning, emphasizing certain upper midrange frequencies to clarify footsteps and gunshots in games, it also sucks the low frequency energy from the sound which ends up making it sound anemic, so I leave it turned off.

So those are my thoughts on the OPPO Enco Air5. Links in the pinned comment if you want to check their latest price, click here for Shopee, and subscribe for more reviews like this one, and watch this video to find out which are the best sounding earbuds of this year.

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