As I said in my AirPods Pro 3 review, wireless earbuds have reached a ceiling. Generally, the basics—sound, active noise cancellation (ANC), and battery life—can only be improved by so much each generation. The feature that arguably gets the least attention is microphone quality. I’m constantly asking people on calls and Zooms whether they can hear me and if my voice sounds clear or not. The answer is typically no to both if I’m asking. Tech startup Nothing—you know them for their transparent wireless earbuds and the controversial Nothing Phone 3—has a clever solution that could fix bad voice quality once and for all.
Nothing’s new $179 Ear 3 wireless earbuds are a straight evolution from its previous Ear and Ear 2. The Ear 3 still sports its distinctive clear plastic cover, and there’s still a divot for fidgeting with the case, but the bottom enclosure is now made of aluminum, an aesthetic that brings it in line with the Headphone 1. That bottom has a few new things, including a lanyard loop, a microphone next to the USB-C port, and another on the bottom of the case, and a “Talk” button. That button is a shiny, push-to-talk key that turns on the Ear 3’s “Super Mic” feature, which effectively isolates your voice when pressed for clearer, less distorted call quality. You can think of “Super Mic” and the “Talk” button as working like a walkie-talkie. By holding the Ear 3 case up to your mouth, the microphones can simply pick up your voice more clearly than from the microphones located farther away in the buds.
Sounds great, right? Well, there is some fine print. While Super Mic will work for regular phone calls and voice memos, you can’t use it as a wireless mic for recording videos from your iPhone or Android’s main camera app. That means you can’t use it in place of something like a DJI or Rhode mic. Third-party app support seems to be a mixed bag. Super Mic will work with the Blackmagic camera app, but TikTok, Instagram, and other popular content creation apps aren’t compatible. Maybe Super Mic will be supported in the future, but unless Nothing sells a boatload of Ear 3, there’s little incentive for developers to make their apps work with a small company’s product. Even for conferencing apps, the list is limited to Google Meet, WeChat, WhatsApp, Teams, and Zoom, according to Engadget.
The buds themselves also have some upgrades. I mean they gotta, since Nothing is asking for $30 more than the Ear. ($50 if you want to count the $20 discount that Nothing is currently shaving off the MSRP for the Ear.) There are now three microphones inside each bud, and combined with bone-conduction and a voice pickup unit (VPU), Nothing says voice call quality should be greatly improved while wind and other distracting background noise are reduced more. The buds also contain larger 12mm drivers, which Nothing cofounder and CEO Carl Pei says improve bass and treble, while reducing distortion.
Nothing sent me a pair of Ear 3 to try out, but it’s been a hectic week of iPhone Air and iPhone 17 Pro reviews, so I’ve only had time to unbox them and give them a brief listen. It’s too soon for me to have any real impressions comparing the Ear 3 to the Ear and AirPods Pro 3, and I haven’t had a chance to try the Super Mic feature, but I plan to have a review soon.
At the very least, I can say that I really like the design and the cold touch of the aluminum. It feels more premium and looks more “grown up,” as Nothing’s senior industrial designer Frank Lin said in the product’s introduction video.
You can preorder the Nothing Ear 3 today and they’ll be available on Sept. 25. You can get them with the silver aluminum case and white buds or black aluminum with black buds.