Shure AONIC 50 vs. Sony WH-1000XM3

Spending upwards of $350 on headphones isn’t an easy decision to make, and no one wants to feel the nauseating pang of buyer’s remorse. Today, we’re breaking down the matchup of the Shure AONIC 50 vs. the Sony WH-1000XM3 to see what headset is best for your needs. Whether you’re a frequent flyer or remote worker, noise cancelling headphones are sure to benefit you.

Fit and hardware

A photo of a man wearing Sony WH-1000XM3 headphones.

The Sony WH-1000XM3’s exterior boasts a soft-touch material.

Both headsets have plastic ear cup housings and replaceable synthetic memory foam earpads, meaning vegans have their pick of the premium noise cancelling headset litter. Sony’s earcups take a more oblong shape than Shure’s which conserves space and follows the natural outline of the human ear. The earpads on the AONIC 50 still leave plenty of room for you to wiggle those lobes, though.

Sony’s best headphones are better for the travelers among us, because its headphones have a more versatile design; users can rotate the ear cups to lay flat or fold the cups toward the headband. Shure’s ear cups can only be rotated to lie flat on a surface. This makes it less travel-friendly, but more durable because it reduces breakage points by omitting inward rotation. The value of durability is subjective to a point, but the WH-1000XM3 are objectively 80 grams lighter than the AONIC 50, making them more appealing when gram counts.

Before the Shure AONIC 50 headphones’ size scares you away, I can assure you that Shure’s headset doesn’t feel nearly as heavy as its weight indicates. The headband evenly distributes weight along the head while avoiding excess clamping force. As someone who regularly wears glasses, I was pleasantly surprised by how comfortable the AONIC 50 remained for hours at a time.

Regardless of which pair of noise cancelling headphones you get, you’ll benefit from USB-C charging and a headphone jack for high-resolution listening, which is particularly beneficial for those with FLAC libraries or subscriptions to Amazon Music HD. Both the Shure AONIC 50 and Sony WH-1000XM3 include a hard, zippered carrying case for travel; though, Shure’s is comically huge because the headset can’t collapse into itself.

Onboard controls

An picture of the Shure Aonic 50 noise cancelling headphones onboard button controls and switches.

Shure skipped the touch controls, instead opting for onboard tactile buttons.

You can control playback, noise cancellation/passthrough, volume levels, and access your virtual assistant directly from either pair of headphones. To enable the latter on the WH-1000XM3, you have to download the Sony | Headphones Connect app, and remap the ANC button to access Google Assistant, Siri, or Alexa. On the other hands, the multifunction button on the AONIC 50 supports this from the jump while also having a separate ANC toggle switch. It makes things a little easier, but Sony’s process isn’t hugely inconvenient by any means.

Winner: Shure AONIC 50

These are philosophically different microphone systems

Sony went with a very neutral frequency response across the board, which makes for an accurate sound no matter how high or low your voice is; the downside is how this may introduce unwanted sounds like the proximity effect. This is when low-pitched sounds are amplified as a speaker gets too close to the microphone, something that Shure’s system combats by attenuating low-frequency sounds.

Shure AONIC 50 microphone demo:

Sony WH-1000XM3 microphone demo:


An advantage of Sony’s microphone system is its ability to filter out background noise, which the Shure AONIC 50 fails to do well; so for regular use the Sony WH-1000XM3 is the better pick. However, if you typically take calls in quiet environments, the Shure AONIC 50 is still pretty good—not surprising, given Shure’s pedigree as a microphone manufacturer for the ages.

Winner: Sony WH-1000XM3

The Shure AONIC 50 supports the most Bluetooth codecs

An aerial photo of the Shure Aonic 50-noise cancelling headphones open carrying case revealing the headphones in brown.

The Shure Aonic 50 includes a protective carrying case that takes up a great deal of space.

The Sony WH-1000XM3 and Shure AONIC 50 are both Bluetooth 5.0 headsets that support virtually every Bluetooth codec one could want; yet, Shure has bragging rights because it also supports Qualcomm’s aptX Low Latency codec. The Sony WH-1000XM3 supports aptX HD, LDAC, AAC, aptX, and SBC, while the Shure AONIC 50 supports aptX Low Latency, aptX HD, LDAC, aptX, AAC, and SBC.

  Shure Aonic 50 Sony WH-1000XM3 Bose Headphones 700 Bose QC 35 II
SBC
AAC
aptX
aptX HD
aptX LL
LDAC

Those who stream a lot of TV shows and movies on Android devices should pony up for the Shure AONIC 50 in order to enjoy lag-free videos. The other leg up it has on the Sony WH-1000XM3 is Bluetooth multipoint support: the AONIC 50 may connect to two devices at a time. Although the WH-1000XM3 is also technically capable of this, its functionality is limited because one device can only for calls while the secondary can only be used for media playback, instead of enabling both functions on both devices.

Winner: Shure AONIC 50

The Sony WH-1000XM3 has better battery life than the Shure AONIC 50

A photo of the Sony WH-1000XM3 sitting on a stone wall.

The Sony WH-1000XM3 battery life outlasts that of the AONIC 50 by about four hours.

This metric was the easiest to measure, because we subjected each pair of headphones to a constant 75dB(SPL) output with noise cancelling on high until the batteries depleted. Our testing showed that the Sony WH-1000XM3 lasts 24 hours when subjected to these conditions, and the Shure AONIC 50 lasts just shy of 20 hours under the same conditions. Both headsets are impressive, but this one clearly goes to Sony.

Winner: Sony WH-1000XM3

Noise cancellation is neck-and-neck

A chart depicting the Shure Aonic 50 noise cancelling performance and attenuation.

The Shure AONIC 50 noise cancelling is excellent and aided by high-density memory foam earpads.

Sony’s headset reigns supreme in the noise cancelling space because it’s highly recommended by reviewers and marries functionality with price, comfort, and battery life. Broadly speaking, the Sony WH-1000XM3 outperforms the AONIC 50 when it comes to noise cancellation across the entire frequency range. However, frequent flyers or commuters benefit more from the Shure AONIC 50: it does a much better job of attenuating low-frequency sounds (e.g. a jet engine, subway rumbles) than Sony’s.

A chart detailing the noise canceling performance of the Sony WH-1000XM3 showing a much higher cancellation between 100Hz - 1000Hz when compared to the Bose headphones.

The Sony WH-1000XM3 noise cancelling does a great job of quieting general ambient noise like chatter.

In the charts above, Sony’s headset doesn’t even touch sounds lower than 100Hz, but Shure’s headphones do so right from 20Hz and on. At 100Hz, the AONIC 50 renders noises about three times quieter than Sony’s headphones. On the other hand, the WH-1000XM3 does a better job of combating vocal noise because of the greater midrange frequency reduction. If your headphones are to live on your office desk, the Sony WH-1000XM3 is a better pick.

Regardless of which headset you invest in, you’ll greatly benefit from noise cancelling because it can help protect listeners from hearing loss. When using non-noise canceling headphones, especially out and about, you’re more likely to increase the volume to dangerous levels in order to drown out background noise. This act is often reactionary, and can impact auditory health long term: exposing our eardrums to sounds louder than 85dB for extended periods of time may damage the hairs inside our ears that transmit information to our cochleas and then to our brains.

Shure’s headset more effectively hushes low-frequency sounds, but Sony’s is the better bet for office use.

How you value noise cancellation performance between these two headsets depends on your usage: the Shure AONIC 50 will perform much better in travel environments (e.g. on a plane, subway, as a passenger in a car), but Sony’s headphones do a better job of quieting office banter and foot traffic.

Winner: Draw

Do the Shure or Sony headphones have better sound quality?

Both headsets are incredibly capable machines with nifty features, but when you strip that all away, we’re discussing two pairs of headphones. This would be an incomplete Shure AONIC 50 vs. Sony WH-1000XM3 faceoff if we omitted raw sound quality.

A chart depicting the Shure Aonic 50 frequency response.

The Shure AONIC 50 dynamic drivers reproduce an accurate sound which works well for all music.

First things first: the Sony WH-1000XM3 and Shure AONIC 50 headphones both sound fantastic and can be equalized in their respective free apps, but we’re addressing out-of-the-box performance.Just like the noise cancelling section, we have charts to break down objective data; the frequency response charts depict the response of each headset.

A chart showing the frequency response data from the Sony WH-1000X M3.

For most music, the WH-1000X M3 will be very bass-heavy unless you tune it down in the app.

Shure and Sony’s sound signatures approach bass emphasis differently, but both headsets amplify low-frequency sounds. The former de-emphasizes sub-bass notes and emphasizes the upper end of the bass range, while the latter keeps a consistent ~5dB emphasis until the midrange. Shure’s gently sloped response makes it easier to distinguish vocals from bass beats like kick drums or cello solos. Midrange frequencies neatly follow the line of platonic ideal with the AONIC 50, meaning virtually any genre will sound as the artist and audio engineer intended. Sony’s headphones de-emphasize upper midrange and low-treble notes, which can make it sound like some detail is “missing” compared to the Shure AONIC 50.

The Shure AONIC 50 scored higher on our ratings system by 0.9 points on overall sound quality, but Sony has a trick up its proprietary sleeve: Sony 360° Reality Audio. Using the free app, you can photograph your ears and upload the images to Sony. They’ll be analyzed by a machine learning algorithm, and from there you’ll be able to enjoy music in 3D space from popular streaming services like Deezer, Amazon Music HD, Tidal, and Nugs.net.

Sony 360° Reality Audio is more than a gimmick and uses MPEG-H to remaster songs dating back to the 1970s, but again, we’re addressing raw, default sound quality, and give this round to the Shure AONIC 50.

Winner: Shure AONIC 50

An picture of the Shure Aonic 50 noise cancelling headphones in brown leaning against a coffee carafe.

The Shure AONIC 50 and Sony WH-1000XM3 are both excellent noise cancelling headsets and are at the top of their class.

For those who’ve been keeping a tally, the Shure AONIC 50 outperform the Sony WH-1000XM3, but there’s one thing we’ve yet to account for: value. The Sony WH-1000XM3 fulfills the needs of most consumers, especially once value and cost are taken into consideration. It’s easy to find a pair of renewed Sony WH-1000XM3 headphones for ~$250 renewed, making these a headphones a true bargain. Heck, when bought new, the Sony WH-1000XM3 is still $50 cheaper than the Shure AONIC 50. Anyone who frequently travels for work may find the AONIC 50’s low-frequency noise cancellation to be worthwhile; otherwise, the rest of us will be perfectly happy with the Sony WH-1000XM3 and an extra $50 in our pockets.

Next: What we want to see from the Sony WH-1000XM4

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