Edifier STAX Spirit S3 Planar Magnetic Headphone

If your looking at these headphones you probably know a bit about Audio and the different type of drivers these headphones are sporting so I’m not going to go into detail on the ins and outs of that side.

I’m going to focus on what matters when buying headphones as I have bought a LOT as it’s a passion of mine.

SOUND,COMFORT,BUILD,BATTERY

SOUND……..

The sound these headphones produce is by far the best you can get at this price bracket by a long way.
If I was going to be picky I would say they could do with a bit more emphasis on bass but not by much.

Mids are crisp and clear and the highs are sublime. You can hear every detail on any song you throw at it.
If your mostly into acoustic music you will love these as thats where these Excell.
Songs which require a little more bass can suffer a bit but still sound great.

BATTERY……..

80 HOURS!!!!!!! Still blown away by this…………..
I’m yet to charge these headphones from unboxing and they were only on 80% at the time. And after nearly a week of heavy use I still have just over 30% left.
And with 10 hours playback from a 10 min charge you will never need to worry about battery.

COMFORT…….

These are very light and with the real lamb skin leather headband and pads they feel really comfortable and can be worn for hours on end.
I did find the clamping force a bit excessive out the box but a couple of nights stretched over the box they came in sorted that out 👍

BUILD…….

When I first opened the box (very well packed and looks very premium) I was treated to the very nice headphone case and the extra velvet bags holding the spare cool touch ear cushions.

Inside the case we’re the headphones folded up along with all the extra kit you need for charging,using wired etc.

At first glance and holding the headphones they looked absolutely stunning. The carbon fibre on the earcups is a nice feature along with the black and gold design.

Unfortunately that’s where the positives end.
First day or so they were fantastic but eventually they started to make a creaking sound at the hinges where the cups are attached to the headband.
Honestly I have tried sooo hard to ignore this as they sound so good but unfortunately unless your sitting perfectly still every time you move your head or jaw they creak and this can be heard inside the earcup which spoils the music.

And forget about walking with them…. every time your foot hits the floor the creaking noise is reverberated inside the earcup.

Like I said earlier I have tired sooooo hard to ignore this problem but sadly it’s got the better of me and I’m gutted to say that I’m returning these headphones 😭😭😭😭
At this price you definitely shouldn’t have to put up with creaking from them

Edifier if you read this review please please please redesign the headband and cups to not creak because if you do even without the noise cancelling and all the fancy gimmicks that other headphones manufacturers offer at this price I would without doubt buy these again.

Never been so disappointed to send something back as I have these 😥

Note: all opinions are my own and this item was bought with my own money with zero discounts or influence from any external factors.

Tl;dr: These are probably the best you’re going to get for their price in terms of raw sound quality, paired with microphones that have no business sounding as good as these do and an 80 hour battery life, but beware they lack most of the “modern” functions of many bluetooth headphones.

Summary:
The Stax Spirit S3, despite the name carry more similarities to the Audeze Penrose/Mobius and LCD-1s than they do anything remotely related to stax. With that said, it’s a clever marketing stunt to slap a random acclaimed headphone brand on your entirely unrelated but intrisically connected company; good job at capturing attention of audio nerds with that, Edifier.

Features/Whats missing:
As mentioned above, these carry Audeze DNA, making use of what seems to be the same or similar planar magnetic drivers to the open-back LCD-1’s, albeit with a much less roomy sound and somehow less bass despite any profiles used.

Alongside this, we have an 80 hour battery life (wow) which can charge to 10 hours with only 10 minutes and takes about 1 and a half hours to fully charge (I am yet to even need to charge these). Oh, and physical buttons, something I wish we would have kept given 70% of the time touch controls are a pain to use and being an industry standard doesn’t make them any better than buttons, see iPhone missing headphone jacks for reference. The buttons are easy to find, generally very clicky, plasticky covered with rubber, not the best sounding when you depress it as it sounds like a little twang but it’s buttons, what do you expect?

Edifier has a barely advertised and uncustomisable application which is used to change the tuning between “Classic”, “Hifi”, and “Stax”; I personally found Classic to be somwhat v shaped harman-esque signature, Hifi to be a little bit more articulated but keeping in line with the harman vibes and Stax to just be very treble oriented and well… Not for me. I stick with Hifi.

So what’s missing? ANC, Transparency mode, LDAC, customisable EQ

Build: It’s “okay”, alot of people have whined and cried about it not being build excellent but it just feels as “okay” built as a XM4 or the LCD-1’s, not amazing but passable once you acknowledge you should be using it to play music instead of using them as earmuffs (shoutout to the idiots complaining about creaks when they’re missing when you play music).

Sound:
They sound like planars.. Wait, let me elaborate; these are very accurate, probably even more accurate than the Focal Celestee’s (£999) with good imaging, layering, seperation and as I said, accuracy. They’re not super bassy but they slam enough for me with enough subbass and midbass to make me smile when playing songs such as Kazuo’s “WATCH OUT!”

The mids are nice, they’re a good listen for both male and female vocals and place the singer a realistic manner, reverberations in songs such as Brandon’s “Elastic” from his voice and guitar play are almost life-like and supremely accurate, similarly Alina Baraz’s “My Whole Life” sounds beautiful; the voices of these singers are very intimate but placed far enough for you to not feel as if you’re listening to a claustrophobic pair of headphones. If I had to compare I would put them above any closed-backs I have heard in terms of accuracy and placement and the spaciousness, granted they fall flat against even the KSC75 in those respects.

Highs:
I don’t really know what to say about highs, a lot of what I listen to is mid-centrics however instruments such as cymbals along with female vocalists sound rather pleasant, there is enough decay and control to avoid sibilance especially when listening to songs that can sound rather sibilant on other pairs. JYOCHO’s “Lucky Mother” is a rather busy track with alot of mixing between a flute, vocals and cymbals and all of which sound defined, proper, and smooth which is nice.

Conclusion:
They’re good, damn good even if you can ignore the lack of features.

The sound is “great” when you have high resolution music source with aptX Adaptive.
Then the sound is “Phenomenal” when you use it wired and have powerful and neutral DAC/AMP.
I connected it wired with Corda Stepdance AMP + CLAS Solo DAC, listening to Apple Music Lossless, crazy good. at the level or certain aspects like the mid and bass is slightly better than my SRH 1840 with more dynamics and timbre.
When connected with Audioquest Dragonfly, playing “Spanish Harlem” FLAC, the imaging, depth and layers are so revealing.
Edifier did an amazing job with Stax, Audeze at such fair price.
Wonderful Cost-Performance Ratio, on functionality it doesn’t have ANC or fancy gimmick like Sony WH-X1000M4 ( i have that ), sony one is a great phone, but Stax Spirit S3 got all the codecs except AAC (licence issue).
Comparing with my Shure SRH1840, Audeze EL-8 and Spirit S3 provided the wireless convenience on top of the superbe audio quality and accuracy. I can’t wait to see the next Edifier Stax Spirit revolutionary product!

I wanted a planar magnetic wireless headphone to be able to enjoy while out and about. I don’t really care about having an app with a headphone, so the rather bare bones app that Edifier supplies is more than adequate for me. I love the fact that you can choose between three sound modes right on the headphones. Even though there is no noise cancelling, sound isolation is sufficient for me, even when riding on trains to commute. And I love the punchy bass this headphone has. Combine that with the fantastic mids and airy treble, and I am very happy so far.

Now, I debating giving this headphone a 3 or a 4 star. The reason is that this headphone creaks like nobody’s business around the earcups. I can usually ignore it, but sometimes it gets to the point I just want to take these off and jump on them and smash them into pieces. I gave these 4 stars because when the creaking isn’t being overly annoying, they do sound great and I find them to be very comfortable. However, I almost made this a 3-star review by taking off one star for the creaking and then another star for Edifier being completely shameful in knowingly releasing a $400 pair of headphones that CREAKS!!!! I refuse to believe they did not know that the plastic joints where the earcups meets the rest of the headphone that swivel was very prone to ridiculous amounts of creak. However, this review is being written on Christmas Eve, so joy and good will to man, and all that other stuff, therefore Edifier gets a 4-star though they probably deserve a 3-star. Anyway, if you can get past the creaking, or if you get lucky and get one of the sets that do not creak, then you should be perfectly satisfied with what you get.

I had reviewed these cans for the Amazon Vine Program back in July, giving them just three stars for their sterile, midrange-forward sound.

Then my review disappeared from the product page. Had Edifier removed it?

I have since been monitoring the reviews for these headphones to see if others were hearing the same harsh, fatiguing sound I was reporting.

No, apparently I was in the minority.

So I decided to try these cans again, reinstalling the Edifier Connect app in my Android phone.

This time, I’m happy to say, the sound seems to have been improved, although I still find the midrange rather prominent and fatiguing.

Previously, I could hear no difference between the three equalization settings in the app. This time I found the Classic setting warmer, closer to a sound I would expect from headphones costing this much.

But when I did some A/B comparisons with the Jabra Elite 85h cans I have in the house, I still prefer the Jabra’s, which also have ANC and cost $150 less.

So I really can’t recommend the Spirit S3’s to anyone but the most rabid midrange hounds.

There are just too many other great over-the-ear headphones for less money…

And did I mention earbuds with better sound, ANC, and a more compact and convenient form factor? The truth is, I would prefer to wear and listen to the 1More EVO’s, the Devialet Gemini’s, the Sony WF-1000XM3’s, or the Sudio E2’s any day or night over the Spirit S3’s.

To summarize, then, regardless of the S3’s nice packaging or high price or exotic technology, I think that this particular emperor is as naked as a jaybird!

No squeaking with my pair as some of the so called review experts have stated. The sound from these headphones are by far the best I have listened too. I listened to the focal bathys and the Egdiffier Stax to me are far superior sounding. I have learned over the past few years enjoying this hobby that most of the so called experts doing the audio reviews are just trying to sell product and that you can take to the bank and deposit it.