Cheap wireless earbuds are getting better and better. But it is hard to find out which budget bluetooth earphones below 50 bucks are the best. But here is the good news. We reviewed a lot of wireless earbuds and we tell you in this article which budget earbuds are the best to buy and why.
In this article
Best budget earbuds (less than 50 bucks)
Check out which budget earbuds below 50 bucks we have reviewed and rated the best.Number 1:
SoundPEATS Truengine 3 SE
- Price: 49,95
The SoundPEATS Truengine 3 SE absolutely are the best budget earphones. We have fully tested the SoundPEATS Truengine 3 SE and are amazed at the quality at this price in every way. The balanced sound in particular has more value than the price we payed. The microphone is the best tested microphone so far for this price range. Period. This is due to the 2 microphone openings per earbud.
These are the ratings we gave the SoundPEATS Truengine 3 SE in our review.
| Ratings | |
| Sound | 8.5 |
| Microphone | 9 |
| Fit | 7.5 |
| Battery | 8 |
| Control | 7 |
| Stability | 8.5 |
Number 2:
QCY T4
- Price: 34,95
The QCY T4 are a lot cheaper than 50 bucks. But there is no doubt to give these true wireless earbuds a place in this list. The sound is admirably good and the microphone is decent.
With QCY earbuds you can use a handy app. So you have features that normally only the high end earphones have. For example: an equalizer, GPS tracking and the ability to configure your button controls.
| Ratings | |
| Sound | 7.5 |
| Microphone | 7 |
| Fit | 8.5 |
| Battery | 7.5 |
| Control | 9 |
| Stability | 8 |
Number 3:
QCY T6
- Price: 33,95
QCY T6 are top earbuds in everything! In many ways, these are better earphones than any other QCY earphone. The sound is really excellent. Better than the T5. But no better than the SoundPEATS Truengine 3 SE. But the QCY T6 is also quite a bit cheaper.
These are the areas where the QCY T6 earbuds excels:
- Great Sound
- Handy QCY app
- Configure touch controls yourself
- Volume control on earbuds
But why are these wireless earbuds not number 2? Because they have a bow that goes around your ear. The bow is very useful for running or for people where earbuds always fail. But many people find the bow around the ear unnecessary. But the quality of the T6, we really couldn't ignore. Absolute great earbuds!
| Assessment | |
| Sound | 7.5 |
| Microphone | 7 |
| Fit | 7.5 |
| Battery | 8 |
| Control | 8 |
| Stability | 8 |
Number 4:
SoundPEATS Trueshift 2
- Price: 40
The SoundPEATS TrueShift2 are wonderful earbuds! The biggest benefits are the sound and the large battery.
The sound is nicely balanced. Low and high tones come out nicely, but the real power is in the mids. They really make the difference with most SoundPEATS earphones. And so with the TrueShift2.
The microphone is good. You can have a great conversation by telephone with these earbuds. The microphone is not as good as the variant: SoundPEATS Truengine 3 SE. But that says more about the greatness of the 3 SE than about the TrueShift2 not being good. To be clear: the TrueShift 2 mic is still highly above average and a lot better then for example QCY earbuds.
The battery and runtime are absolutely great! You can listen to music for more than 100 hours with 1 full charging box without the need for a cable or charger. And that's cool! In addition, the charging box has a power bank function with which you can charge your phone.
| Rating (0 to 10) | |
| Sound | 8 |
| Microphone | 7 |
| Fitting | 6 |
| Battery | 9.5 |
| Controls | 7 |
| Stability | 7 |
Number 5:
Haylou GT1 Plus
- Price: 18
The Haylou GT1 Plus are the smallest and lightest earbuds that we have tested so far. And the beauty is: the low weight does not compromise sound quality. The GT1 Plus sound is fantastic!
| weight | 3,9 gram |
| size | 1x1,3x2 cm |
Never before has the fit of earbuds been rated as high as the Haylou GT1 Plus. 9 out of 10 is really exceptional.
| Rating (0 to 10) | |
| Sound | 6.5 |
| Microphone | 7.5 |
| Fit | 9 |
| Battery | 7 |
| Control | 5 |
| Stability | 7 |
This is how we test earbuds
We test all earbuds for the following aspects:
- Sound Quality
We test whether the true wireless earbuds have nice tones. The biggest problem with the cheaper wireless earphones is that the low and mid tones lag behind. Some factories choose the speaker component for price reduction of their product. And that way the sound quality decreases. Anyways: the cheaper that component, the greater the chance that your earbuds will not have an amazing sound. We will prevent you from buying earphones with bad sound. At least you are at the right place reading this review.
- Microphone
Nothing is more frustrating than earbuds with a bad microphone. People are not able to hear you which makes conversations inconvenient or even impossible. That way you always need to disconnect the earphones when calling. That is just horrible. Earbuds with a bad microphone are simply a no go for us! We therefore set very high standards for the microphone of the earbuds we review. We test them in two ways. First of all, we will have a telephone call to see what the sound is like when on a call. Second, we record voice notes to be able to listen back the recorded sound. All earbuds from this test have very good microphones. But about 70% of the earphones that we have reviewed, would not have passed our requierements to get in this list just because of the poor mic quality.
- Fit
Do the earbuds fit well in your ear. It is hard for manufacturer to build good sound in small earphones. That is why (cheaper) earbuds are often a bit larger and so more uncomfortable. But good news: more and more bluetooth earphones on the market fit great and sound great.
- Battery
The battery life of true wireless earbuds is also very important. For bluetooth earphones of less than 50 bucks, our requirement is that you can listen at least 4 hours to music. There are earbuds that can be used twice that number of hours (for example, the Eardopes B6 pro), but those earbuds are above 50 euros. No worries: this top list of cheap earbuds contains enough wireless earphones with a great battery life.
- Controls
Controling your music and phone calls in an intuitive way without having to pick up your phone every time is very important. Did you know that adjusting the volume and skipping song is the most used action on wireless earphones? And did you also kow that there are wireless earbuds that do not have volume control? We took that into account when deciding our top list in this article. Why? Because it is very inconvenient if you have to take your phone out of your pocket every time to adjust the volume.
There are 2 types of controls: touch control and buttons. We do not prefer one or the other. Both can be built very well or very poorly. With touch control, a complaint is often that the earphones do not respond to a touch. With buttons a frequent problem is that you have to press too hard in order to press the button. And because of that you are pressing the earbuds in your ear canal. Not nice.
We see it as a big advantage if you can configure the functions of the buttons or touch control. This is possible if an earbud has its own app.
- Stability
The last important aspect of earphones is stability. Some earbuds with a weaker chipset have a less stable connection. If you then walk between buildings with a lot of signals, your earphones can malfunction.
This might be interesting to you:
- Check out all our blogs about wireless earbuds
- Check out the Airpods alternatives blog
