Soundcore Liberty 4 Pro review

The Soundcore Liberty 4 Pro are the newest and most expensive earbuds from Anker’s budget-oriented lineup, and it’s safe to say the foray into the mid-range has met with mixed results. These buds are the ANC version of the Liberty 4, which only feature standard noise cancellation. The Pro’s have seven sensors to pick up background noise and even atmospheric pressure in real-time, which limits disruption to your favorite music.

Compared to other Soundcore earbuds, the Liberty 4 Pros offer much more customization in features, and a higher standard of audio quality — although it still feels like a weak choice for the price. The likes of the Sony WF-C700N ($119) outmatch the SoundCore’s, however, thanks to its superior detail in sound. In return for the sacrifice in quality, you get features like a touchscreen on the case.



In practice, though, this ends up being one of the weakest parts of the earbuds. With that said, there still might be some aspects of the Liberty 4 Pro that you might like. Read on for my full Soundcore Liberty 4 Pro review.

Soundcore Liberty 4 Pro review: Cheat Sheet Soundcore Liberty 4 Pro review: Price and Availability You can pick up the Liberty 4 Pro earbuds for $129 from Amazon , with the listing providing a choice between 6 color variants, including 2 glossy editions. Soundcore is known for its budget headphones and earbuds, so the $129 asking price is uncharted waters for the brand. In fact, the Liberty 4 Pro is one of the most expensive pairs of earbuds in Soundcore’s lineup, and competes with opposition like the Sony WF-C700N — and those only cost $119.

The Liberty 4 Pro earbuds are also more expensive than other budget ANC earbuds, such as the OnePlus Buds 3 ($99). However, there are several features I’ll get to later that partially explain this. Despite their impressive feature set, the Liberty 4 Pro buds still feel pricey for what feels like a distinctly budget pair of earbuds.

Soundcore Liberty 4 Pro review: Design The earbuds feature a fairly typical, if not larger than most, design. The prominent downwards-facing stems are about double the length of the earbud itself. This will be the most noticeable feature of the earbuds when walking down the street, and they’re not exactly subtle — even if you opt for the black version of the buds, they’re very shiny and reflective.

While the materials are a decent quality plastic, the earbuds only boast an IPX5 rating — this means they will survive light rain, but anything more than a small splash will risk breaking them. The high-tech case has no waterproofing at all. For this reason I would call the earbuds more of an indoor audio solution, rather than a pair for wearing out and about — which might detract from their purpose as wireless in-ear buds.

That said, if you commute mostly on public transport, these are a great option. There are six different colors to choose from, with the Blue and Green options being the most visually appealing in my view. The earbuds themselves are two-tone in whatever color you go for, even if you opt for a glossy variant.

Soundcore Liberty 4 Pro review: Comfort The Liberty 4 Pro earbuds are remarkably comfortable. The large size of the main body of the earbuds keeps them rooted in my ear, with a surface smooth enough not to cause irritation — even while wearing for longer periods. I didn’t need to replace the tips with any of the included alternatives, and they fit perfectly to my ears.

I was able to test the seal using the mobile app, which showed a perfect seal out of the box — your mileage will of course vary. The one drawback here is they did feel a little too loose. The comfort of the fit makes them feel like they are almost floating on my ear — it was precarious walking across busy roads with them in, and I found myself worrying about them falling out.

Soundcore Liberty 4 Pro review: Case The case features a sliding lid, which was firm enough to keep the buds secure in their magnetic slots. It’s quite bulky, although it has a flat enough profile to still fit into my pocket. It looks as good as the earbuds, and it matches the chosen color of the earbuds.

The worst part of the case is also its most noteworthy feature. The touchscreen interface, a thin screen located underneath the earbud slots, is very clunky to use. It operates based on swipes and long presses, but the lack of any real animations or other forms of feedback make it hard to know what inputs I am making.

This is the main method to reset pairing, as well as providing controls for the ANC, but this is something I would have preferred a physical button for. Soundcore Liberty 4 Pro review: Battery Battery life is around seven hours in my experience, which is enough for a full day of usage. The charging case contains up to 40 hours of charge, so you won’t need to recharge the earbuds every day — it’s above average compared to other ANC earbuds.

With enhancements enabled they lasted about three hours longer than the OnePlus Buds 3. It was really good to get an accurate reading of the battery, down to two decimal places, by viewing the screen in the case — you can see a live display of the battery increasing while charging, too. With the app installed, you can also view accurate percentages for charge on the go — much better than the 10% increments displayed on my Android phone.

Soundcore Liberty 4 Pro review: Audio quality The audio quality of the Liberty 4 buds is good, but not perfect. I found the mixed guitar and synth lead instruments on “Why Didn’t You Stop Me?” by Mitski sounded great, with a lot of rich texture to the sound. Folk songs and acoustic performances were the best performing, with the guitar on “Anything” by Adrianne Lenker sounding especially luscious.

However, the near complete absence of bass in the earbuds leaves songs feeling really flat. Obviously, tunes that rely more heavily on bass therefore suffer more, for example, the bassline on “Shadowplay” by Joy Division is completely lost. I tried to adjust the EQ settings in the app to make this sound better, to only minor improvements over the default quality, and the same can be said for the other, personalized sound customization settings available.

If anything, these settings ended up making the earbuds sound worse, in my experience. The mobile app has a neat feature which can determine the perfect EQ settings based on your hearing. There is a general hearing test, as well as a mode that lets you pick between different settings with an example song playing — the end result being a custom EQ graph.

Sadly, this didn’t work too well for me, leaving me with a really bad EQ setting which sounded good for the example song but very tinny for my own music. The gap in quality between these earbuds and other similarly priced ones is most noticeable when listening to speech — podcasts sound very muddy in particular, and I couldn’t stomach listening to audiobooks using them. In music, the issue remains but it’s not quite as bad.

The highest vocals on “Night Shift” by Lucy Dacus lack in their usual detail, and vocal heavy songs by Mitski like “A Burning Hill” come through sounding very tinny even at moderate volume. Soundcore Liberty 4 Pro review: Call quality The microphone on the Liberty 4 Pro earbuds is surprisingly good — considering the middling quality of earbud microphones in general. My voice came through very clearly, which made it serviceable for taking calls when away from my computer or when listening to music on my phone.

Letting it down is the poor audio quality, on the listener's end. It sounds tinny and thin, and as a result, more grating than my phone speaker. Definitely avoid extended meetings while wearing these earbuds, for your own sake rather than the others.

Soundcore Liberty 4 Pro review: ANC The earbuds feature ANC, using six of the built-in microphones and one pressure sensor for air travel. This is a really neat feature, which makes them a great option as a pair of travel headphones. They adjust every 0.

3 seconds, so you can go from a busy road to a commuter train without having to worry about the noise cancellation catching up with you. In my experience, they are good at blocking out background noise, but the ANC was not strong enough to block out cars on a busy road for instance. You can enable a transparent mode, from the earbuds or from the case using the touch bar, which disables the ANC entirely — a good battery-saving option if needed.

Soundcore Liberty 4 Pro review: Other features A frustrating aspect of the Liberty 4 Pro’s design is the touch controls on the headphones. You can pause music, or adjust volume, by squeezing the stem — however, I found this was overly sensitive and often had a delayed response. If I was accidentally toggling it, I wasn’t able to figure out what could have caused it.

Rather than a squeeze, a brief touch is enough to cause an adjustment, which isn’t ideal. Fortunately, this can be adjusted using the app — but short of disabling it entirely I found the controls to be very inconsistent. Soundcore Liberty 4 Pro review: Verdict The Liberty 4 Pro earbuds are tricky to recommend.

While I appreciate the amount of features, and good(ish) ANC, I feel they are let down in other areas. The earbuds undeniably have a budget feel to them — making them an unnecessary risk when compared to the safer bets from Sony and OnePlus at the same (or cheaper) price. Although the level of customization is great, it takes a lot of work to get the Liberty 4 Pro’s sounding good for your own music and preferences.

A lot of the app assistance ends up leading to poor configuration, and the overall quality of the sound is hampered by the lack of power behind the bass. With that said, these earbuds are a much easier recommendation if you frequently travel by air— the pressure sensor and ANC is a lifesaver if you’re someone who doesn't like the sound of an airplane. You can do a lot better for $129, with some of the best cheap wireless earbuds going for up to $20 less.

In a crowded market, the Liberty 4 Pro earbuds don’t have a lot going for them..