Epos H3Pro Hybrid review: the complete package - The Verge

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The Epos H3Pro Hybrid is a wireless gaming headset with several perks and just a few easily dismissed flaws. It offers good sound quality, active noise cancellation (ANC), and a lightweight, comfortable fit (even for larger head sizes) suitable for long gameplay sessions. All of those assets are tough to find in one headset, and I won’t hesitate to recommend it to anyone who can afford to drop $279 on a gaming headset.

Compared to other popular options, that’s a lot of money. But as it turns out, buying the H3Pro Hybrid is easier to justify because it doubles as a set of equally good wireless Bluetooth headphones.

In the interest of not getting called out for wearing a gaming headset in public, this headset’s magnetically attached lift-to-mute boom microphone can be yanked off, converting them into fairly normal-looking headphones. Okay, some people might still realize that you’re wearing a gaming headset, but at least this one looks more suave than most other models.

The H3Pro Hybrid has a secondary microphone on the left ear cup that can work for calls, meetings, or anything else you need a mic for. Unfortunately, that mic can’t be muted with a button on the headset; you’ll need to mute using your Bluetooth device. Otherwise, juggling Bluetooth with 2.4GHz audio worked nearly flawlessly. The headset sometimes fumbled the signal for about five seconds after I transitioned between wireless sources in my testing. The issue seemed to stem from the dongle being plugged into my external USB hub. Once I swapped it to a USB port on my PC, the problem was resolved.

This handy wireless feature is, thankfully, something that’s getting easier to find, and you don’t need to spend this much to get it in a headset. But so far, no other options at this price point come to mind that look this good, feel this good to wear, or deliver the rich audio quality that the H3Pro Hybrid does. Unless there’s some amazing sale happening, I heartily recommend these over the $329 Bose QC35 II wired gaming headset that also doubles as a set of wireless headphones when you’re on the go.

The H3Pro Hybrid has a closed-back, over-ear design that blocks a good amount of ambient noise even before you turn them on — in fact, Epos claims that the ambient noise level can be reduced by around 30 decibels just by wearing them in a powered-down state. By turning on ANC, the company claims noise is reduced by another 16 decibels. To me, the noise-dampening effect of just having the cozy ear cups on my head was sufficient enough. So much so that most times I didn’t need to use ANC to achieve the level of quiet I was looking for (your mileage may vary) and that helped to conserve some battery.

Speaking of longevity, the battery life is impressive, even when you’re juggling multiple wireless connections. The H3Pro Hybrid can last nearly as long when you’re connected to two wireless sources as when you’re connected to one (30 hours with just the dongle, or 28 hours with the dongle and Bluetooth). With ANC turned on, the battery life drops to about 19 hours whether you’re connected to just the dongle or with concurrent wireless connections. If you plan to use just Bluetooth, it can last up to 38 hours per charge, but I didn’t have a chance to put this claim to the test. In any case, recharging using its USB-C charging port is a breeze, taking two hours to fully charge.

The USB-A wireless dongle included with the Epos H3Pro Hybrid didn’t put up a fuss when I plugged it into my PC, a PlayStation 5, or the Nintendo Switch’s dock. It also worked with my MacBook Pro and the Oculus Quest 2 when I used it with my own USB-C adapter. Epos includes a USB-A extender cable so the dongle can get better range, and I needed to utilize it more than I expected.

I encountered occasional signal cutouts when I walked away from my computer, and some even happened mere feet from the dongle. It’s typical for a headset to start cutting out when you put a wall or two between it and the dongle. What’s less common is choppy audio from the headset at about 15 feet away with line of sight to the dongle, or even less distance in some cases. Strangely, it was finicky some days, while it worked perfectly on others.

This headset lets you connect physically to devices for audio playback, too. It includes a USB-C to USB-A cable, which can charge the headset and ensure the lowest amount of audio latency. You can also use the console cable, which has a 3.5mm jack on its end that can go into any device that has a headphone port, like a controller or a tablet. Either of these wired modes can be used in conjunction with Bluetooth, which is handy.

I quickly grew fond of what the H3Pro Hybrid can deliver for both gaming audio and listening to music. Its performance is good out of the box, but it gets better if you have access to a Windows PC to customize equalizer settings in the free Epos gaming suite download. I was able to create an EQ that sounded the best to me, with a warm sound delivery that had noticeable, but not booming, bass. I’ve mentioned several times now that the sound quality here is good, but it’s not quite at the same level as the Sony WH-1000XM3 that I usually wear for music. Audio aficionados should probably still chase after headphones geared specifically toward music playback, but the H3Pro Hybrid generally deliver better sound than I expected, and the customization settings are great.

The software offers the option to switch to 7.1 surround sound instead of its default 2.0 mode. It seems to split apart the sound, making all of its layers easier to pick apart (at the risk of sounding echo-y, depending on the content). Whether you prefer the 2.0 or the 7.1 sound mode, there’s a reverb slider that can give games and music some more spatial depth, as if it’s a live show. I also like that mic monitoring can be adjusted within the app, if you prefer to hear your voice and your surroundings while speaking.

Epos has been riffing on a similar design for its headsets for a while now, but the H3Pro Hybrid delivers its most refined, easy-on-the-eyes take yet. The ear cups are mounted to hinges that branch off of the headband and let the cups swivel, improving the chances that they’ll fit you as comfortably as they did me. I was delighted to see that the headband offered several more sizing notches beyond what my large head required.

The leatherette (read: not genuine leather) on the ear cups is high quality enough that I wouldn’t have known it wasn’t real leather unless Epos told me. And I was happy to find out that this headset is covered by a two-year warranty.

For those who want many of the same perks for less, the wired H3 Hybrid costs $179 and supports Bluetooth connections. But if you’re a gamer who’s constantly multitasking and wants to go totally wire-free (and keep the distractions at bay with noise cancellation), the $100 premium for the H3Pro Hybrid isn’t a ridiculous price to pay for those luxuries.

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November 16, 2021 at 11:00PM
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Epos H3Pro Hybrid review: the complete package - The Verge
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