Sony noise cancelling headphones are on sale for Cyber Monday

Here’s a fun fact about me: I live in the noisest part of my city. There’s an electronics store underneath my apartment that blasts pop music all day – I’ve heard The Black Eyed Peas atrocious cover of “Rhythm of the Night” twice a day for the past 18 months. Across the street is a flea market that pays a guy to just yell stuff; I can never understand what he’s saying. If I didn’t have a pair of Sony WH1000XM2 headphones, I would have long ago completely lost my mind or, even worse, gotten really into “League of Legends” or something. 

Sadly, those headphones aren’t on sale today, because they’re several years old at this point. The good news is that both their successor, the Sony Noise Canceling Headphones WH-1000XM4, and their budget model, the Sony Noise Canceling Headphones WHCH710N, are both discounted for Cyber Monday, down to $248 and $79.99 respectively.

So the question you have to ask yourself is “which one is for me?” Well, that depends.

The budget model – the WHCH710N – has fairly effective digital noise-cancelling technology, though you’re still going to be more aware of your surroundings than if you were wearing its big brother. The 35-hour battery life means you’ll be able to take it on long trips (I can’t stress enough how helpful these things are for air travel), but the relatively slow charging (10 minutes gets you 60 minutes of charge) means that if you forget to charge them or are on an especially long trip, you might get stuck having to read a book or something. That said, while I reckon these are a bit overpriced for $200, they're an absolute steal at $79.99.

The WH1000XM4s, on the other hand, provide “industry-leading” noise cancellation technology. Virtually every review raves about their efficacy. The 30-hour battery life (down from previous models) is slightly disappointing, but it’s still plenty of time for extended trips and the fast charging (10 minutes of charge gives you a whopping 5 hours of listen time) means you have far more leeway to be forgetful. They also have a bunch of quality of life features, like “wearing detection” that automatically pauses music when the headphones are removed, and an advanced program inside the speakers will upscale the music quality in compressed files.

Check out our Black Friday and Cyber Monday coverage to score early discounted gifts for everyone on your holiday shopping list.