The most badass earbuds you can find today
From the moment I opened the box I was impressed with the Angry Miao Cyberblade earbuds. That’s saying a lot because I’ve used plenty of different stereo wireless earbuds and many mono Bluetooth headsets over the past 20 years of tech reviewing at Pocketnow. Most of the wireless stereo earbuds I’ve tried were fairly poorly designed. Either they copied Apple’s AirPod designs or they made something that really wasn’t comfortable or frequently fell out of my ears. Comfort and functionality was one thing that I found lacking in other earbuds… Good looks was another thing I found lacking. Apple’s AirPods just look dumb to me.
Angry Miao solved all of that with their Cyberblad earbuds! Not only do these look absolutely incredible, but their fit/comfort level is also excellent… AND the sound quality is pretty incredible, too!
You might be asking, “Who the heck is Angry Miao?” They’re a fairly new company in China that was established in 2019 and has been mainly producing really cool looking beautifully-designed mechanical keyboards.
Angry Miao Cyberblades price and availability
- The Angry Miao Cyberblades were announced on August 30, 2022.
- You can pre-order them at their Kickstarter page starting September 1, 2022 at 8am PDT for $299 while the retail price will be $328.
- Orders placed within the first 24 hours are eligible for an additional 20 USD discount.
Angry Miao Cyberblades design
This design of these things is incredible. I haven’t seen earbuds or Bluetooth headsets that look this good since the turn of the century.
They actually have RGB lighting in the sides. If you’re in a low-lit area, you can have the lights turn on every 10 seconds and it looks really cool when the earbuds light up like that and fade through a rainbow of colors. Obviously this has a slight negative effect on battery life, but holy cow does it look cool!
The earbuds are very small and very comfortable. A nice, rounded piece goes inside the ear while the triangular piece sits just outside.
The speaker piece that goes inside the ear has removable silicon or memory foam inserts and there are many sizes to choose from in order to get the perfect fit.
Above are the charging contacts. The Cyberblades ship with a little black sticker over these to protect them. It’s hard to see, but you’ll definitely need to remove the sticker before you’ll be able to charge the earbuds, so pay attention to that.
On the back there’s a wavey plastic grill which looks kind of like a speaker, but it’s probably a noise cancellation microphone area.
See the small indentation on the edge of the triangular tip of the Cyberblades? That’s a pressure sensitive button that you can use to control different functions of the headphones.
One press will play/pause the music or answer/end a call. A double press on the right side will go to the next track while the left side will go to the previous. Triple press will turn on or off the RGB lights. A press and hold will change the noise cancelling mode.
I LOVE the Chromaflair “Violet Dreams” purple/green paint job of the Cyberblades. Angry Miao calls this color “Shell Black”, but it looks a lot like the Mystic Violet Dreams paint. It perfectly matches the old HTC Touch Diamond Adam Lein Edition…
…as well as the Nokia Lumia 1020 Adam Lein Edition. Yes, the color changes between purple and green depending on how the light is refracted within the paint.
A single Cyberblade reminds me of the Nextlink Bluespoon 5G which I reviewed in 2005. Back then, the Bluespoon 5G was the smallest and lightest Bluetooth headset ever made. It probably held that title for many years afterwards too. Of course, 17 years later, the Angry Miao Cyberblades are much more technologically advanced, but I love the call back to the rounded pointy headset design.
The design of the Angry Miao Cyberblades really stands out among all the other wireless earbuds on the market. Most of the others are just copying Apple’s silly AirPod design without providing much visual innovation. That’s certainly not true with the awesome and unique Cyberblades. The Cyberblades sound a lot better too!
The Angry Miao Cyberblades will also be available in “The Dark Side” which would be totally black with red lights, and “Ghost White” which would be white with green lights.
Angry Miao Cyberblades specifications
| Category | Angry Miao Cyberblades |
|---|---|
| Connectivity | Bluetooth, proprietary “Active Sound Enhancement” |
| Ports | USB-C |
| Battery | 6 hours per charge earbuds (75mAh), 24 hours including charging case (800mAh) |
| Water Resistance | IPx4 |
| Materials | Plastic, metal, acrylic, fabric, silicon, memory foam |
| Weight | 6.5g for each earbud |
| Colors | Shell Black, Ghost White, The Dark Side |
| Release Date | August 30, 2022 |
| Price | $328 |
Angry Miao Cyberblades What’s In The Box
Usually with smartphones and earbuds these days, the unboxing isn’t very interesting anymore. You’ll get some headphones and maybe a USB-C wire. Angry Miao’s Cyberblades have some great stuff though and the packaging is quite impressive.
- 2 earbuds
- 2-piece cylindrical charging case with wireless charging
- Desktop PC docking station for charging case
- USB-C to USB-A cable
- USB-C to USB-C cable
- Numerous ear bud silicon and memory foam size options
- Instruction booklet
The Cyberblade earbuds ship inside the charging case.
An impressive 7 sizes of both silicon and memory foam ear inserts are included so that you can choose the size that fits best for you. The default set fit me really well at first, but after months of use, it may be necessary to switch to the next size up or the memory foam options.
Angry Miao Cyberblades Desktop Functionality & Charging
The cylindrical charging case sits on a square docking station that plugs into your computer with either the USB-A or USB-C cable. The dock works with any device that supports USB Type-C digital music output such as MacBook, Windows PC, iPad, Sony PS5, Nintendo Switch, etc. No software install required!
You can plug the cylindrical charging case directly into your PC with a USB-C cable if you want to, but having the dock means it’s easy to grab that whole thing when you want to run off to catch the train and have your earbuds with you. Plus the dock just looks really cool with its colored LED light up acrylic base.
The cover of the charging cylinder acts as a control dial when connected to a PC. A single press on the top of the dial will switch to the PC connection. When the PC connection is active, rotating the dial clockwise will increase the volume (as well as the LED brightness). Rotating it counterclockwise will reduce the volume. This is a pretty awesome volume control utility as the dial is very smooth, but the volume control on Windows isn’t as granular as it could be as it takes some significant rotation in order to change the volume one unit.
A double click on the top of the dial will disable the PC connection and switch the earbuds back to Bluetooth connections. A triple click of the top will toggle the dock & cover’s LED lights on or off. A long press will switch between gaming, movie, or music booster modes, and the lighting colors will change accordingly (red & purple for gaming, yellow and green for movie, light blue and purple for music.)
Opening the charging case and removing the earbuds while the dock is plugged into a PC will cause the PC to switch audio over to the ASE (Active Sound Enhancement) proprietary wireless protocol for listening to audio on the earbuds through the PC that the dock is connected to. CYBERBLADE’s ASE mode utilizes HRTF (Head Related Transfer Function) virtual 7.1 surround sound, studio-level EQ and AGC (Automatic Gain Compensation), Hybrid ANC (Active Noise Cancellation), Dual-Mic AI ENC (Environmental Noise Cancellation) and Transparency Mode.
This is awesome for gaming, watching movies, or having video calls, but the ASE wireless protocol’s range is pretty limited. You get much lower latency (40ms for the Cyberblades versus the AirPods Pro 200ms latency), but you lose out on the range. You’ll want to stay pretty close to the docking station to keep the audio quality going good. If you walk into another room, the audio will start to flake out with studders. It’s recommended to stay within 1.5 meters of the docking station for optimal audio performance. If you use Bluetooth instead, you’ll get much better range, but the latency won’t be as good.
The bottom of the cylindrical charging case has a magnetic attachment and some metal contacts for connecting to the dock.
The cylindrical case nicely also supports Qi wireless charging so that you can charge it on any of the other wireless chargers you may have around the house.
Angry Miao Cyberblades Mobile Bluetooth Functionality
On the bottom of the cylindrical charging case, there’s a small inset button for activating Bluetooth pairing mode so that you can connect the earbuds to your phone or other Bluetooth device. The Cyberblades nicely support Bluetooth 5.2.
One slightly annoying thing about the charging case that doubles as a control dial is that the cylindrical shape is not very pocket-friendly when you’re out on the go. Other wireless earbud charging cases are often much smaller and ergonomically shaped for easier pocket storage, but such is life when the case doubles as a desktop control dial so this is an acceptable sacrifice.
The Cyberblades work beautifully over Bluetooth for music, but with Bluetooth 5 Android phones, you may notice some audio lag in games or movies sometimes. The sound quality is still excellent though. These are awesome for listening to music on the train or at work. As mentioned previously, the Bluetooth range is much better than the ASE range. So if you feel like walking around your house listening to music, use the Bluetooth. If you feel like sitting in front of your computer playing a game, use the ASE dock.
Angry Miao Cyberblades software
Installing software for the Angry Miao Cyberblades is not really necessary. They’ll work fine if you pair them with your phone via Bluetooth or simply plug the dock into a PC, but there is some software available to add some enhanced control over the features.
The Angry Miao Cyberblades Android app lets you change between audio and noise cancellation modes, change equalizer modes, monitor battery levels, and change the RGB LED light modes.
Angry Miao Cyberblades battery life
- About 6 hours of playback time per charge for the earbuds with their 75mAh batteries.
- Charging case can recharge the earbuds about 3 times for a total of 24 hours of battery life with its 800mAh battery.
Angry Miao Cyberblades: Should I buy it?
Buy it if…
- You want the coolest looking earbuds that have ever been released
- You want excellent audio quality in very small earbuds
- You want extremely comfortable earbuds with a wide range of sizing options
- You want low-latency gaming earbuds on your PC or gaming console that also work nicely for music on your phone
- You’ve got the money to spend on $300 ear buds
Don’t buy it if…
- You want to look like an average Apple user
- You can’t afford high-end earbuds
- You want a very pocket-friendly earbuds charging case
Conclusion
I was extremely impressed with these wireless earbuds from the moment I opened the box. I love the Mystic Violet Dreams Chromaflair finish, the RGB lights, the comfortable fit, and the excellent sound quality. Prior to trying these, I generally didn’t like using earbuds at all. The half dozen other versions I’ve used have all had comfort problems, longevity problems, or audio problems. The Angry Miao Cyberblades don’t have any of those problems and I dread the day that I lose or break them because they’ll be pretty expensive to replace.
Special thanks for photo appearances by Nea Mclin.