Review of the best bluetooth headphones for entertainment Jabra Elite 7 Pro

Jabra Elite 7 Pro are your everyday true wireless earbuds showcasing a balanced sound, solid battery life, and unmatched comfort. On the other hand, effective passive isolation carries the ANC, which barely does anything.

Unlike the sportier Jabra Elite Active 75t (replaced by the Elite 7 Active model), the Elite 7 Pro target the general audience of commuters and frequent phone callers.

The sound quality, battery life, passive noise isolation, HearThrough feature, and comfort are a few things that earbuds do right.

On the flip side, active noise cancellation only slightly improves low-frequency reduction, with passive noise isolation doing most of the heavy lifting. However, the end performance is far from the competition.

Should you consider Jabra Elite 7 Pro for their asking price of $180? What are they best used for?

Find out in the full review below.

Sound

Star Rating 4.0 Great

Jabra Elite 7 Pro have a balanced signature out of the box, with immersive soundstage and imaging. Unfortunately, the custom EQ is too limiting to fully correct their tuning.

Affordable Jabra products usually have a V-shaped sound signature, whereas their high-end stuff sticks to a more balanced approach.

That said, Jabra Elite 7 Pro could’ve offered slightly more, especially in the treble. Let’s dive in the details.

Bass: Smooth and fairly controlled

The bass is boosted by a few dB above neutral, adding a little warmth without being too punchy.

While the bass quantity is OK, users who want more can add some using the custom EQ in the Jabra+ app. More on that later.

Low frequencies can reach quite deep and deliver a subtle rumble when listening to hip-hop music. Like during a chorus in “Umbrella” by Rihanna.

The bass control and detail are pretty good when listening to bass guitars and with decent speed when a song contains faster drumming.

Further boosting the bass in the app’s EQ results in a slightly muddier performance.

Midrange: Polite and quite natural

Mids are slightly recessed around 1kHz, making instruments like electric guitars less apparent.

On the other hand, vocals stay relatively unaffected, with good texture and natural tone. However, the default tuning is prone to occasional sibilance.

The harshness gets less present by boosting the 1kHz and 4kHz regions. Also, the instruments play a bit louder, with a harder-hitting snare drum as well.

Treble: Shimmery but lacking detail

While high frequencies extend pretty well, the upper region isn’t very present. You get the air and shimmer but very little detail.

Consequently, cymbal crashes don’t produce that natural, textured, crackly sound. Instead, they only shimmer, making them very uninteresting. That’s due to the lack of energy between 10kHz and 16kHz, and a bit too much energy between 6kHz and 9kHz.

Unfortunately, the custom equalizer only offers 7kHz as the highest frequency to adjust. That means that lowering the 7kHz in the EQ reduces the entire upper treble frequency response.

By adding the 12kHz (or higher) band to the EQ, Jabra might have helped improve the sound quality. Who knows, maybe in the future.

Until now, try out my custom EQ, which helps make the sound slightly more balanced.

Unexpectedly, the soundstage is pretty broad on Jabra Elite 7 Pro.

In conjunction with accurate imaging and instrument separation, earbuds create a very engaging listening experience, with sounds coming all around and slightly out of your head.

Furthermore, active noise cancellation and HearThrough features don’t affect the sound performance or quality.

Overall, Jabra Elite 7 Pro are balanced/slightly bright across the board, with some corrections needed to sound the best.

The tuning is best for casual users who don’t nitpick small details but mostly want an inoffensive listening experience during their daily commute.

Comfort & Fit

Star Rating 4.0 Great

Jabra Elite 7 Pro have an ergonomic design with a long nozzle and ear tips that don’t cause annoying pressure. They’re also reasonably stable but not for the most intensive workouts.

Jabra earbuds are known to be very comfortable, and the Elite 7 Pro are no exception.

Earbuds are relatively average in size and should fit all but the smallest ears. Also, due to the long nozzle, the pinna barely feels the pressure of the housing, which helps reduce wearing fatigue.

Speaking of a long nozzle, the included silicone ear tips do a good job of preventing pressure build-up inside your ear canal.

The deep insertion also helps with overall stability. Since ears lack ear wings to lock themselves in place, a good ear tip seal is crucial.

Though, don’t expect a rock-steady fit. While earbuds can easily hold themselves during walking and some light exercising, you might risk losing them when jumping or running on uneven trails.

Durability

Star Rating 4.5 Almost Perfect

Jabra Elite 7 Pro have a hard plastic housing with a smooth, silicone-textured layer to add a more premium feel. Also, they’re rated for an IP57, making them waterproof. However, the case is sturdy but left unprotected.

The Elite 7 Pro definitely feel premium. They have a minimalistic design made with a mixture of plastic and what feels like silicone.

The latter makes them smoother to the touch but also more prone to catch grease from your ears, which you later transfer into the case (which has an even smoother finish). Here is how to keep your earbuds clean.

Earbuds are put together from at least 3 parts, one being a big physical button with the “Jabra” logo.

When pressing the physical button, you push against the part of the outer ear called the concha and not directly into your ear canal. As a result, you don’t get that annoying pressure sensation like with many other earbuds using physical controls.

Even though Jabra Elite 7 Pro aren’t meant for sports activities (Jabra Elite 7 Active are better suited for that job), they carry an IP57 rating. That makes them fully waterproof (up to 1 meter in depth) and dust resistant.

To match the premium feel of the buds, the charging case shares a similar minimalistic yet sleek design. It’s made of matte black plastic on the outside and an almost suede-like finish on the inside.

The case feels reasonably sturdy. However, the thin lid and the plastic hinge don’t look like they would survive a drop on a hard floor.

Furthermore, the case lacks an IP rating itself. But that’s rare for earbud’ cases.

Battery

Star Rating 5.0 Perfect

Jabra Elite 7 Pro offer a fantastic battery life of 8 hours and 20 minutes per charge (with ANC enabled), beating even the best noise-cancelling earbuds in this category. The Qi wireless charging case holds another 22 hours of juice.

Active noise cancellation uses a lot of energy, so ANC earbuds were never mind-blowingly great when it comes to battery life. However, Jabra Elite 7 Pro are thinking otherwise.

In our test, letting earbuds play music at 50% with ANC enabled, we got:

8 hours and 20 minutes of battery life.

That’s 20 minutes more than what Jabra advertises. Also, that makes the Elite 7 Pro (so far) the longest-lasting ANC earbuds since we started testing battery life.

That said, since Jabra’s noise cancellation is nothing to write home about, many of you will probably leave it off. Meaning you can expect an even longer battery duration.

Furthermore, the Elite 7 Pro’s charging case support Qi wireless and fast charging:

You get 1 hour of juice after a 5-minute charge

30 minutes of charging equals 50% of the battery

Earbuds and the case charge up from 0-100% in 2.5 hours

For those who will use the earbuds every once in a while, the standby time is up to 292 days.

Features

Star Rating 5.0 Perfect

Jabra Elite 7 Pro have many features, and almost all are hidden inside the Jabra+ app. Also, earbuds deliver loud and clear microphone audio.

If you want to squeeze the most out of Jabra Elite 7 Pro, you must pair them with the app. Thankfully, it doesn’t require enabling the internet and GPS to connect, as some other apps do.

The list of features you can access within can be almost overwhelming. Here’s all that the Jabra+ app offers, on top of renaming your buds and selecting voice assistant.

MyFit

This feature checks how well earbuds seal your ear canal by playing a short sound (like a sine sweep).

It can be helpful to ensure you are using the proper ear tips. However, if you don’t hear much of the ambient noise, then you probably have a good seal.

MySound

The app plays continuous beeps at different frequencies, from very quiet to increasingly louder. You tap on the screen when you hear the beep.

Ultimately, the app creates a personalized sound profile that works quite well. I see people using their designated profiles as they genuinely improve the sound.

MyControls

You can select commands based on whether you’re listening to music, have an incoming call, or are in the middle of a call.

Gestures vary from one to triple presses, but unfortunately, you don’t have an option for volume controls.

Soundscapes

Here is where you find various sounds to either comfort you or to help mask ambient noise. Sounds range from simple pink or white noise to nature and even crowd noise.

What makes this feature excellent are the high-quality recordings of those sounds. Furthermore, a wide soundstage from the earbuds boosts the immersion.

Other features include multipoint support and a personalized ANC, which I’ll discuss later.

Noise Isolation

Star Rating 4.5 Almost Perfect

Jabra Elite 7 Pro passive noise isolation is truly impressive, beating all their competition. They can even outperform earbuds with foam ear tips.

You can achieve good passive noise isolation by having denser tips (like foam ones), more than one seal (like with multi-flanged tips), or a very deep seal. The Jabra Elite 7 Pro go by the latter.

Surprisingly, the deeper fit doesn’t feel intrusive nor creates pressure, so you don’t even notice how deep the ear tips reach.

The result is excellent passive noise isolation that smoothly surpasses most, if not all, earbuds I’ve tested.

While the low-end rumble remains relatively unchanged, the middle and high frequencies noticeably reduce in loudness.

You might as well use these as hearing protection when handling loud power tools if there are no earplugs around.

Furthermore, Jabra Elite 7 Pro also don’t suffer from sound leakage. People will barely hear what you’re listening to, even if you blast them in the middle of a library.

Noise Cancellation

Star Rating 2.5 Average

Jabra Elite 7 Pro have rather disappointing adjustable noise cancelling for the price, with minimal reduction in the low frequencies. Some cheaper alternatives can do much better.

When toggling between ANC on and off, you realize it heavily relies on passive noise isolation. The latter basically does all the work.

The only difference that active noise cancelling does is slightly reduce the low end. However, you can still hear the hum, which is the very thing you want to block when traveling or commuting.

That’s quite disappointing since most true wireless earbuds that support ANC can do better, even much cheaper ones.

What about ambient sound mode?

For the most part, the HearThrough performance is clean and natural, not bright and peaky like on 1MORE Evo, a similarly priced flagship from 1MORE.

While you hear the ambient sound slightly quieter than you would if you take the earbuds out of your ears, you can easily use the HearThrough to reply to people next to you.

Bluetooth

Star Rating 4.5 Almost Perfect

Jabra Elite 7 Pro have a reliable Bluetooth 5.2 connection with up to 60 feet of indoor coverage, multipoint support, and no visible lag for videos (but a small one during mobile games).

Connectivity-wise, you shouldn’t have any problems using the Elite 7 Pro. Throughout my testing, I have yet to experience a random stutter and lost connection.

Even the indoor connection range with 2 brick walls in between is above average, lasting 60 feet (18.3 meters) before completely cutting off the audio.

Furthermore, you can use earbuds in mono mode and have them paired to 2 different devices simultaneously (multipoint). That way, the earbuds switch from your laptop to a phone when you receive a phone call.

How to pair Jabra Elite 7 Pro?

Earbuds automatically start pairing when you take them out of the charging case.

To pair them to another device, you must take the earbuds out of the case and hold both buttons for 3 seconds until the small LED lights start blinking.

What Bluetooth Codec Do They Use?

Like all Jabra earbuds and headphones, the Elite 7 Pro also come with SBC and AAC Bluetooth codecs. That should cover the basics of both Android and Apple devices running iOS.

Is There an Audio Lag?

None when watching videos on YouTube and social media. The start might be a bit junky, but the audio quickly syncs with the picture.

On the other hand, you can see a split-second delay when playing mobile games. It isn’t much, but still annoying if you’re a professional competitive gamer.