Beats Powerbeats Fit review: A confusing entry into the Beats family

The Beats Powerbeats Fit are for runners — the wing that dominates the little buds tells you that straight away. They’re the latest version of the Fit line, which sit between the Powerbeats Pro 2 and the Studio Buds+.

There are some nice upgrades over the previous pair here. We’ve got a new fitting wing that makes sure they stay in your ear better, a refreshed design to keep them looking and feeling up to date, and a sound profile to keep your legs pumping.

But there are some strange holdovers from the old model. Sure, the seven hours of battery life is good, but it's not as good as the recently released (albeit $50 more expensive) AirPods Pro 3. We’ve still got the H1 chip from the original AirPods Pro (they came out six years ago, but who’s counting?), so you can’t expect the improved noise canceling and features that the H2 chip affords the Powerbeats Pro 2.

But that’s not the whole story. Find out how I fared with the Powerbeats Fit in my full review.

Beats Powerbeats Fit review: Cheat sheet

• What is it? Buds for running that come in funky colors
• Who is it for? Beats fans and fitness fanatics
• What does it cost? $199
• What do we like? New fitting wings make them more secure, and the design has been slimmed down for better pocketability
• What don’t we like? The sound just isn’t there, they’re not terribly comfortable for long sessions, and the ANC isn’t as good as cheaper models

Beats Powerbeats Fit: Specs

• Price $199/£199/AU$329
• Connectivity Bluetooth 5.4
• ANC Yes
• Battery 7 hours (buds) 30 hours (Case)
• Weight 2.1oz
• Dimensions 2.46 x 2.18 x 1.08 inches
• Colors Jet Black/Gravel Grey/Spark Orange/Power Pink
• Compatibility iOS, Android
• Frequency response 10Hz - 22kHz

Beats Powerbeats Fit review: Price and availability

The Beats Powerbeats Fit come in at the same launch price as the now outgoing Fit Pro. You can grab a pair for $199 from either the Beats website, the Apple Store, or from retailers like Amazon, Best Buy, and Walmart.

Beats Powerbeats Fit review: Design and build

• A new, slimmer design
• Nice and compact
• Uncomfortable after a while

Living up to their fitness credentials, it looks like the Fit have gone on a cardio workout to lose some of their winter weight. They’ve slimmed down noticeably since the last version, especially in the case department. It’s much smaller now, more akin to the AirPods Pro line in size rather than the Powerbeats Pro 2’s massive charging case. I like the way this new case looks — and I’m a particular fan of how easy it now is to slip into a pocket. It helps that it’s smooth and pebble-like, which really adds to the premium feeling of the package.

It’s those wonderful colors that make things even better, though. I’m in love with the Pink colorway that Beats sent to me, and my colleagues are all enamored with the Spark Orange.

The buds inside are also smaller now, and the fit wings are now made of a stiffer material. Comfort is, unfortunately, a mixed bag. I’ve not had any problems with the fit wings, and they do a good job of keeping the buds firmly inside your ears.

The buds themselves, however, are a different story. Even with the smallest of the eartips (and yes, I did sample all four of them) didn’t help, instead only making the seal worse and the ANC less… good. Instead, it’s the bud housing itself that seems to sit in just the wrong spot in my ears. It’s impacting the concha in a not-nice fashion, and after a time, they start to irritate. It takes about 45 minutes for them to get annoying — and I want to take them out.

For short bursts of exercise, you’re going to be fine. Some people might not have the same fitting issues as me either, with some of my colleagues not reporting the same issues. But it’s definitely worth keeping in mind.

Beats Powerbeats Fit review: Sound quality

• Solid, dynamic bass
• Iffy mids
• Stifling sibilance

Echoing a sentiment that I’ve had to write a lot during this review, the Fit doesn’t sound bad — but there are buds that sound better for less.

The Fit features a V-shaped sound. That means that the bass is lovely and deep. It’s dynamic and punchy, making for a lovely time for bass heads. It’s not as in-your-face as older Beats buds either, and it’s well-formed. It doesn’t invade the rest of the soundscape, which is good as well.

Things fall down when we get to the rest of the sound profile. The V-shaped sound means that the mids are pushed all the way down, making vocals in particular much weaker than you might hope. Guitars and other instruments suffer as a result as well. That’s supposed to be the tradeoff for the usually ‘fun’ sounding V-shaped sound, but that relies on the highs being good.

Instead, we get sibilance — that means that S sounds and plosives are uncomfortably edgy — and it makes the whole experience feel less than the sum of its parts. There’s plenty of detail, brought to light by the lack of mid-range presence, but it can get piercing on occasion.

This means that they’re not fantastic for spoken word content, so if you’re the sort who likes to listen to podcasts, you’ll want to look elsewhere. I watched buckets of YouTube videos to test them out, and it felt like someone was whispering into my ear, putting emphasis on all the worst sounds their mouth could make.

Spatial Audio is fine. It highlights the sibilance to some degree, but it does make the music sound wider. Head tracking is typically accurate, making them good enough for watching movies.

Spinning up A Valediction from Obscura revealed some of the buds’ strength, but also shone a spotlight on their shortfalls. While the fretless bass danced well down below, the distorted guitars and vocals felt pushed back in the mix. Meanwhile, the cymbals and other high-range sounds made the experience feel edgy.

I moved over to Alpha Mist’s Breathe, and things got a little better. While the smooth vocal line was pushed back in the mix, the rest of the track felt fairly strong. The bass was solid and well-defined. The trumpet line did occasionally become slightly too edgy and sibilant, but it wasn’t too much of an issue overall.

Finally, Thundercat’s lo-fi vibes in Dragonball Durag bring big bass impact to show off how good the bass of the buds can sound. It’s huge, it’s funky, and it’s loads of fun. The vocals, again, take a back seat, and the soundstage feels restrictive, but it’s otherwise a decent experience.

Listen along with the Tom’s Guide testing team with the Beats PowerBeats Fit testing playlist:

Beats Powerbeats Fit review: Fitness

Nick Harris-Fry

Nick Harris-Fry is an exercise obsessive who runs every day as well as cycling and doing strength sessions regularly. This gives him plenty of chances to get sports headphones sweaty and test out their fit and other fitness features.

The Powerbeats Fit don’t have the built-in heart rate monitor that you get on the Powerbeats Pro 2, but I don’t consider that a major loss given the accuracy issues I experienced with those earbudsthe Powerbeats Pro 2. The Powerbeats Fit are good sports headphones.

I’ve done a couple of runs, three strength workouts, and a sweaty indoor bike ride with the buds so far, and the fit has been rock solid thanks to the wing. I haven’t had to adjust the buds mid-workout, and getting such a secure fit without needing an earhook is impressive.

It’s not the most comfortable fit, though — if I wear the buds for more than an hour, I get some unwelcome pressure from the wing. This was a problem I also had with the Beats Fit Pro, and I hoped the redesigned wing on the Powerbeats Fit would be an improvement, but it’s still noticeable in a bad way. Even more so than other sports headphones with wings.

Like other Beats buds, the Powerbeats Fit have a physical button to control playback, which is always a plus for sports use because I find you can use it more easily with sweaty or gloved fingers than a touchpad.

Beats Powerbeats Fit review: Features

• They’re missing the headline busters
• Spatial Audio is here, though
• But that’s about it

The AirPods Pro 3 and the Beats Powerbeats Pro 2 featured a brand new heart rate monitor — something the new Powerbeats Fit lacks. That’s no great issue, given how our fitness team found the monitor in the Powerbeats Pro 2 to be less accurate than hoped. In this case, that’s probably no great loss, given the issues that our fitness team suffered with Beats' first attempt at buds with heart rate monitoring. Still, it feels strange that there aren’t any new features to the Fit family.

They don’t even have the latest H-chip, instead wielding the now 6-year-old H1 chip from the original AirPods Pro 2.

As you might expect, iPhone users get the better deal here. You’ve got all your settings accessible in the iPhone settings menu, including fit check. They’ll also connect to all the Apple devices connected to your Apple Account, which remains a big bonus for Apple users.

You’ll also get Spatial Audio with Apple Music, along with head tracking. I’m still not a massive fan of Spatial Audio, but if you like the format, you’re not going to have any complaints about the performance of the Fit.

Android users don’t get head-tracked Spatial Audio, but you do get the static version of the format. The features are found in the Beats Android app, which emulates the settings menu you’ll find built into Apple devices.

Beats Powerbeats Fit review: ANC

• It works
• But there are cheaper alternatives
• Transparency mode is good

The noise cancellation of the Powerbeats Fit comes courtesy of the H1 chip, which, for those not paying attention, is now six years old. That’s not to say that the ANC inside the buds is in any way bad, but it’s not as good as you might hope, given you’re spending so much on the buds. It blocks out a decent amount of noise, but it’s easily defeated.

You’re not going to have any issues when you’re riding the bus or when you’re on the train. It does let engine and road noise in (again, even with music playing), but voices and other noises are kept at bay. Going for a run next to a road isn’t going to be a noisy experience, but it’s not going to be as cocooning as some of the other options out there.

And therein lies the problem. There is better ANC to be found out there — the Sony WF-C710N, for example, features better ANC for around $80 less. I also experienced what I can only call a “weirdness” with the ANC of the Fit. When typing on my keyboard at my desk, the headphones tried their best to keep up — but ended up making some very strange noises as a result. It was slightly distracting, but thankfully, it only happened during spoken word content.

Transparency mode is fine, and lets you easily chat to people around you without needing to take the buds themselves out. It’s perfectly natural sounding, and your conversation partner won’t sound robotic or synthetic.

Beats Powerbeats Fit review: Controls

• A single button
• Customizable
• Good for gloves and sweaty fingers

Beats has never gone for touch controls, sticking with physical buttons on all of its devices. The Powerbeats Fit are no different, with a button on each of the earbuds. They’re small and clicky, and have to be pushed multiple times for playback and held down for noise control. I never found that I had to re-press to get them to work as I have with some buds.

You can customize the button as well, to some degree. In the Beats app or the iPhone settings menu, you’ll find some options — six, to be exact. You can set the press and hold function to either change the volume (up and down distributed across left and right), activate ANC, or activate your voice assistant. You can choose a function for both left and right for the latter two options. Right for Siri, left for ANC, and vice versa. Or both doing the same.

Beats Powerbeats Fit review: Call quality

• Excellent on the callers end
• Unfortunate sibilance on the other

I was really hoping that the call quality with the Fit would be excellent. After all, they’re not too distantly related to the AirPods Pro 3, which are excellent for calls. Unfortunately, as I’ve found with every other aspect of these confusing earbuds, they’re a mixed bag.

The microphones are really, really good. I sounded great when chatting with my sister as I walked by a busy road. Our managing editor of TV and AV, Nick Pino, reported that I sounded crystal clear. That’s good — it’s important that you sound great to your bosses at work and your mom on the weekend.

The problem is the sound quality on your (or in this case my) end. There’s already an issue with vocal clarity, something I’ve talked about previously, and it’s also done damage to the call quality. There’s an unfortunate sibilance that affects S sounds and plosives, making for a pretty uncomfortable experience, no matter who you’re talking to. It’s a shame because they were looking pretty good initially, but the hurdle of sound quality apparently proved too much.

Beats Powerbeats Fit review: Battery life

• It’s fine!
• But there are better

According to Beats, you’ll get 6 hours with ANC on. Turn ANC off and you get an extra hour of battery life, and put them back in the case for 30 hours of charge time. The battery life is fine, but when you compare it to some similarly priced buds, they are lacking in staying power.

The more expensive (by $50) AirPods Pro 3 feature eight hours of ANC on time, while the much cheaper Sony WF-C710N has 7.5 hours of ANC on time. Six hours just doesn’t feel like quite enough, considering how much better the competition is at this point. The Cambridge A100 offers an excellent 12 hours of battery life.

At least the battery life claims live up to real-life usage. I found that after 3 hours of listening to music and playing some spoken word content, I was at around 48% battery life. Looks like those figures are going to match up to your expectations.

Beats Powerbeats Fit review: The competition

There are plenty of options that are cheaper and offer potentially better sound. We’re big fans of JLab’s buds, and there are some great options if you don’t want to spend $200 for noise canceling and a fitness-oriented fit. The Epic Sport ANC, for example, are half the price and have an earhook to keep them in place.

Then there are the Cambridge Melomania A100, which cost $50 less and offer much better sound and battery life. The Sony WF-C710N sound better and have better ANC for $80 less. Or, you could opt for more features and improved sound and ANC with the $50 more expensive Powerbeats Pro 2.

The Fit feel strange at their price point. Spend a little more and get vastly better buds, or spend less and get performance that’s on par or better with Beats mid-range buds. If they were cheaper they’d be much easier to recommend — but, as we've seen, that higher price highlights some of their shortcomings.

Beats Powerbeats Fit review: Verdict

The Beats Powerbeats Fit are not bad by any stretch of the imagination. They have reasonable battery life, slick, compact styling, and the new, more secure fit. They’re a solid pair of earbuds if you’re looking for something that you can run with, thanks to the sweat and water resistance. They’re good buds — but they’re not great.

The ANC isn’t quite up to scratch, the sound isn’t perfect (and can’t really be dialled in), and the fit can get slightly uncomfortable after a time. That’s a big, big shame, and it makes the $200 price tag sting all the more.

If you’re looking for exercise buds to go with your new iPhone 17, then you might just be the target audience for the Powerbeats Fit. For others, you should probably check out some of the other best running earbuds.