Review: Baseus Inspire XC1 Open Earbuds

If you find traditional wireless earbuds uncomfortable, or maybe they just won’t stay in no matter what you do, there’s still hope, thanks to open-ear earbuds like Baseus’s Inspire XC1. Open-ear earbuds don’t sit directly in your ear, up against your ear canal, which gives them two major advantages over the more common “closed” design (think AirPods Pro with the silicone ear tips): better comfort and situational awareness.

There are currently two styles of open-ear earbuds to choose from: the classic, ear hook design, and the newer clip shape, which wraps around the side of your ear and sort of resembles an earring. The Inspire XC1 belong to the latter group.

You may not be familiar with Baseus; it’s a relative newcomer to the personal audio space. And yet, every time I try one of its products, I marvel at how it manages to get so much right, at prices that are well below the competition. The Inspire XC1, crafted in partnership with Bose, are no exception.

Out of the Box

Photograph: Simon Cohen

I’m sure it’s no accident that Baseus created the XC1 in Cosmic Black and Starlight Off-White (pictured here), two colors that mimic Bose’s preferred hues. The charging case’s plastic is very smooth, making it tricky to open the lid. Once open, it provides easy access to the XC1, which firmly snap in and out of their charging nooks thanks to their strong magnets. You don’t get wireless charging, but that feature seems to be a rarity among open-ear models and almost unheard of with clip styles.

Like almost every set of open-ear buds I’ve tried, the XC1 are very comfortable, even after three hours of constant use, and they’re a better option than ear hooks if you wear glasses. Most of the time, I can’t even tell that I’m wearing them. Once clipped in place, they hardly budged, even when working out. An IP66 rating gives them excellent protection against both dust and water. Showers are fine, but don’t take them swimming.

Baseus via Simon Cohen

Like the OpenDots One, the XC1 are reversible. Onboard sensors figure out the left/right balance when you put them on. This is especially useful when dealing with the controls. Baseus uses a single button on each bud, mounted on the battery/electronics pod, and you can decide if you prefer to activate it with your thumb or index finger.

The buttons are a breeze to click, and unlike touch controls, they can be used while wearing gloves. The Baseus app lets you customize the click gestures, with options for single-, double-, triple-, and long-clicks—more than enough flexibility for your preferred playback, volume, calling, and voice assistant controls. As an added convenience, the earbuds have wear sensors that auto-pause and resume your music when you remove or replace them.

Baseus also deserves props for its handling of Bluetooth Multipoint. In the app, you can add a new device pairing and see a list of previously paired devices, making it easy to switch between simultaneous connections.

A New Experience

Photograph: Simon Cohen

If you’ve never tried open-ear earbuds, you should know that, by design, they let in a lot of external sound. It’s perfect for conversations; you’ll never need to remove an earbud to hear the other person. This also makes them ideal for phone calls, because you can hear your own voice without the muffling effect of regular earbuds. It’s better than the best transparency mode.

All of this openness also means that your music is competing with whatever is going on around you. Traffic, coffee shop chitchat, the howl of a treadmill as the person next to you is midway through a high-intensity hit—you’ll hear it all, and when it’s really loud, it will simply overpower your audio. No set of open-ears can completely compensate for this reality, but the Baseus Inspire XC1 are up with the best.

To help with the XC1’s sound (or perhaps its marketing), Baseus partnered with Bose on its three-product Inspire line, which includes the XP1 ANC earbuds and XH1 ANC headphones. According to Baseus, “Bose's legendary audio engineers have fine-tuned the sound performance,” and I’m sure that having Bose know-how helped, but it also didn’t hurt that Baseus gave the XC1 a dual-driver system with a dynamic driver for the lows and a Knowles balanced armature for the highs—an unusual setup in the open-ear world.

Photograph: Simon Cohen

In what I’ve come to think of as typical for open-ears, loud locations proved challenging, especially for spoken-word content like podcasts and calls, and the low end lost some of its punch. When things were quieter, however, they wowed me with their bass response and clarity.

Using a selection of some of my favorite headphone test tracks, like Billie Eilish’s “Bad Guy,” Dominique Fils-Aimé’s “Birds,” and Stevie Ray Vaughn’s “Tin Pan Alley,” I compared the Inspire XC1 to leading clip-style models, including the Shokz OpenDots One, Bose Open Earbuds Ultra, and Soundcore AeroClip. The XC1 didn’t disappoint, with bass response that goes deeper than Bose’s pricey Open Earbuds Ultra, and an overall sound signature that rivals the OpenDots One for midrange and high clarity.

Open-ear earbuds have an inherently wide soundstage that gives a natural, airy feel to the sound. This is true of the XC1, making them an ideal choice for those who like Dolby Atmos Music tracks.

Out of the box, the Inspire XC1 use Baseus’s “Sound by Bose” EQ preset, which is a lively mix, but a little too tame in the lows and highs for my liking. Thankfully, the Baseus app gives you six additional presets and the ability to mix your own using an eight-band equalizer. I found only subtle differences between the presets; a custom EQ with boosted lows and highs proved most satisfying. When listening critically, certain bass notes lacked detail, but for casual listening, it didn’t bother me at all.

Photograph: Simon Cohen

Speaking of critical listening, the XC1 work with Sony’s hi-res capable LDAC Bluetooth codec, should you happen to own a compatible Android phone (sorry, iPhone users). Using LDAC can reveal more detail, especially when listening to a source of lossless audio, but for these earbuds, I don’t think the juice is worth the squeeze. Using LDAC disables your EQ settings and Bluetooth Multipoint, and the XC1 struggle to maintain a steady Bluetooth connection when LDAC is set to its highest-quality setting.

Baseus also includes two Dolby Audio modes (Music and Cinema), which are meant to create a more immersive, spatial experience. For me, it’s the opposite. I find they wash out the sound, with Cinema being downright muddy. At 60 percent volume, there was more than enough power for an engaging listening experience indoors. Outside, I needed a bit more oomph.

Beyond Music

Photograph: Simon Cohen

Calling on the Inspire XC1 is good. Whether indoors or outdoors, your callers will find it easy to understand you, and almost all background sounds are kept at bay. However, as with most clip-style open-ear earbuds, your voice won’t be crystal clear—some distortion does manage to creep in, particularly when outside.

Baseus rates battery life on the XC1 at eight hours per charge, with 40 hours of total use when you include the case’s battery, numbers that are only eclipsed by the OpenDots One’s 10/40 combo. Baseus assumes 50 percent volume and does not include the use of either Dolby Audio or LDAC. LDAC can be very power hungry, often reducing battery life by up to 30 percent, which is one more reason to avoid it.

Open-ear earbuds aren’t for everyone, but with great sound quality, a comfortable, clip-style design, and easy-to-use controls, the Baseus Inspire XC1 are an excellent choice. They check a lot of boxes for a price that’s considerably less than their nearest competitors, including strong water and dust resistance, optional LDAC mode, and Bluetooth Multipoint. The only thing that’s missing is support for Auracast. Sadly, that feature has yet to see widespread adoption. If you're after an affordable pair of open buds that compete with the best, these are among the best we've tried.