Audeze Maxwell Wireless review: A luxe gaming headset for audiophiles

Price When Reviewed

329

Best Prices Today: Audeze Maxwell Wireless

Finding a wireless gaming headset with a sound quality as good as any studio grade pair of cans is no easy feat. Many premium headsets sound great – impressive even – but a gaming headset reaching the status of audiophile grade? That’s particularly rare.
Audeze begs to differ, with the company’s newest gaming headset, the Maxwell Wireless, which is quite simply one of the best-sounding gaming headsets I’ve had the pleasure of using.

Its secret sauce? Try the 90mm planar magnetic drivers for starters, which produce an extremely warm, high-fidelity audio that should please even the most discerning audiophiles. Yet despite the exceptional quality on offer, this set is ideally primed for the very specific world of wireless gaming.

It comes in two variants, an Xbox version (my review model) or a PlayStation option, both of which undercut some near rivals in price, while they also upstage cheaper models in functionality. Read on to find out more.

Further reading: See our roundup of the the best wireless gaming headsets to learn about competing products.

Design and build

Oval-shaped cups are often called round by reviewers, but the Maxwell’s cups are actually round. I’m talking the classic UFO-saucer kind of shape. Of course, round cups will only fit snugly over oval ears when they’re quite large — which is exactly the case here. The earcups are so large in fact that Audeze has left out any mechanism to adjust the headband up or down — it’s a one-size-fits-all length.

Still on that thread, my first thought after unboxing it was: Why so big? Then it dawned on me… you need bloomin’ big cups to fit 90mm drivers. Yes, folks, the Audeze Maxwell has some of the biggest audio drivers you can find in a gaming headset and it’s obvious that its form is dictated by that formidable hardware.

For its part, though, the Maxwell Wireless has plenty of luxe appeal thanks to the high-end materials in its chassis. The headband, for instance, is made from spring steel, while the yokes are a premium aluminum. Of course, all that metal takes a toll on weight — it weighs slightly more than a pound (490 grams), which is quite a lot, even for a headset in this premium category.

But honestly, I never found the weight an issue, there’s enough luxury on board to counteract any discomfort I might have felt. For example, the leatherette material over the soft memory foam pads felt plush on my ears and there was ample cushioning to keep my head feeling unpressed.

Doing a little test on how long I could wear the headset without taking it off saw me last approximately three hours, which is pretty decent for a headset of this size. Then again, I only needed to take it off because my ears were becoming a little too hot — the leatherette feels great, but as I’ve found so often in headsets with leatherette, it does lack the breathability of mesh and tends to heat up a little after a while.

Dominic Bayley / IDG

Despite there being no vertical adjustment available in the headband proper, there’s plenty of movement in the set overall. The cups tilted upwards in the yokes, providing me with a medium-grade clamp pressure. They also swiveled 180 degrees so I could comfortably rest them on my neck — the headset wasn’t quite long enough to reach my chest.

An inner flexible suspension strap is located beneath the main band — this distributed most of the headset’s weight neatly across the top of my head. It’s adjustable to three comfort settings and replaceable should it wear out, but it does suffer from a cumbersome hole-punch adjustment mechanism.

As to the styling, the Maxwell is exceptionally elegant, sporting a metallic finish, the kind I was happy to wear anywhere. I especially liked the contrast between the gun metal outer parts and the black cup coverings.

Connectivity and compatibility

I had the Xbox variant of the headset, which is designed to work with Windows PC, Mac, Xbox 360, Xbox X/S, and Nintendo Switch, as well as Android and iOS devices. But I also managed to get it to work with a PlayStation 5 console using the supplied USB-C to USB-A adapter.

This kind of cross compatibility is not possible with the Xbox if you purchase the PlayStation variant, which means the Xbox variant is the one you’ll really want if you’re looking for the absolute best connectivity you can get.

One point of caution on that, though, is that this device isn’t officially sanctioned to work with PlayStation, so there’s no way of knowing if it’ll work down the line when Sony or Audeze decide to update their firmware.

As well as the aforementioned USB-C to USB-A adapter, you get a 2.4GHz USB-C dongle for low-latency Wi-Fi, a USB-C to USB-C cable for setting up a wired connection, and a 3.5mm cable for making an old-school analog connection.

After plugging the dongle into my laptop, the headset worked immediately, without me having to do anything extra. To pair Bluetooth, however, was a bit tricky. The on/off switch doubles as the Bluetooth pairing button, which means it’s kind of easy to accidentally turn off the set while trying to pair. A dedicated Bluetooth button would have been useful here. Still, since my phone remembered the device once I paired it, it’s a problem I only encountered once.

I was slightly bummed also by the fact that the Audeze Maxwell’s chipset doesn’t support simultaneous Bluetooth audio while using the Wi-Fi dongle, like you can in the SteelSeries Arctis Nova Pro Wireless headset. Still, all is not lost since it does support simultaneous audio when using Bluetooth and a wired connection or Bluetooth and an Aux connection. That just means you’ll need to be tethered to enjoy that functionality.

Controls and microphone

The control setup on the Maxwell Wireless is the same as its predecessor the Audeze Mobius. Located on the left earcup is a power button and a mute mic switch, as well as two dials — one to control the audio and another the mic volume. The cluster of controls also includes a button at the front to turn the AI noise suppression feature for the microphone on and off.

Overall, I found the controls easy to use. I could tweak the Bluetooth volume from the top dial on the headset, which saved me having to do it on the device itself. The controls are also well spaced out, which meant I never hit the wrong one by mistake.

Dominic Bayley / IDG

Attaching the headset’s detachable hypercardioid boom microphone was as easy as slotting it into the bottom of the left earcup. It worked really well, conveying my voice loudly and clearly in voice chats, while nicely blocking out unwanted noise with the AI noise suppression feature switched on.

A big win for the microphone is the addition of the pop filter that helped soften the input of my voice. It sounded altogether smoother at the beginning and ending of words — something my gamer friends noticed in our chats.

Audio performance

As well as impressive 90mm Audeze planar magnetic drivers, the Maxwell features improved driver housing that Audeze says makes it “more acoustically balanced than the Penrose and Mobius” gaming headsets.

Not having either predecessor for comparison I was nonetheless very impressed by the balanced (up to 24-bit / 96kHz) sound coming through my cups, and even more impressed by how full-bodied it sounded, being mainly accustomed to the more limited audio from headsets with smaller 40mm or 50mm neodymium drivers.

There’s no doubting how well the audio was primed for competitive gaming too. In games like CounterStrike: Global Offensive and Fortnite, the headset delivered balanced neutral tones through the lower to mid end of the spectrum, while tones at the higher end of the spectrum — like the upper mids and highs — sounded exceptionally detailed and pronounced.

This is exactly the kind of audio that serious gamers are looking for, in that they can distinctly pick out subtle game sounds like footsteps and explosions in the distance — audio cues that often get lost in headsets with narrower audio signatures.

Dominic Bayley / IDG

I personally found sounds that tend to fall by the wayside in my games a lot easier to hear — like the chug of opponents’ weapons reloading, their footfalls, and bursts of fire in the distance. Environmental sounds like birds’ chirps and the pitter patter of rain drops also sounded eminently more realistic than I’m used to hearing in games like Kingdom Come: Deliverance.

Although there’s no Active Noice Cancellation (ANC) to speak of, the passive noise cancellation is excellent in these cans. The round cups met my ears with a skintight fit that cut out most of the ambient noise directly around me. It also did a great job keeping further away sounds like the roar of a leaf blower outside and the incessant muttering of a radio in a next-door neighbor’s apartment down to just faraway murmurings that had no impact on my play.

If that weren’t enough, the Maxwell Wireless can play back audio for a lot longer than a host of rival headsets. Despite all its power-draining functionality, its battery life is rated for a massive 80 hours. That’s a formidable figure that’s double the Razer Barracuda Pro’s 40 hours, and just under three times longer than the SteelSeries Arctis Nova Pro’s 22-hour battery life.

With such a long battery life, I actually didn’t need to charge once during my playtesting. But had I needed to, the headset’s fast-charging capability could have fixed me up right smart — it charges the unit to 100 percent in as little as two hours.

Software

Should you want to tinker with EQ settings, or change presets, you can do that in the Audeze HQ software app. The app is easy to navigate and is perfectly suitable for making these kinds of changes, but it’s not as detailed or as user friendly as some rival apps. Indeed, if you’re used to using competitor apps like SteelSeries GG with Sonar — you may well be wishing the Audeze had something similar.

Being the Xbox variant, my headset also came with a Dolby Atmos license for Windows 10/11 and Xbox. Setting it up on Xbox was simply a matter of connecting the device and then selecting Dolby Atmos for Headphones from Audio Settings — a process that took under a minute. On PC it was almost as easy, requiring me to first download the Dolby Atmos app from the Microsoft Store, then connect the device and launch Dolby Access.

Dolby Atmos is a world class app that really does elevate your gaming experience, providing you the kind of surround sound experience that will help give you an edge in competitive play. For that reason, it’s a great value addition by Audeze.

How does the Audeze Maxwell Wireless compare to rivals?

My Xbox variant currently costs $329 (£349.00) while the PlayStation costs $299 9 (£319.00). While those prices are on the high end of the scale for what you’d expect to pay for a premium gaming headset, if you look at what you’re getting here versus the competition, it doesn’t seem exorbitant.

For example, the $349 SteelSeries Arctis Nova Pro Wireless is more expensive than the Maxwell, and yet it lacks audio technologies that the Maxwell has — like beamforming microphones and an AI noise filtration processor. It also has just one third of the Maxwell’s exceptionally long 80-hour battery life. Although, on the flipside, this headset does feature simultaneous Bluetooth audio that works with the headset’s USB dongle, something I wish the Maxwell had too.

Reversing the price dial, and options like the $249 Razer Barracuda Pro, and $299 Astro A50 Gen4 are cheaper than the Maxwell, however they compare even less favorably in design and functionality comparisons. For example, the Razer’s plastic build is a lot flimsier than the Maxwell’s solid metal one and the headset lacks a detachable microphone.

The Astro A50 Gen4, on the other hand, lacks a suspension headband, has just a 15-hour battery life, and also omits a swathe of audio technologies you can find in the Maxwell. Consequently, and on balance, I think it’s entirely worthwhile spending a little more for the kind of premium functionality Audeze is offering here.

Should you buy the Audeze Maxwell Wireless?

Despite its large and heavy design, Audeze’s Maxwell Wireless headset is an impressive audiophile-grade wireless gaming headset with a full set of premium features for gamers. As well as a comfortable and robust design, this headset sports excellent cross compatibility and the advantage of all the major connectivity types.

Thanks to its 90mm planar magnetic drivers, the headset’s audio quality is one of the best in the business, sounding warm and full-bodied and tuned perfectly to highlight subtle cues in competitive games. The microphone also produces a near perfect voice reproduction, which is just ideal for voice chats.

To top that all off this device has a long battery life the likes of which leaves rivals lapping at its heels. Ergo, recommending this headset is easy: It’s certainly one of the best premium gaming headsets money can buy.