JLab Go Air Pop review: these cheap wireless earbuds are surprisingly good

This JLab Go Air Pop review is for anyone who wants some of the best budget wireless earbuds, they’re seriously cheap without making too many sacrifices and they would also make a great gift. 

There aren’t really many other pairs of cheap headphones that compare to these. I previously reviewed the Skullcandy Dime which cost about the same amount, but the JLab Go Air Pop far outperform them in every way, whether that’s in terms of sound quality, battery life, features or even design. 

JLab Go Air Pop review: price and availability 

Super cheap true wireless earbuds, the JLab Go Air are available to buy on Amazon and only cost $20 in the US and £20 in the UK. Take a look at the widgets on this page to find out where else you can buy a pair.

JLab Go Air Pop review: design and fit 

When you open up the JLab Go Air Pop, the first thing you’ll notice is how compact the charging case is that the earbuds come in. You’ll very easily be able to slip it into your pocket and it’ll barely take up any space in your bag. It only weighs 35.4g with the earbuds inside so you’ll barely know it’s even there. 

You can buy the JLab Go Air Pop in a few different colours including black, lilac, teal, rose and slate. It’s a good variety of different shades so you’re sure to like one of them for yourself, or for someone else if you plan to buy them as a gift. 

The buds themselves are tiny and round, their design is simple and discreet. But given how cheap these wireless earbuds are, you can’t expect too much in terms of build quality. Each earbud is very light and made from thin plastic, they don't feel as though they're going to be easily damaged but they don't fill me with confidence that they'll last forever either. Similarly, the lid of the case feels a little flimsy when you open and close it. 

In saying that, these true wireless earbuds do have IPX4 water resistance so while they might not survive a dunk in water, they’ll be fine if they get splashed with rain or sweat.

To find the perfect fit for you, the JLab Go Air Pop come with three sizes of silicone ear tips. They’re actually quite comfortable, the small round buds sit nicely in your ear and they didn’t budge when I used them during exercise. I did start to get a bit of discomfort after a couple of hours but they were just fine up until that point. 

You’ll get about 8 hours of music from the earbuds, which is a total of 32 hours of listening time with the charging case. For a pair of cheap true wireless earbuds, that’s actually very impressive. 

Hidden in a crevice on the underside of the case there’s a USB cable attached to charge it back up again. It takes about 2 hours to get the case back up to 100% and the earbuds themselves will take just over 2 hours.

To change the music, there are touch controls on the outside of each bud. Double-tap on the right earbud to pause or play the track, a single tap on the same side will turn the volume up, or if you press and hold down on the bud you’ll be able to skip forwards to the next song. On the left-hand side, a single tap will decrease the volume, a double-tap will call upon your smartphone’s voice assistant and holding it down will skip backwards. You’ll also be able to accept or reject calls, hang up the phone and cycle through the equaliser settings using these controls.

The controls are very responsive and worked every time I went to use them although I did find that when I went to skip through tracks I kept accidentally pausing the music instead. Still, it’s great to have that level of control without needing to reach for your phone.

JLab Go Air Pop review: sound and features 

You’d be surprised at the quality of the audio considering how cheap the JLab Go Air Pop wireless earbuds are - they won’t blow you away like some of the best wireless earbuds, but the sound is clear, crisp and quite well balanced so there aren’t any glaring problems to note. 

Surprisingly, there are 3 different equaliser settings built into these headphones, those being JLab Signature, Balanced, and Bass Boost. You don’t need to open up a smartphone app to switch between them either, you just need to triple tap on the earbuds. 

JLab Signature is probably the most consistent setting across genres of music, it keeps the sound even and clear. The Balanced mode will be better for listening to podcasts and watching videos, while the bass boost setting somewhat overpowers the music and makes vocals much harder to understand but does exactly what it says on the tin, adding a bit more oomph to the audio.

The sound isolation is actually quite good on these earbuds, you can barely hear anything going on around you when the music is playing. Obviously, it would be a lot better if there was dedicated noise-cancelling technology but at this price, you can't have it all.

One area where these earbuds do massively fall down is call quality. The person on the other end found it very difficult to understand me, especially when I was in a busy place or by a road. So while you can take calls through them, I doubt you actually will.

JLab Go Air Pop review: verdict 

As far as cheap wireless earbuds go, the JLab Go Air Pop are the best you’ll get at this price. These are dirt cheap but they still manage to pack in plenty of features, decent sound quality and a good amount of battery life. 

Of course, they’re not perfect and when it comes to the sound, these hardly compare to headphones that cost twice or three times the price but it's the call quality that really lets them down. 

Despite that, the main point here is that the JLab Go Air Pop cost about as much as takeaway pizza, so they’re without a doubt the best cheap headphones for anyone looking to spend as little as possible.