Sony’s oddest earbuds tipped for audio and fitness upgrades

The earbud market is so crowded it's often hard to tell whose earbuds are whose. But there's no mistaking Sony's Linkbuds WF-L900, which are as weird as they are wonderful. And now a successor is imminent – and Sony appears to be updating its Linkbuds S too.

If you're not familiar with the original Linkbuds, they have a very different design to most earbuds: instead of the familiar ear-tip design they have a doughnut-shaped bit instead. That means you can hear the world around you without needing a transparency mode, and one of the examples Sony gives is of wearing them in the workplace where you need to hear other people.

According to The Walkman Blog, as spotted by our colleagues at What Hi-Fi?, there are two new models en route: the Sonly Linkbuds Open, which would be the successor to the Linkbuds WF-L900, and the Linkbuds Fitness, which may be a new version of the Linkbuds S aimed more at fitness users. If so, we'd expect improved water and sweat resistance and hopefully better battery life too.

Sony's new Linkbuds: what we know so far

The new names are unusual for Sony, which tends to go for relatively meaningless letters and numbers instead of words – so for example its best earbuds are called the WF-1000XM5. This is an ongoing Sony thing and hopefully the move to more memorable and descriptive names is part of a wider, more consumer-focused strategy: it really helps with researching products, comparing models, finding deals and so on.

The new report doesn't detail the specs of either set of earbuds. But recent rumours have suggested that they'll be getting the same chipset as the WF-1000XM5, which delivers excellent ANC; previous rumours from the same source have promised that the new Sonys will "push the boundaries of audio innovation". A release date hasn't been confirmed but it's possible we'll see these new models this side of Christmas 2024.