Design & Construction

With the launch of the Accentum headphones, Sennheiser is completing its Accentum line with a new true wireless option. Today, we are getting a new budget-friendly earbuds from the makers of the iconic Momentum series. The Accentum True Wireless. Does it still live up to its name? Well, there is only one way to find out. Diving straight in, we see a rather new design that takes cues from its predecessor, the CX Plus as well as its older brother, the Momentum True Wireless 4. While it shares some similarities in terms of embracing the classic Sennheiser design, it is clearly different this time Starting off with the case, the earbuds case has a squarish look to it. This time, we got the smallest case design ever from Sennheiser and with a new blue colour. On the outside, the blue plastic case features an debossed glossy Sennheiser logo with the USB-C charging port is located at the front of the case with an accompanying LED indicator to show you its charge. Like all true wireless earbuds, the earbuds dock in fairly easily and will not fall out when the case is flipped since there are magnets inside to keep them secure. In terms of durability, it is protects well against accidental drops but I can see it potentially scuffing up in day-to-day use. As for the earbuds, the rectangle design isn't the smallest but it fits well into most ear shapes and sizes. After listening for an hour or two, it is quite easy to forget that you have them in. As usual, Sennheiser went ahead with touchpads that feels responsive even when you tap them lightly. Now for the controls, a single press on the right earbud will play/pause your music, a double press will skip forward and a triple press will bring up Google Assistant, Alexa or Siri; holding it down will increase the volume. Moving to the left earbud, a single press will enable Transparent Hearing while a double press will skip backwards and a triple press will enable Active Noise Cancelling. Meanwhile, holding it down will decrease the volume. For calls, there is yet another set of controls that does the same command on either earbud. A single press will pick up the call and a double press will reject the call. When you are in a call, a single press will mute/unmute the microphone. Similarly, the volume can be increased by holding down the right earbud and decreased when holding down the left earbud. Now, it is worth mentioning that though these are the original out of the box settings, you can customise the touch controls to any command you would like to either earbud and the app will sync the new settings immediately. If you need to pair another device, you can hold down both earbuds for 3 seconds to enable Bluetooth pairing. It takes about 1.5 hours to charge both the case and the earbuds from a dead battery. However, if you are in a rush, there is always quick charge which will allow for 1 hour of playback with a 10 minute charge. Both earbuds has the debossed Sennheiser logo and have subtle LED indicators on the inside that will only light up when necessary such as in situations of pairing them. In normal usage of music playback or calls, they never light up to attract unwanted attention. In the box, there are extra sizes of silicone ear tips and fins to ensure a tight seal and secure fit. Even though the Accentum isn't a sports earbud, it boasts an IP54 water resistance for those intense workouts or rainy days, giving users the ultimate peace of mind. The earbuds itself also do a great job at resisting fingerprints smudges with a matte finish. 

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Sound Quality

Exciting, bass-focused and energetic is how I would describe the sound of the Accentums. Let's start off with the bass response. In short, it is deep, punchy, and tight. It never managed to distort at loud volume and never bleeds into the mids when it is at a low volume level. Thanks to the refined 7mm TrueResponse transducers, the highs sound bright and forward with plenty of details. The mids do sound extremely crisp especially with the help of the equaliser tuning that is found in the Sennheiser Smart Control app that really help to configure the sound to your ears. The soundstage is indeed the widest I have heard from any earbuds on the market today and nothing comes close to it. The instrument separation is excellent with distinct left and right channels being heard clearly. If you are not so much of an EDM or Hip-Hop fan, I am glad to report that the Accentums works perfectly with all other genres ranging from Pop to Jazz after you fiddle with the customisable sound settings in the Smart Control App available for download from the App & Play Store. In the app, you will first see the My Devices page where you can select which compatible Sennheiser device to delve into. Thereafter, you will be greeted with the selected devices' settings where the battery life status is shown as well as the option to manage your earbuds' multipoint connection to your devices. Next, there is the Equaliser setting which you can choose to customise your very own or choose from the presets. There are presets like Rock, Pop, Dance, Hip Hop, Classical, Movie and Jazz. Different presets do work well with different music genres and you may also select any presets to further tune and rename it to become your custom setting. Additionally, there is the Bass Boost option which I greatly enjoyed using to boost my low frequencies as well as the Podcast mode where the equaliser will be disabled fully and set to Sennheiser pre-made Podcast mode. Should you happen to mess up doing custom presets, a simple tap on the 'Restore all Sennheiser presets' will revert all changes made. Now, you can further take this experience deeper using the Sound Check feature where you will first do a fit test to determine iif you have a good seal. Next, a series of drums, bass and strings will be played through the app to compensate for your hearing needs. Just below, Adaptive Noise Cancellation is next with the simplest option of all, just a simple Off, Anti-Wind or On. No advanced customisation here since Sennheiser have specially tune it to simplify the process for the end users. Comparing the ANC performance of the Sennheiser's to the competition, I found that the Accentum isn't too far from competitors in its price range. If I were to rate it, I would say it is on par with the Nothing Ear (a) and the Sony WF-C700N. Moving on, we have the Transparent Hearing option where you can change the setting from Off to using it With Music or enable Pause Music to stop the music every time you enable it. There are also options to set the Transparency Mode from Low, Mid and High levels so you can find the middle ground between mixing in your environment and your music. Unfortunately, the Accentums' transparency doesn't have the smarts to detect and filter out loud bursts of noises or selectively take in voices only. There are options to switch on auto-pause so you can have a clearer hearing need as well as selectively adjusting the volume for phone call ambient sound intake. You can enable or disable the Touch Controls as well as customise each button setting to your preference. Next, you will see Sound Zones which allows the app to automatically switches to a certain equaliser and ANC or Transparent Hearing setting when it detects that you have reached a frequent destination like your office, school or at home. You can set up to 20 different zones and each can be from a close radius accuracy of 100m to 1km from the selected location. The Noise Control settings will tap into existing equaliser presets that you have and you will need to set what happens when you arrive and leave the location. Personally, I don't use this feature as it can be quite gimmicky as well as making it a great way to give away your location to Sennheiser too. There is now a Find Headphones feature which allows you to trace back your earbuds in case you misplace them. You can also play a sound if they are nearby so that you can find them easily. Lastly, you can now use Auracast to tune in to nearby broadcast and experience personal listening. Alternatively, you can leave your app feedback too. Onto the Discover tab, you can read and catch up on the latest Sennheiser press release and news where they will share their latest product offerings and possibly entice you to buy them? In all case, its possibly the least important and useful feature in the app. In the settings, you can alter the audio resolution from standard to low latency for gaming. However, each time this setting is changed, a restart will be required to take effect. The codecs in effect will be displayed as well as the option for Battery ECO which does the opposite and turns off high-res codecs for extended listening times. You may enable Smart Pause if you prefer the faster way of removing one earbud to pause the music to hear someone and auto accept calls when the earbuds are removed from the case as well as set the duration for auto power off ranging from 15 minutes to an hour. Moreover, you choose to use both tones and voice prompts in multiple language, use tones only or just turn it off completely and enable battery protection mode to prioritise battery longevity. At the bottom, a factory reset of the app settings is possible together with the ability to show or hide the individual tiles to show on the homepage. In terms of call quality, the Accentums uses 2 beam-foaming mic array per earbud to capture your voice while eliminating ambient noises. In my opinion, the quality is comparable in quality to the Nothing Ear (a) and the Jabra Elite 5, though in some cases, very strong winds or loud traffic noise does affect its quality and lowers the voice pickup,

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Connectivity & Portability

The earbuds support the still new AptX, AptX Adaptive, LC3, AAC and SBC codecs together with Bluetooth Version 5.3. The earbuds also automatically power on/off when docked and taken out from the case. The battery life peaks at 6 hours per use with ANC on and up to 8 hours without ANC; together with the charging case, you are able to achieve up to a maximum of 28 hours. The package also comes with a USB-C cable for charging and the case is Qi wireless charging capable. Either earbuds allow for one-sided listening with perfect connectivity to the app as the app was able to detect my earbuds all the time. Additionally, multipoint is supported so you can connect two devices at once to take calls and listen to music simultaneously. If you try to watch videos or movies with these, they do not have any latency in audio transmission.

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PROS​​

• Durable Construction

• Ergonomic Fit

• Customisable Equaliser

• Energetic Sound Signature

• My Sound Check Customisation

• Strong Active Noise-Cancelling

• Transparent Hearing

• Responsive Touchpads For Music Play & Calls

• Bluetooth 5.4 with AptX Support

• Auracast Support

• Quick USB-C Charging

• Long Battery Life

• Qi Wireless Charging

• IP54 Water Resistant

• A Range of Colours​​​​​

• Multi-point Bluetooth Pairing

 

The Bottom Line

In all, the Sennheiser Accentum True Wireless is a waller-friendly travel-ready earbud with strong yet straightforward features that keeps its users happy. The top features why it is so sought-after in a saturated market of true wireless earbuds has got to be its signature Sennheiser sound signature, decent noise-cancelling as well as smooth user experience. The Accentums is definitely the way to go if you need a complete package with an attractive price tag to match. It is indeed a seamless and hassle-free experience that Sennheiser has nailed after going through several iterations of perfection.