Everyone wears these headphones for workouts – but are they any good? Let’s look at some alternatives to keeping your ears open while working out, including one that was just released.
Although some of these products have been around for a while, we personally use many of them on a regular basis. Whether that be for workouts, phone calls or even dancing. Let’s start with the Oladance Open Wearable Stereo.
Bone vs Air Conduction Headphones
Type of Headphones | Transmit Sounds Through | Audible to Others | Vibrations Can Cause Discomfort | Beneficial for Certain Hearing Impairment |
---|---|---|---|---|
Bone Conduction | Bones | ✗ | ✓ | ✓ |
Air Conduction | Tiny Speakers Near Ears | ✓ | ✗ | ✗ |
Oladance OWS ($200)
At $200 these are the most expensive on the list. But also the best sounding. You can sometimes find them for $150 too, if you look carefully. The Oladance uses tiny speakers that emit sound close to your ears, also called ‘air conduction’. Usually, when your ears don’t get a seal, it’s hard to produce good sound quality, especially in the bass. But the Oladance packs a punch! It has a rich sound signature with strong bass. It can also get quite loud which you’ll need if there’s a lot of background noise. And the EQ in the app isn’t a gimmick. It’s actually quite capable.

One of the other reasons we love the Oladance is just how comfortable they are. Apart from workouts, Kevin keeps them in the car too and very often while stepping out of the car he just forgets to take them off! Using them in the car keeps him aware of his surroundings. Since he’s got a bad carkit it makes sense for calls too. Speaking of which – here are some microphone samples for you!
CLICK HERE for the mic sample (full samples are available for select Patrons & YouTube Members)
Now, if you’re not Dutch or Kevin’s bright orange colour is just too much for you then Oladance gives you options. Like this sleek blue one we have as well. Or any of these you can choose from. You operate them using touch controls on both buds. They’re very responsive. You’ve got volume controls by swiping on either bud and the app also gives you the ability to customise the controls. You will also not be charging them all too often. They give you 16 hours on a single charge. After that you can pop them in the case and plug in a USB Type C cable to charge them up again.

And this is what brings us to the not so great stuff about the Oladance. At the already hefty price of $200 you only get a dummy charging case included. Meaning the case itself doesn’t contain a battery of any sort, but just enables you to charge. The included case isn’t the most compact either. You can however buy an active charging case, but that’ll be an extra $50. The comfort and fit really is very good on these, but where the buds sometimes fell off was during yoga for example. If you’re not doing strange poses but sticking to normal upright workouts, then you won’t have any issues with the Oladance. Depending on the workouts or areas you plan to use them, the IPX4 might just be enough. For us it was against rain and sweat, but your mileage may vary. And finally, there is neither multipoint nor a wear sensor onboard. So you’ll need to put them into pairing mode if you’re connecting to another device.
Shokz OpenRun Pro ($190)
We’ve got three flavours of Shokz that we’ll talk about today, starting with the most expensive Shokz OpenRun Pro. Shokz products are bone conduction, which means the sound travels through your bones and straight to your inner ear. This is also especially interesting for folks with some hearing loss. And, of course, it means that there’s nothing blocking your ears. These are Shokz’s top of the line model. So you do get a nice build, excellent comfort and a good fit. Surprisingly, these are not the most water resistant, but at IP55 we’re not exactly complaining about that. These sound much bassier than any other bone conduction headphones we’ve used and you know what? We kinda dig it. With a 10 hour battery life, you will be good for those extra long runs. And you get pro features, like multipoint and access to an app. The app also enables you to tweak the EQ and of course, firmware updates. And yes there are microphones on board. Here’s a sample:
CLICK HERE for the mic sample (full samples are available for select Patrons & YouTube Members)

What did you think? Rounding out the pros of the OpenRun Pro, there’s also a completely unnecessary hard case if you’re someone who really persecutes your audio gear.
And speaking of persecuting – you either like bone conduction, or you don’t. And there’s a good chance that the vibrations with that extra bass might be uncomfortable for some of you. These don’t distort at higher volumes, but we did find that the bass forward sound could be a bit too much. The headband also needs to be the right size for you since the extra slack at the back can interfere with your collars, coats or DHRME hoodies which you can get from shop.dhrme.nl. What? Oh right, the OpenRun Pro also has a proprietary magnetic charging cable, so you gotta hang on to those, no standard USB peasant cables for you.

And at the end of the day, you have to ask yourself the question if you want to pay so much for bone conduction headphones? If not, the next couple of headphones might be something to consider.
Links for Latest Prices
Shokz OpenRun ($145)
Yes, the Shokz OpenRun headphones are from another time. A time when Shokz was called AfterShokz and OpenRun was called Aeropex. The newer OpenRuns are identical to the older Aeropex, but have fast charging on board. And yeah – that’s a benefit, along with a solid 8 hours. Yeah – that’s two hours less than on the Pro. But get this – the OpenRun has a better IP rating at IP67! What? And here’s the kicker, we think that in quieter environments, these actually sound better than the expensive OpenRun Pro because the sound is much more balanced and the bass doesn’t obfuscate the mid and higher frequencies.

The OpenRun also offers multipoint! Crazy right! And here’s a quick mic sample for you folks who plan to use them for calls:
CLICK HERE for the mic sample (full samples are available for select Patrons & YouTube Members)
Now, it’s not all unicorns and bubble tea. The sound does start distorting at higher volumes, which you will have to use with open-ear products depending on the ambient noise. You don’t get a hard case, only a soft silicone case and you don’t get a soft app and even though these are cheaper, they aren’t as cheap as what’s coming next.
Cleer Arc ($110)
The Cleer Arc is an interesting product – similar to the Oladance, but much cheaper. You’ll still be aware of your surroundings and have a comfortable and reasonable fit even for workouts, decent sound quality for open ears. They do lack a bit of bass though and focus on being clear with the mids and the highs. The app has EQ options too. And you get a case that can charge your earbuds – yay! The touch controls also include volume, always a plus in our books. The microphones are decent too. Here are some samples we recorded a while ago.

CLICK HERE for the mic sample (full samples are available for select Patrons & YouTube Members)
But that’s where the good stuff ends. You get no extra features like multipoint or smart pause. The Cleer Arc doesn’t get as loud as the Oladance. And just isn’t as comfortable. It has slightly less responsive touch controls. You don’t get as many color options and has just 7 hours of battery life on board.

The case situation isn’t great because it has an attached USB A cable and it’s not as pocketable. It only has an IPX4 rating – check out our comparison with the Oladance in this video. We concluded there that the Oladance was the clear winner, but you know what – at the newly discounted price, the Cleer Arc is certainly worthy of consideration. But hold on, before we get to the ABSOLUTE best value, we have one more from the Shokz family to go.
Shokz OpenMove ($90)
The OpenMove is a cheap way to get into the Shokz family… and you know what? It actually has some advantages over its more expensive siblings. To start off with – you don’t need any special cables to charge it – your old USB Type C lying around will work. And it gives you 6 hours of battery life – a solid number unless you’re a marathon runner. It doesn’t skimp on too many things either – there are good, clicky controls that do volume as well. A play pause button and for calls you can also control volume as well as mute the microphone. The OpenMove also offers multipoint!

And there’s a very respectable IP55 rating against dust and liquids and… the good stuff ends there. Before we go to the not so good stuff, see how it performs on a mic test.
CLICK HERE for the mic sample (full samples are available for select Patrons & YouTube Members)

What did you think? So let’s go on… that Type C port? It has a worse build, with a sharp edge and stiffer plastic. There’s an annoying flap you need to keep closed if you want to keep that water resistance rating. The overall design is bulkier and you get ZERO smarts – it can’t even connect to the app.
SoundPeats RunFree Lite ($40)
Ok – these are the last product on this list. And the newest. And the cheapest. By a mile. The SoundPeats RunFree Lite comes in at a ridiculous $40 which means you can buy 2 of these instead of the previous product. But what do you get for that price? These are Oladance style ‘Air Conduction’ headphones, which means no bone-related vibrations for you. The battery life is PRETTY amazing. We’re talking 17 hours with USB Type C charging!

Are these the best sounding open-ear headphones on this list? Nope, but still decent! The best part is the bass doesn’t give you a weird vibrating feeling unlike bone conduction products. Voices sound very natural without weird sibilance issues, which makes these very nice for podcasts. And yes – you can pair this to two devices at a time. It works… ok-ish. On our MacBook, we noticed we HAD to close a browser tab to resume playback on the phone. But at this price – we’re not complaining. A comforting fact is that the SoundPeats app works with the RunFree Lite, giving you EQ settings and a game mode. But most importantly we’ve already received a firmware update in the limited time we’ve had it for. And funnily enough it wasn’t able to update it for some reason! Oh well… moving on. Here’s a short microphone sample:
CLICK HERE for the mic sample (full samples are available for select Patrons & YouTube Members)
Now you can RunFree with these SoundPeats, but you shouldn’t buy this product to attract potential mates. Here’s where it really differed from the Oladance for us. The bass extension is about the same as the Oladance – no sub bass to speak of. But there’s also none of that midrange clarity or width. There’s a certain mid-bass bloat that takes away from the clarity. But you know what – in a quiet place, with the right angle, these are fine for even enjoying music with some bass. However, the shape and design of this meant that it began to press down on our tragus after about 30 minutes, as opposed to the Oladance which doesn’t even touch our tragus. #freemytragus

And another place where it differs from the Oladance is that it feels super cheap and plasticky. Like the OpenMove, you also get a USB C port covered by a flap. Closing that flap is necessary for the little bit of water resistance it has at IPX4. Just about industry standard at this point. There’s no sensor in there automatically pausing your music either when you take of the headphones. And that build. You can almost tap the two ends and use it as a percussion instrument – it sounds so hollow. And of course, there’s the headband which can be annoying as it rests against collars and other elevated clothing. If you want to elevate your clothing game – you know where to go! The buttons feel cheap, but sturdy. But weirdly – they didn’t respond very well to presses. Sometimes a volume button press would take a full second to register and some other times it wouldn’t register at all. Strange. And strangely, while Kevin’s app worked, Rohan couldn’t even connect to the app.
Wrap up
This video’s been sponsored.. by you! Our awesome Patrons and YouTube Members. We have a strict policy of not being sponsored by companies whose products we review. So we wanted to reach out to you guys again to help support us on Patreon and YouTube. Thank you for your time, money and patience with our puns.
You’ve been keeping an open mind to headphones, and we’ve been DHRME. Namaste!
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✅ Products were supplied by Jabra for review.
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