In the past, Jabra marketed its Evolve headsets more toward businesses rather than consumers. But as more people have shifted to hybrid or work-from-home environments, the professional-grade headset market's dynamics have shifted to the point where the Danish brand made a major design decision for its new Evolve3 85 ($649) and Evolve3 75 ($463) headsets: it left off the boom microphone and designed the new models to look like your typical premium over-ear and on-ear headphones.

While there's no flexible boom microphone to bring the mic close to your mouth, I was impressed by how well the new models are able to pick up your voice clearly while dramatically reducing background noise; they reduce even more background noise than their predecessors in the Evolve2 series. What also makes this hybrid headset/headphone stand out is its lightweight design (220 grams or 7.7 ounces) and slim profile -- the earcups are flatter than your typical over-ear headphone -- and how slim and compact the carrying case is with the headset folded up and flat inside it (it can fit in the side pocket of a laptop bag). A dedicated mute button allows you to toggle the headset's microphone on and off.

The Evolve3 85 and Evolve3 75 have very similar specs and performance, but they just have different earpieces, with the Evolve3 75 having an on-ear design (I found the over-ear model slightly more comfortable). Both come with the Jabra Link 390 USB dongle (you can choose between USB-A or USB-C) that allows for quick and reliable wireless connectivity with a PC. I also used the headsets with my iPhone over Bluetooth (they use Bluetooth 5.3 with a range of 30m).

While they excel at voice-calling and video calls, they do double duty as everyday headphones. Their audio quality for music listening and noise-canceling performance isn't up to the level of what you get with headphones like the Sony WH-1000XM6 and Apple AirPods Max 2, but it's still quite respectable and there are equalizer settings in the Jabra Plus companion app for iOS and Android to tweak the sound and adjust the amount of sidetone for hearing own voice in the headphones when you're on calls. Battery life is also impressive at up to 120 hours of music listening with noise canceling off. A 5-minute charge gets you 5 hours of power.

The headphones come in a Microsoft Teams-certified option with a dedicated Teams button that gives MS Teams LED notifications that are visible on the Jabra headset, quick meeting access and automatic device selection if multiple MS devices are present. If you do not use Microsoft Teams as your softphone client, Jabra says to choose the standard UC variant, which is certified for use with all leading UC platforms, including Cisco, Mitel and Avaya and is less than $500 on Amazon. If you use a UC variant with Microsoft Teams, the plug-and-play experience will not be available, Jabra saysm but you can "set up audio and call control features manually by selecting the UC variant as the default communication device in the Microsoft Teams settings."

Over the last several years, Sony has made some of the best noise-canceling headphones on the market, so it's a big deal when the company comes out with a new flagship model, like the WH-1000XM6, which arrives three years after the release of the WH-1000XM5. Though the XM5 was -- and still is -- one of the top over-ear Bluetooth headphones, there's always room for improvement. With the XM6, Sony has fixed the small design flaws of its predecessor while bumping up the overall performance, including voice-calling performance. The result is a headphone that's arguably edged just ahead of the competition and is now at the top of its class. Read our Sony WH-1000XM6 review.

A few years ago Shokz turned its OpenRun (formerly Aeropex) bone-conduction headphones into a more communications-friendly headset with an integrated boom microphone called the OpenComm ($160), which remains available. The second-generation OpenComm 2 UC costs more than the original, but features an upgraded Bluetooth 5.1 chipset that improves performance a bit and now allows for the firmware upgrades that are required for Zoom certification. Additionally, the microphone has moved from the left ear to the right and a convenient mute button has been added to the boom microphone -- an important addition. 

Since these leave your ears open -- the sound is conducted through your cheekbone -- they aren't for people who want to seal their ears out from outside noise. Rather, the idea is that you can hear everything around you without having anything covering your ears or jammed inside them. The headset is quite comfortable to wear. Some folks find that liberating and these do feature excellent noise reduction for calls, as callers told me they heard very little background noise even when I was out on the noisy streets of New York. 

While the Shokz are arguably the best-sounding bone-conduction headphones, they aren't great-sounding for music because they're lacking in the bass department. However, they're great for speech, so they work very well as a headset for making calls and listening to podcasts or audiobooks. These also have multipoint-Bluetooth pairing, so you can pair them with your phone and PC and easily switch to your phone if a call comes in while you're on your computer. And they come with either a USB-A or USB-C wireless dongle (you choose) that you plug into your computer for quick and reliable wireless connectivity.  

As long as you don't mind the boom microphone, you can use the OpenComm 2 for sporting activities as well and are favorites for runners who want to keep their ears open to hear the outside world for safety reasons. They're also water-resistant. The only downside is they require a proprietary charging cable instead of USB-C. Battery life is rated at 16 hours of talk time and eight hours of listening.

The AirPods Pro 3 are about as close as earbuds get to being complete: excellent noise cancellation, strong voice-calling performance and sound quality that rivals the very best. Few buds excel in all three areas -- and the Pro 3s manage it while packing in plenty of extra features, including a new heart-rate monitoring feature. Read my full review.

Logitech's Zone Wireless 2 ES is a fairly affordable headset that starts at $160 and offers good all-around performance in a comfortable, lightweight design with a reversible boom microphone (you can opt to wear it on your left or right side, and flipping it up mutes the mic). While this is an on-ear model, the ear pads are nicely cushioned, and I found the headset easy to wear for long stretches. Noise reduction during voice and video calls was excellent, and people said they could hear me clearly. When I used the headset in the noisy streets of New York, callers told me they could hear only minimal background noise, though the headset did pick up some wind noise.

Equipped with 40mm drivers, I also thought they sounded good for music listening, as they feature ample bass and decent clarity. Also, while their noise canceling may not be up to the level of what you get with premium Bose, Sony and Apple headphones, it was better than I thought and effective. The model I tried is a Bluetooth-only version, but it is also available in a UC version for $20 more that comes with a wireless USB-C or USB-A wireless dongle that offers quick and reliable wireless pairing with a PC. That said, the standard Bluetooth version is Microsoft Teams Certified and does offer multipoint Bluetooth so you can connect the headset to two devices simultaneously and switch audio between them. You can customize settings in the Logi Tune app.

Battery life is rated at 20 hours of talk time and 25 hours of music listening time with noise canceling on. A cloth carrying case is included. If you're looking for more of a plug-and-play option, Logitech also sells the Zone Wired 2 ($140). It also worked well in my tests and sounded good, but I prefer the untethered freedom that Zone Wireless 2 ES offered.

There's a lot to like about Logitech's Zone Vibe 100 wireless over-ear headset, which comes in off-white, carbon and rose color options. For starters, it's lightweight and comfortable to wear, with a retractable boom microphone that you can flip up to mute, plus it has a mute button on it. Additionally, it features multipoint Bluetooth pairing, so you can pair it simultaneously with your Mac or Windows PC and your smartphone and easily switch audio back and forth between the two devices. These aren't active noise canceling headphones but they offer a decent amount of passive noise isolation. Battery life is rated at up 20 hours of listening time.

People said I sounded clear on calls and there's some sidetone, so you can hear your voice in the headphones as you talk (that way you don't end up raising your voice two much). I thought they sounded quite good while listening to music on my smartphone. However, the sound quality wasn't quite up to the same level when streaming Bluetooth audio on my computer, though it was still decent. The Logi Tune app for iOS and Android does allow to tweak the sound profile, adjust the sidetone and set when the headset goes to sleep when not in use.

This also comes in a version USB dongle for your computer called the Zone Vibe 125 for $30 more.

Why I like them

While the new-for-2025 Ultras look almost exactly the same as the original QuietComfort Ultra Headphones that were released in 2023 -- and it's unclear exactly what's changed from a hardware standpoint -- this second-gen model offers several enhancements, including slightly better sound, improved noise cancellation, USB-C audio, a new immersive-audio Cinema Mode and improved battery life (it's now rated for up to 30 hours, up from 24, and can be charged during use via the USB-C port).

When it comes to noise canceling, these are neck and neck with Sony’s new WH-1000XM6 headphones, as the two companies continue to battle for ANC supremacy. Before this 2nd-gen model arrived, I had the Sony XM6s slightly ahead, but with the small but noticeable improvements Bose has made, it's hard to say which headphones are better. It may come down to how they feel on your head -- but both are pretty comfortable.

Reasons to buy

They're a good choice for frequent travelers, commuters and professionals who want comfortable, well-designed headphones with impressive overall performance, including superb noise-muffling capabilities.

Reasons to skip/keep looking

Those on a tighter budget should look toward more midrange and budget headphone options.

The redesigned Galaxy Buds 4 Pro are essentially AirPods Pro 3 for Samsung and Android users, with top-notch sound, voice-calling performance and a strong feature set. They should also fit most ears comfortably and securely. Their noise-canceling is also quite good, though not quite at the same level as Apple, Sony and Bose. That's why I awarded them a CNET Editors' Choice. Read my full review.

Shokz wanted to equip its new flagship OpenFit Pro open earbuds with active noise cancellation, but that's not easy with open earbuds. Instead, it ended up dialing back expectations and calling the tech inside these new ear-hook style buds, "OpenEar Noise Reduction." It's a good thing it did because, during time testing the OpenFit Pro, they didn't reduce ambient sound nearly as well as the Apple AirPods 4 with Active Noise Cancellation. But they sound impressive for open earbuds, are comfortable to wear, offer very good voice-calling performance and have the premium build quality you'd expect from a set of earbuds that cost $250. Read my Shokz OpenFit Pro review.

If you're an Apple-centric person who works on a MacBook and also has an iPhone (and maybe an iPad), Apple's AirPods Max 2 noise-canceling headphones allow you to easily connect to multiple Apple devices simultaneously (so long as you're signed into your iCloud account on all the devices) and switch between them. If you're on a Zoom teleconference and a call comes in on your iPhone, the AirPods Max automatically switch to the iPhone if you pick up the call. Read full review.

While the AirPods Max 2 look the same as the Max (USB-C), they now include a new "dynamic range" amplifier and Apple's H2 chip (the original Max was powered by the H1), which adds a host of features already available in the AirPods Pro 2, AirPods Pro 3 and AirPods 4 and helps improve the headphones' performance in a few key ways. While Apple didn't upgrade the microphones, the H2 chip supports Apple's Voice Isolation feature, which helps with voice-calling and video-calling performance. On top of that, both sound quality and noise cancellation are improved.

They sound great, and with all their microphones and advanced algorithms, they do an excellent job picking up your voice and reducing ambient noise. Aside from their high price, the other potential downside is their heavy weight. Although I found them comfortable, some people may have trouble with that.

Jabra's Evolve2 30 is a wired on-ear office headset with an integrated boom microphone. It's lightweight and comfortable and comes in USB-C and USB-A versions, as well as stereo and mono versions (I tried the USB-A stereo version). The headphones are decent but not great for music listening, but they're primarily meant for voice applications. They feature dual microphones: one for picking up your voice and the other to help reduce the ambient noise around you so callers can hear you better.

Plantronics' original Voyager Focus UC has long been considered one of the best work-from-anywhere headsets. Now we get the Voyager Focus 2 UC from Poly (the company Plantronics morphed into after it acquired Polycom), and it's improved in several ways, including better noise reduction (it's stellar), two levels of active noise canceling, increased battery life (up to 19 hours with ANC off and 16 hours with it on) and superior wireless range with Bluetooth 5.1.

You can pair the Voyager Focus 2 UC with your computer with the included USB dongle or your phone (or tablet) via Bluetooth. It can also connect to a desk phone if you want to bring it to the office. Also worth noting: The boom microphone has a mute button on it, but when you flip it up it also automatically mutes the microphone. The original Voyager Focus doesn't mute when you lift the boom microphone.

The Focus 2 comes in several different versions, including USB-A and USB-C models and a version that's Microsoft Teams certified. You can get the headset by itself or in a bundle that includes a charging dock. All versions include a nice protective carrying pouch.

The Voyager Focus 2 UC is expensive but offers excellent performance and is quite comfortable for an on-ear headphone. It also sounds good for music listening with nicely detailed sound and ample bass. It may not be quite up to the level of the Sony WH-1000XM5 for music, but it offers a nice music-listening experience for a work-centric headset.

Years in development, Shokz OpenMeet comes in a standard version ($220) and a UC version ($250) that includes Shokz' Loop120 USB-A/USB-C wireless dongle for use with Windows and Mac PCs. Equipped with a TitaniumFlex frame and weighing a mere 83 grams, the first thing you notice is how light and comfortable it is (it's designed to be worn for hours). Like other bone-conduction headphones, this headset sits on your cheek in front of your ears and doesn't cover them, leaving them open to hear what's going on around you.

Like Shokz OpenRun 2, this headset combines Shokz' bone-conduction technology with its air-conduction speaker technology (Shokz says it's a "Qualcomm-driven" 11mm x 18mm custom speaker), which is able to deliver more bass than bone-conduction technology and helps fill out the low end. The result is the headset sounds more like a traditional headphone, offering significantly fuller sound than the company's previous bone-conduction headphones. While there are plenty of $200 headphones and earbuds that sound even better than the OpenMeet, it does offer respectable sound quality.

The headset's voice-quality performance was quite good in the test calls I made. Equipped with a dual-microphone system powered by Qualcomm's cVc noise reduction, Shokz says the OpenMeet reduces background noise by up to 98.6%. Note that while the OpenMeet fit my head securely and I was able to walk around with it in the streets of New York, it's really designed for more stationary use. In other words, if you jostle your head too much, the headset will likely slip out of position or slip off your head. Shokz's OpenComm 2 headset, which has a similar design to the company's sport-oriented neckband style headphones like the OpenRun 2 but incorporates a boom microphone, fits more securely but is not as comfortable.

Known for its value headphones and earbuds, JLab offers a pair of on-ear headphones with an integrated boom microphone (it can be rotated up when just listening to music) and multipoint Bluetooth pairing so you can connect them to your phone and computer simultaneously. JLab's Go Work headset may not be great, but it delivers better-than-expected performance for a modest price. They're also comfortable to wear with a lightweight design. You won't mistake these for premium headphones, but the build quality means that they are among the best headphones for work for around $50.

Battery life is rated at up to 45 hours at moderate volume levels, and you can mute calls using the multifunction button (an LED lights up at the end of the boom mic when the call is muted). I wouldn't call the sound quality for music listening and the headset performance stellar, but it's decent, particularly for the price. For music listening, there's ample bass and clarity and a cable is included for wired use. The headphones charge via USB-C. Note that JLab also sells over-ear Go Work headphones that cost around $80 and do sound a little better.