Priced at under ₹8,000, the Huawei Freebuds 4i earbuds offer some premium features like active noise cancellation, but are they the ones you should go for? Read on to find out.
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Design & Comfort
The Huawei Freebuds 4i have a rather unique design, and come in an egg-shaped matte-finish charging case, which is flat on one side to ensure it doesn't roll around on a table. Inside the case there's the two earbuds that feature a circular head and rather long stalks. In this Silver Frost colour variant, both the earbuds and charging case look and feel quite premium.
The buds themselves are quite lightweight, weighing around 5.5g each, and the case weighs around 36.5g. Overall, it's a very compact and handy package, and won't take too much space in your pocket.
The earbuds manage to fit in the ear quite well, but the default eartips were a bit tight for my ears. To this end, Huawei has provided extra eartips, which is handy. Once you've got the right fit, the earbuds sit fairly deep in the ear canal, enough to create a good passive seal against noise.
There's no IP rating for the buds, so I would advise against using them during sweaty workouts or in the rain.
Hardware & Touch Controls
When it comes to specs, the Freebuds 4i house 10mm large drivers, that are tuned in quite a balanced manner. There's also Bluetooth v5.2 here, which ensures the very best connection quality, and gave me no problems throughout my usage.
The Huawei Freebuds 4i get touch controls on the very top of the stalks, which double-tap and touch-and-hold functions. There's no single tap, which I think is a good idea, because it can get triggered accidentally when you're trying to adjust the earbuds.
The touch controls can be used to toggle the active noise cancellation and transparency modes, play, pause or change tracks and also to wake the voice assistant. It is worth noting however, that you can't use touch to change volume with either earbud.
What you can do without touch controls is use the in-ear detection feature to pause content playback when you remove the earbud and resume it once you pop them back in.
Active Noise Cancellation
The Huawei Freebuds 4i come with active noise cancellation technology, which is good to see in this price range.
Now since the earbuds block noise quite well without the ANC itself, the experience is only improved when you turn the feature on. With ANC on, barely any sounds make it through, and when we used them in an office setting, we could barely hear any ambient noise with music playing at around 50% volume.
The transparency mode is useful too, and helps you keep an ear out without having to remove one of the earbuds. It can be toggled using the touch controls, or the Huawei AI Life App.
Music & Video
Sound quality for everyday music-listening is quite enjoyable on the Huawei Freebuds 4i, and they get fairly loud. The sound profile is surprisingly balanced, and doesn't favour bass as most earbuds at this price point do. Details come through quite clearly as well, whether it's while watching films or listening to podcasts.
However, it's worth noting that there's no Equaliser settings, even if you pair the earbuds with the compatible app. This can be remedied by adjusting the EQ settings on music-listening apps, but for apps like YouTube, Netflix and others, you're stuck with the default sound profile.
There's also support for the SBC codec, and the AAC codec as well, which is good to see.
It's worth noting that we did not experience any lag in the audio transmission while watching videos on YouTube or Netflix.
Gaming
When it comes to gaming, there's no low latency mode available on the Freebuds 4i, and that translates to a bit of lag. It's not to the extent that titles like COD mobile are unplayable, but it certainly doesn't make for an ideal gaming experience either.
Calling Quality
Now thanks to those extra-long stalks and a dual-mic system, call quality on the Huawei Freebuds 4i is fantastic. Beamforming technology and AI noise reduction combined with the hardware help reduce background noise around you quite well, and people we spoke to using the earbuds, said they could hear us clearly.
Moreover, their voices were crisp, and not muffled like it usually tends to happen with in-ear buds.
Battery Life
The Freebuds 4i sport 55mAh battery in each earbud, which translates to a claimed 7.5 hours of music playback with ANC on, and 10 hours with ANC off. In our testing, we got well over 5 hours with ANC on while listening to music, watching a few TV shows and taking a couple of long calls. You'll definitely be able to stretch that battery life if you turn ANC off, but if you do need a quick top-up, the charging case holds a respectable 215mAh.
The case sports a USB-C charging port, but there's no wireless charging, which is offered by its competitors at this price point.
Huawei AI Life App
Now Huawei's AI Life App that's available on the Google Play Store hasn't been updated since August last year, but if you do still download it, you'll see there's no support for the Freebuds 4i. However, the app will automatically inform you that you can update to the latest version using the Huawei App Gallery, which you can sideload on Android smartphones.
The updated AI Life app supports pairing with the Huawei Freebuds 4i, and gives you the ability to view battery information, update the firmware, and customise touch controls.
However, we do wish that the app had an option to customise the sound profile and equaliser settings.
It's worth noting that the iOS App Store version of the app gave us no trouble with pairing the earbuds, and offered all the same functions as the updated app from the Huawei App gallery.
Also watch: Best Active Noise Cancelling Earbuds Under ₹20,000
Verdict
At ₹7,990, there's a fair bit on offer here. Despite missing out on Equaliser settings and wireless charging, the earbuds do provide a balanced sound profile, excellent noise cancellation, and great sound quality. If you are looking for in-ear true wireless earbuds with active noise cancellation at this price point, the Huawei Freebuds 4i are a compelling choice.
