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Model: MPOW M12
Price: £18.49
Vendor: Amazon UK
Review Reference: RC012
Manufacturer Blurb:
- Brand: MPOW
- Model: M12
- Driver: 6mm Dynamic Drivers
- Chipset: Not known
- Mic: 4
- ANC: No
- Volume Control: Yes
- Codecs: AAC, SBC
- Full Charge Time: 2 hours
- Quick Charge: Yes
- Wireless Charging: Yes
- Single Use Playtime: Up to 5 hours
- Playtime with Charge Case: Up to 25 hours
- App Support: No
- Bluetooth Range: 10m advertised
- Bluetooth: Bluetooth® 5.0
- Bluetooth Protocols: HSP/ HFP/ A2DP/ AVRCP
- Water Resistance: IPX8
Real Life Experience
Welcome to the Regancipher review of the MPOW M12. MPOW are one of the first names that jump out when you search TWS on Amazon, with 377 5 star reviews for this very product! With it's impressive feature-set and low cost, I took the plunge, which is kinda apt, because they would ultimately end up down the toilet!
The Unboxing - 6/10
No different to any other cheap earbud really, standard cardboard surround revealed a second box, within which the plastic shroud houses the case and the buds. Like many earbuds nowadays, these arrived separated from the case, meaning they were DOA and required charging.
Inside the box we have the amusing 'You've won an Amazon voucher...just leave a 5 star review and email us the link' card. Oh dear. And so many suckers fell for it!
PLEASE STOP DOING THIS!!
Otherwise it's the standard fare: quick guide, user manual, warranty extension card, spare tips, usb-c charge cable, case, buds.
The Case - 8/10
Nicely compact. No case size comparisons this time I'm afraid, but I'd say it's similar to the Aukey EP-T25 I reviewed not so long back - around 60mm x 40mm. The main issue - not a problem for me but will be for some - is the depth. It sat higher than most of my TWS, making it kinda bullet shaped, which is not going to sit well in pockets compared to, for example, the Boltune BT-BH024 or Edifier TWS NB2.
So why the high score? Well, firstly it supports wireless charging, secondly it is USB-C (although that is almost a given now), thirdly you get a reasonable 20 extra hours from a fully charged case, and finally as well as supporting quick charge, it also has 4 lights on the front showing how many charges remain. With many cases not having this feature, it's nice to see it back. Oh yeah - it also supports hall switch mode, which means instant pairing - no racing to get the buds out of the case before they shut down!
The Ergonomics - 7/10
The M12 is another from the 'bulbous brigade' designed to balance noise isolation, fit and touch control. And in all honesty, it does it pretty well. Noise isolation is surprisingly really effective and the large 'fingertip-friendly' touch surface area is sufficiently spread to prevent pressure on the ear and minimise accidental touches. I shouldn't be surprised, because these are designed similarly to the Tranya T10, which were also very good at isolating noise.
The driver housing is not overloaded with a heavy surround (unlike the TaoTronics SoundLiberty 79) so the fit is quite comfortable, but due to the width of the bud, they are not ideal for listening in bed or for strenuous exercise.
The IPX rating suggests they were designed with exercise in mind - IPX8 means they are fine in heavy rain - but I gave them the shake test and unfortunately they didn't fare too well compared to something like the Nillkin TW004, which don't budge, the above-pictured Tronsmart, which angle more with a shorter neck, and even the Apollo Bold, which pack your concha.
Sound Quality - 5.5/10 (for the price paid), 4/10 (raw score)
It is always a difficult balance reviewing raw sound quality against intermediate sound quality (i.e. sound quality against price). What are you expecting at this price? Honestly I wasn't expecting much, and unsurprisingly they didn't deliver much either. Some music sounded OK on Windows, mostly non-complex pop. 'Calvin Harris - Summer' sounded passable, but anything complicated and they started to suffer.
My usual reference tracks, which really test the buds ability to separate low and high mids around a mixture of vocal ranges, sounded almost distorted, especially where multiple groups of the same frequency range instruments combined. On some tracks, as vocals tried to push through, in trying to create a wider soundstage the higher frequencies thin and the lower frequencies distort. John Legend would have barely recognised 'Love Me Now', and 'Right Out of Heaven' by Bruno Mars lost all of it's charisma.
It sounds silly making these comments about £18 earbuds but I think it's important to know what you are and aren't going to get - these are low complexity specialists which boost the trebles and try to boost the lower mids without emphasising the bass too much - a problem with most of MPOW's previous releases - if you like pop and dance, these genres should for the most part sound well rounded and not too harsh even at quite high volumes, but if you like baritone vocals, opera and anything remotely complex in the lower frequencies, prepare to be disappointed.
Call Quality - Indoors - 2/10, Outdoors - 1/10
I didn't anything could be worse than the Aukey EP-T25. After multiple resets they improved somewhat. These are the new worst.
I reset them several times. Still I cannot make out a single word I said with a little ambient noise. It actually sounds like it is trying to cancel EVERYTHING out! Without any ambient noise, you sound a little distant - you have to raise your voice a little to be heard.
I even checked for stickers that might be covering the mics, nope, they're just rubbish, or possibly faulty. Do not even consider these if you intend to use them for calls and you have any kind of ambient noise!
Connectivity, Controls and Other Features - 7/10
These are theoretically great. The large surface area of the touch pad is perfectly sized, for example, but totally unresponsive. You touch the controls and maybe a few seconds later something will happen. Holding the buds down turn the volume up and down supposedly, again, theoretically great but I couldn't get this to work at all, it just skipped tracks.
Connectivity was OK - the usual distance (<10m), but I didn't take out to test if they worked in congested areas.
These feature SIRI or Voice Assistant by triple tapping, which I managed to achieve on multiple occasions when trying to skip track
The M12 do not use a Qualcomm chipset SoC, so they default to AAC on Android and IOS. I had too many applications open to reboot to test through Bluetooth Tweaker to see what was going on with the codecs. Wireless charging is a great bonus at this price point.
Battery Life - 7/10
At the lower end of average, but perfectly acceptable - over 4 hours from a single charge, including music and phone calls. This extends to around 25 hours with the case. It's a 90 minute charge with USB-C and around 2 hours wireless.
Final Comments
In the sub £20 market these aren't all that bad. They do some stuff pretty well, but are far better on paper than they are in practice. The jittery controls and poor microphone made them frustrating to use, and latency issues on YouTube didn't help their cause.
I can accept these frailties if earbuds sound good, but sadly the M12 don't even do that. There's a reason they are 5 star throughout on Amazon - and it isn't because they're 5 star headphones.
Price Weighted Score: 62%
Raw Score: 50%
