The first over-ear headphones from Nothing are great

Nothing’s first-ever over-ear headphones are here, and they follow the ethos of all of the other Nothing products, but with an ever-so-slight touch of polish.

As you unbox the headphones, you’re first greeted with a nice case that feels the same as the one that comes with the Sonos Ace headphones. The Nothing option might be a little larger, but they’re more or less birds of a feather.

Once you open the case, the next thing you see is the headphones’ design. This is set to be polarizing, but I like them, and they’re quite minimal, which works well for Nothing’s aesthetic. There is also a Black option, but I got the white version for testing. Also inside the case is a 3.5mm audio cable and a standard USB-C charging cable.

While the case and design are both impressive, the headphones show their strengths once you put them on. They’re light and comfortable, with intuitive controls and excellent sound quality. After a single wear, I understood all the controls instantly, which is something that very few headphones accomplish this nicely.

The top pill-shaped button actually rolls, making it the perfect volume knob.

On the right ear cup, there is a roller you can spin for volume adjustment, and below it is a little toggle that makes it easy to skip tracks. Both of these are super easy to find with your fingers and just as easy to use. There’s also a small button on the outside of the cup that’s used for triggering a voice assistant by default, but in the Nothing X app (not to be confused with the website formerly known as Twitter), you can reformat any of the buttons to be a plethora of alternate controls.

All of this is great, and the icing on the cake is that they also sound great. Tuned by KEF, the audio feels smooth and balanced with a really solid bass backbone. Like with other Nothing earbuds, the company’s app lets you tune the headphones to your liking. If you want to crank the bass, you can do so with a separate bass enhancement toggle alongside a standard eight-step equalizer. Finally, you can turn on active noise cancellation for a little extra control, which does an excellent job of blocking out the outside world.

These headphones use Bluetooth 5.3 for connection, and while testing, I was using an iPhone, and I could walk far away from my phone while wearing the headphones, and they maintained connection. If you use Android or Windows, there is also quick pairing support for both of those operating systems. It’s not much, but there is IP52 water/dust protection. It’s a relatively low water rating, so I’d say these are more sweat-proof than water-proof, but they should stand up to a tiny bit of rain.

One downside I have with them is that the earcups aren’t replaceable, which might be a disadvantage in the long run, but for now, they seem pretty durable. The headband is also a little thin for how plastic it feels, but it should be fine unless you apply a lot of force. The microphones are the final area where they aren’t as good as some premium over-ear headphones. They’re fine, but it doesn’t offer the same magic as AirPods Max.

Overall, these are pretty fabulous headphones, and at $359, they come in under a lot of the competition while still maintaining an excellent bar of quality. They don’t feel quite as premium as AirPods Max or the Sonos Ace, but they’re really close, and for almost $250 less than the Ace, you get a great pair of headphones. You can buy the Headphones 1 from Nothing for $359.