The Sony WH-1000XM4 were long the dominant headphones on recommendation lists, laudatory Reddit threads, and TikTok FYPs, so it's no surprise that six years and two flagship releases later, the audio brand decided to take another crack at the older headphones.

Thus, the release of the Sony WH-1000XM4C (2nd gen). What this (slightly confusing) name imparts is that this is not Sony's latest flagship headphones, but a second generation of the original XM4 flagships. The price reflects a similar story: at $299.99, they're significantly cheaper than the current flagship pair, the $459.99 Sony WH-1000XM6 headphones.

So what improvements were made, and how do they stack up to Sony's pricier models? I spent two weeks testing out the headphones to find out.

The Sony XM4C come with much of the same interior tech as the first generation XM4 headphones, with major upgrades in the audio department. The spec rundown is as follows:

The concept behind these headphones is same beloved shell, slightly better interior specs. Most notably, that comes through in the sound profile, which resembles more closely that of the WH-1000XM5 and WH-1000XM6 headphones, which results in a more detailed and rich sound out of the box.

Powering up the companion app also results in more fine-tuning, with the addition of a 10-band equalizer, compared to the five-band equalizer found in the first generation headphones. The equalizer presets now also include a gaming option, making these an overall more versatile pair of headphones. Whether I was enjoying the spooky season with my favorite fishing sim , playing jazz standards, listening to live rock performances, or listening to a podcast , these headphones delivered on a solid performance.

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