JOIN USNokia Power Earbuds Lite review: Reliable earphones
The untimely Covid-19 outbreak in early 2020 led to lockdown around the world. Corporate companies initiated Work-From-Home and this has become a new normal for almost a year now.
With most of the corporate employees at least in India continue to work from home, there is still a lot of pent-up demand for wireless earphones, and tech companies cashed in on the trend. They launched a series of affordable audio devices.
Recently, HMD Global Oy launched affordable Nokia Power Earbuds Lite series with different unique designs in India for Rs 3,599. I have used it for a couple of weeks and here are my thoughts
Design and build quality
Most of the affordable earphones in the market look like a cheap rip-off of Apple AirPods. However, the new Nokia Power Earbuds Lite is different. It features an in-ear design and visually appealing earbud with a sensitive touch panel on the top. The top part is glossy polycarbonate material and the lower half has a soft silicone-like finish.
The ear tips pre-loaded with the earphones comfortably fit in my ears. But, they might not for some people. Fret not, the company of two pairs of small and big ear tips and surely either one of them will perfectly fit the ears.
However, like all earbuds, I always have the anxiety of losing them while traveling on a bus. In the initial days, I used to keep touching the earbuds to make sure they are rightly placed to the ears and there is no room for them to drop. As days passed by, I began to feel relaxed and less worried about losing them.
Also, I did not face any issues while walking down or going up the stairs. The Nokia Power Earbuds Lite was able to hang tight in my ears not just in the aforementioned case, but also while jogging.
Also, it comes with an IP5X rating, which comes in handy while doing heavy workouts in the gym or jogging outdoors. The company also claims the Nokia Power Earbuds Lite is waterproof even up to 30 minutes in 1meter of water.
The company offers a compact case along with earbuds. It comes with USB Type-C port for charging. Also, the magnetic caps fit tightly and hold together strongly enough so that the earbuds don't fall when kept in a bag.
User-interface and performance
Setting up and pairing the Nokia Power Earbuds Lite is pretty straightforward. Just open the case and the earphones will initiate the connectivity with the phone.
There is no mobile app, just turning on the ubiquitous Bluetooth on the mobile is enough to detect the earphones easily.
After the first pairing, going forward they will automatically connect to the phone every time you open the earphones from the case.
The touch-sensitive outer panel responds well to the gestures. One tap will pause or play the music. If you get a phone call, again just one tap on either of the earphones, you connect to the call and hang up by just on tap again.
To reject the call, you just have to long-press any of the earphones for over a second and to invoke the voice assistant (Google Assistant on Android and Siri on iOS devices), just long pressing over two seconds is enough.
For volume control, users need to double up on the left earphone to reduce volume, and doing the same gesture on the right side, will increase the volume. To go to the previous track, the user just needs to triple tap the outer panel on the left side, and to go to the next track, triple tap on the right earphone.
The most important aspect of the earphones is the sound quality. During the review period, I listened to podcasts, music with varied genres ranging from Carnatic to blues, even hip hop, and pure acoustics. Nokia Power Buds Lite delivered decent audio output and there was no stressing issue to complain about.
The in-ear design and silicone tip helped the earphone fit comfortably into my ears and block some amount of outside noise when hearing music while traveling on busy Bengaluru roads.
As far as the battery life is concerned, it lives up to the hype. Each Earbud houses a 50mAh battery and the case features a 350mAh cell. It promises to offer up to 35 hours of playtime
I never had the anxiety of running out of battery life, as the earphones' case offers an LED light indicator showing power status. Four LED lights signify full charge, two show 50 per cent, and just one shows, there is 25 percent power left. So, I was able to accordingly recharge the case and never faced a battery life shortage during the entire testing period.
Final thoughts
Nokia Power Earbuds Lite offers decent sound quality worth the asking price. Also, the battery life and build quality are pretty solid too.
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