The audio accessories market and particularly the True Wireless Stereo or TWS segment have seen meteoric growth in the last couple of years. Of many big and small brands that are trying to capture a piece of this pie, Lumiford has seen some success. The brand operates both online and offline and in Delhi-NCR we noticed that Lumiford audio accessories are increasingly finding their way to offline retail shelves.
Lumiford Max T85, that we will be talking about, are basic TWS earphone with 10mm extra bass drivers available at a competitive price of INR 2,799. Are these good enough for us to recommend? Well, we have been testing these for a while and will try to answer all related questions in our Lumiford Max T85 review.
Lumiford Max T85 Review: Price and Specifications
| Product | Lumiford Max T85 |
| Frequency response | 20Hz – 20KHz |
| Driver | 10mm Extra Bass driver |
| Battery | 35mAh each earbud, 500mAh case, 21 hours playback time (rated), 4 hours talk time (rated) |
| Charging time | 1.2 hours |
| Connectivity | Bluetooth 5.0 |
| Price | INR 2,799 |
Page Contents:
- Lumiford Max T85 Review: Design and Build
- Lumiford Max T85 Review: Setup and connectivity
- Lumiford Max T85 Review: Battery and Calling
- Lumiford Max T85 Review: Sound quality and Latency
- Lumiford Max T85 Review: Verdict, Pros & Cons
Lumiford Max T85 Review: Design and Comfort
Lumiford Max T85 earphones come in a pill-shaped charging case that looks stylish and can easily fit in pockets. The lid can be flipped open using a single hand but doesn’t feel flimsy enough to accidentally open up when being carried in a bag.
The earbuds themselves have flat stems with a touch sensor towards the top and plastic housing for drivers. There are no rubber ear tips for firm grip and, just as is the case with Apple AirPods, there is just one single fit for all ear sizes.
Luckily the Max T85 fit snugly in our ears and they proved light enough to wear over a long duration without any substantial ear fatigue. The fit felt secure and passively canceled noise. It’s still quite easy to lose them – for instance, they often dislodged from our ears when we put on or removed our face mask.
There are led indicators to denote the charging state on each earbud and also within the case right above the pairing button. The glossy plastic build isn’t exactly premium but certainly doesn’t feel cheap.
Overall, we are quite satisfied with the design and build quality, keeping the price in mind.
Lumiford Max T85 Review: Setup, features, and connectivity
You will have to pair these manually the old-fashioned way. There is no proprietary app support or Google Fast Pair, and that’s perfectly fine for buds priced under 5K. Once paired, we didn’t face any issues with repairing or losing connection in one of the buds.
The feature set is pretty limited. Max T85 don’t have extensive gesture support, but basic controls for play-pause, track change and to summon Google Assistant work reliably. All of these controls are assigned to double tap and long tap actions on both left and right earbuds.
In-ear detection is not supported, which is to say that your media won’t auto play-pause when you pull a year bud out. There are a few affordable TWS earphones that offer features like basic ANC and Game mode, so you may count these as omissions.
Connectivity within the 10m range was pretty solid, notwithstanding the regular indoor obstacles and walls. SBC and AAC codecs are used for audio streaming.
Lumiford Max T85 Review: Battery and Calling
Lumiford specifies 500mAh battery capacity for the case and 35mAh for the buds. The mileage we got fell short of the company claims. On a full charge, the battery lasted for around 4 hours of playback, which is on the lower side by TWS standards but still very manageable. The case can charge the buds around twice over.
During the course of our testing, we mostly streamed music from Prime Music and Spotify at 80% volume.
The battery drops faster while taking calls. After hitting 10% mark, these earphones play regular voice prompts for charging, so you can effectively use them only within the 10-100% range.
Call quality was very decent for calls made indoors. The audio was clear on both caller’s and receiver’s end.
Lumiford Max T85 Review: Sound quality
Most affordable earphones go for a bass-heavy signature and that’s what we went into this review expecting. Instead, the Lumiford Max T85 have a rather well-balanced sound signature and a reasonably wide sound stage. Of course, these are entry-grade options and the audio isn’t audiophile-grade, but overall the Lumiford Max T85 punch above their weight when it comes to audio quality.
Lumiford promotes these as extra bass earphones, but the bass isn’t overpowering. The Max T85 can pick up low bass notes, but they lack the extra-bass rumble. The high bass response isn’t very taut and feels a little wavy.
The soundstage is wide, the Mids are reasonably clear, these earphones pick ample details, and the separation between instruments feels adequate compared to other options in the budget. For specific genres like Rock, we could further enhance the audio using basic equalizers. If you are not particularly looking for thumpy bass, chances are that you’d like how these sound.
Latency is noticeable while gaming, but this is again to be expected of audio products in the segment.
Lumiford Max T85 Review: Should you buy these?
Overall, the Lumiford Max T85 don’t go for fancy features and focus on getting the basics right. They sound decent, work well for calling, and are light and comfortable to wear.
Compromises are still involved. The feature set is pretty limited and the battery mileage could have been better. All said and done, we think Lumiford Max T85 are a decent pick for consumers who are looking for entry grade TWS options. If you are looking for something more feature-rich under 5K, we can further recommend Realme Buds Air 2 and Oppo Enco W51.
Pros
- Balanced audio
- Light and comfortable
- Decent calling
Cons
- Battery mileage
- Limited gesture support and features
