Oppo Enco Air 2 Pro Review: A budget buy for daily needs?

Oppo Enco Air series recently got expanded with the arrival of Buds Oppo Enco Air 2 Pro. It was launched alongside Oppo F21 Pro Series and claims to give premium features at under 5k price range. The Oppo Enco Air 2 Pro comes with ANC, stylish design, long battery life, quick charging, IP54 rating, 12.4mm dynamic drivers, and more, but does it manage to perform well in all the claimed departments? Read on to find out.

Oppo Enco Air 2 Pro Review: Design & Fit

The Oppo Enco Air 2 Pro Buds come in a slightly glossy, translucent pebble-shaped case which attracts attention at first look. Although the basic design is similar to what we see in other TWS Buds, this time Oppo has added a layer of transparent material on top to make the case look different. The case is small, light (42.8 grams), and easy to carry in your pocket but is prone to scratches and smudges, which is a downer. Especially the white-colored (which was loaned to us) case tends to get dirty very easily so one has to use it with some care.

The front of the case has a battery indicator, while the back has Oppo’s logo on top of the lid opening space. There is a USB Type-C port on the bottom, but there are no buttons on the device.

The buds have an in-ear design with stem and silicone ear-tips that ensures they are lightweight and comfortable to wear for longer durations. OPPO bundles 3 sized ear tips to ensure they fit into your ear perfectly. There is an optical sensor for wear detection which makes sure that the audio pauses as soon as your remove the bud from your ear and play it back when you insert it again. There are big L and R signs on the buds which makes their use even easier.

The buds are IP54 rated which makes them only splash resistant. This made it easy to use them while workouts and not worry if they got a little wet. However, the case is not water-resistant so use it carefully.

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Oppo Enco Air 2 Pro Review: Features

Oppo Enco Air 2 Pro supports Bluetooth 5.2 with AAC high-quality audio codec. You will have to take the buds out of the case and touch and hold the on both earbuds for 4 seconds to pair them. Open the Bluetooth settings of your smartphone and as soon as it detects Oppo Enco Air 2 Pro, connect to it.

Post connecting, the battery capacity of the buds and case will also be visible. The headset has wear detection and dual-device connection features. A dual device connection lets you connect the buds to two devices at a time so that there is a seamless switch between listening to music on phone and watching video on a laptop. The switch can be done with a long press of 4 seconds. The touch controls are as follows-

• Pause/Play- single tap on either bud
• Next track or hang up/reject a call- double-tap on either bud
• Voice assistance- triple tap on either bud
• Volume up/down or switch between devices- long press and hold 4 seconds on either of the buds
• Switch between ANC and Transparency mode- Shorthold either bud for 1 second.

Downloading Hey Melody App on any Android or Ios smartphone will help you customize touch controls, change music modes, and more. For Oppo phones running ColorOS 11 or later, you don’t need a separate app. Enco Air 2 Pro also allows you to take photos with a single tap via earbuds which is very impressive. There were slight lags in wear detection sometimes, but that can be ignored.

Oppo Enco Air 2 Pro Review: Sound Quality and ANC

The Enco Buds Air 2 Pro has a 12.4mm titanium-coated diaphragm driver and its large rear chamber gives deeper bass and immersive sound. The Bass Boost mode does not really make much of a difference while switching on the AAC makes sure the audio is even more clear and the bass amount is balanced. The 12.4mm diaphragm driver handles lows, mid, and highs equally well.

Breathless by Shankar Mahadevan and Aaoge Jab Tum by Rashid Khan sound soothing on the Oppo Enco Air 2 as the vocals are crystal clear and the sound of the instruments does not interfere with the singer’s voice.  The lows sound effective in Ek pal ka Jeena by Lucky Ali and Taal se Taal Mila title track which has continuous drumbeats in the background. The mids in A Thousand Years (piano notes) sound soothing at medium volume, but sometimes sound jerky when the volume is pushed to the maximum.

Songs like Chaap Tilak and Pasoori have highs, lows, and mids altogether as they include a blend of various musical instruments and singers. These two sounded decent at mid-volume on the Oppo Enco Air 2. Whether it was drums or flute, piano or table, female voice or male voice, all were groove worthy.

The earbuds are made for gaming as well because it has a low latency gaming mode which reduces the latency to 94ms. Gaming sounds are well synched and sound different from the song listening experience.

Let’s talk about one of the most important features now, which is Active Noise Cancellation (ANC). The ANC filters out most of the background noise like whirling fans, traffic sounds, chattering people, and even chirping birds. I could easily listen to songs or chat on a call even when I was in a noisy environment.

The voice quality from the dual microphones is strictly average and the ANC is not very effective when there are loud noises of heavy traffic around you. The ANC blocks ambient sound up to 25dB and for its price point,` it is satisfactory. Transparency mode is just about average. If you are someone who needs a very good ANC feature, buying Realme Buds Air 3 at a higher price might work for you.

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Oppo Enco Air 2 Pro Review: Battery

Oppo Enco Air 2 Pro Buds come with a 43mAh battery which promises to give 7 hours of standalone battery life without ANC and 5 hours with ANC enabled in 50% volume. However, during my use I felt it was slightly less, as without ANC the buds lasted for around 6.5 hours whereas with ANC turned on, they lasted for 4.5 hours at a stretch. The standalone playback time is decent and adding to it, 10 minutes of charge gave 2 hours of playback which is good.

The case has a 440mAh battery which gives around 25 hours of playback with ANC turned off, and 19 hours when it is turned on. This is a little less as compared to the battery life of Realme Buds Air 3’s case but it works. As long as the indicator light is green, it means the battery is full, yellow means it is medium whereas red means battery low.

The status of the battery can be seen in the Hey Melody app on your smartphone but this will be when the buds are inside the case. Charging the case from 0 to 100% takes about 1 hour and 45 minutes and there is no wireless charging as well.

Verdict- Should you buy the Oppo Enco Air 2 Pro TWS?

The Oppo Enco Air 2 Pro delivers good audio performance, smooth touch controls, good ANC, and decent battery life. In my usage, I hardly had any performance issues with the device. The only problem I had was its case not being water-resistant and prone to scratches and smudges. All this makes it imperative that one uses the charging case with care, which can be a little problematic for some.

Otherwise, the case and earbuds look nice, feel lightweight and the buds are comfortable to wear for long durations. The Hey Melody app allows one to control many aspects of the TWS Earbuds and features like wear detection and dual device pairing make the device value for money in its under 4k price range. If you have an Oppo smartphone, then the use of Enco Air 2 Pro will be even more seamless.