KEF M500 On-Ear Headphone Review

KEF M500 Introduction

The bitterest meal you can eat is one made of your words. That's right, when you are forced to re-evaluated everything you "knew" to be true, admitting you were wrong is something that few are willing to do. Look at the state of the world today. Do you think our government would be so deadlocked if they were willing to admit that, just perhaps, their ideology was, in fact, a touch flawed from time to time? Do you think so many people would be suing each other if not that both parties were unwilling to see that the other person does have a point and that they are at least partially responsible for the current situation?

In the spirit of making the world a better place, I, Tom Andry, was wrong.

I'd like to say that makes me feel better and that a rainbow just appeared over my home but it isn't true.

I stated in a recent review that on-ear headphones could not be comfortable. I may not have used those exact words, but the inference is pretty clear. In my defense, I've worn more than my fair share of headphones and on-ear headphones have never, ever, been comfortable.

Until now.

KEF contacted Audioholics about our interest in reviewing their new M500 headphones. As the resident headphone dude (that should be on my card), the task came to me. Now, I'd seen the KEF headphones at this year's (technically last year's but whatever) CEDIA and my initial reaction was, I'm ashamed to say, that they looked stupid.

That's right, stupid.

I mean, look at that. Tell me your first reaction wasn't, "Huh?"

Now, I loved the industrial look of the headphone. The aluminum band was solid and robust, the headband covering was supple and reasonably padded, and the design was well thought out. But it was the earcups that prompted my response. They have a nearly unique (at least in modern headphones) design with a cover that stretched clear across the cup. While it is perforated, I felt like such a design would be uncomfortable and would perhaps harm the sound quality. As you can tell, these are the words I'm currently eating. Nom.

First Impressions

The KEF M500 headphones come with two cables (one with in-line controls) that are the more popular flat style. There is a carrying case that is in the shape of a clamshell and is rigid. KEF has included not only a 1/4" adapter, but the two pronged adapter for use on airplanes. My experience with the airplane adapter isn't that they don't work, I'm sure they do, but that the ports in the airplane are often so abused that they rarely allow a solid connection. During the course of this review, I didn't have a chance to take a flight anywhere so I couldn't test it out.

Pictured: Things that will be constantly in your way until the night before your flight.

The carrying case is solid and has a separator for the headphones and the extra cables. They really couldn't have made the case smaller and given you enough room for the cans and the accessories. The case is very firm and I have no doubt it will protect your $300 headphone investment from all but the most egregious abuse. The outside of the case is smooth and the only addition I might have requested is some way to clip it to your bag, backpack, or luggage.

That hole on the earcup on the right is for the cable

In an unusual turn of events, I wasn't the first one to try out the KEF M500 headphones. I happened to be hanging out with Clint DeBoer on the set of him and Andrew Gash recording a series of video reviews. Clint was doing some work and needed headphones. While he had some nearby, I offered him the KEFs. The first thing I noticed about them was their ability to isolate noise. Clint, like all of us at Audioholics.com, doesn't listen to music overly loud. We care too much about our hearing. But when Clint put on the M500s, I couldn't hear his music and he couldn't hear me. When we removed the headphones, I could hear the music but the isolation when he was wearing them was outstanding. If you are planning on using your headphones in a busy or crowded area and don't want to disturb your neighbors, these are for you.

That wedge is attached to the bottom

Kef M500 Build Quality, Design, and Fit

The KEF M500 headphones have a very minimalistic or industrial design which you'll either love or hate. The build quality, however, is absolutely top notch. The aluminum is perfectly molded with hard but not sharp edges. It always feels cold to the touch. The rings around the earcups have a hinge in the middle of the sides so that the earcup can angle to perfectly fit your head. While KEF didn't specify the material, it feels too soft to be real leather so I'm guessing it is some form of pleather. That said, it is incredibly soft to the touch.

Still looks weird but man are they comfortable

If I had a knock against the build quality, it is that the slide mechanism is a bit hard to operate. Many will see this as a plus as the M500s tend to be a "set and forget" headphone. Once you get them where you want them, you don't have to worry about them sliding out of place. You can both see and feel the slide mechanism work within the padding of the headband, but it doesn't make the band any less comfortable.

The cable is flat with in-line controls and right angle posts at both ends. The post that connects to your device is slightly extended so that it will work with many of the protective cases out there. Too often I find that headphone manufacturers (and case manufacturers for that matter) don't take into account that people will want to use their headphones with a phone or device that is in a case. The KEF M500 cable plays nice with all the different cases I own.

Flat cables, folded headphones, adapters, and extra cable

The design of the in-line controls are a little odd. The enclosure for the three-button control is very blocky. The buttons are labeled, for lack of a better term, by their shape. The volume up is in the shape of a plus sign, the volume down in the shape of a minus, and the center button is just a circle. The buttons are very small but spread out so they are easy to find and operate. There is not much travel on the buttons so it is hard to tell if you've actually pressed them. Curiously, there is no obvious hole for the microphone input but it seems to work just fine. KEF has included a second cable without in-line controls as well

Note the extended input on the 3.5mm post and the industrial design

In a unique setup, KEF has the cable connect to the headphone at the earcup hinge on the back of the left earphone. Most have the cable connect to the bottom. This solution makes, in my opinion, the cable a bit less noticeable as the connection at the bottom is puts more of the cable in your peripheral vision. But, more importantly to me, KEF has managed to do something that very few manufacturers have - their flat cable is pretty quiet. Frankly, even the traditional round PVC covered cables transmit some noise. My experience has been that the flat cables transmit much more. But the M500 flat cable transmits no more noise than a traditional (and well-implemented) round cable.

How do they Fit?

"On-ear headphones aren't comfortable," said me almost every day of my life. For the most part, that's been true. I've had many different styles of headphones in for testing and I've only universally found the over-ear headphones to be comfortable. In-ear are a pain (literally) and on-ear have about a two-hour window before the cartilage in my ears start waving the white flag.

This has happened with headphones from every price bracket. The KEF M500s, however, break this tradition by providing, for the first time in my life, on-ear headphones that I can wear all day. One of the ways I spend my nights is hours and hours of writing on one of my many novels. Unlike when I review gear or work on other Audioholics and AV Rant related content, I tend not to sit at a desk. Instead, I find a comfy chair and write on my laptop. I often lose track of time and will write until the battery in my laptop dies. I like to listen to music when I write so I'm always wearing headphones. The comfort test I use for every headphone is to use them during one of these marathon writing sessions. If I have to remove them because they are uncomfortable, I take note of the time and put that in the review.

I never had to remove the KEF M500 headphones. Comfort on par with over-ear headphones would not be an understatement. I've actually had over-ear headphones that were less comfortable than the M500s because they were tighter. Usually, such headphones would loosen up over time but this was not necessary with the KEFs.

The band is not overly padded but just enough so you don't really notice it up there

So, the obvious complaint would be that the M500s are too loose for the sake of comfort. If you are planing on exercising with the M500s, I'd say that was true. In more normal (sitting in a chair or walking around) use, the M500s stayed in place just fine. If I moved my head quickly, I could feel them slide a bit, but they never fell out of place.

The extension of the headband of the KEFs is impressive. I can't imagine how big a head you'd need to feel that the M500s were too small. I don't have an overly large head (I wear a small to medium motorcycle helmet), and I only had to extend the sliders a bit to get the right fit. There is plenty of play left for larger heads. I tried the M500s on my kids and, fully retracted, the fit was loose but usable.

Kef M500 Sound Quality and Conclusion

I mostly used the KEF M500 headphones with the Emotiva Stealth DC-1 DAC/Headphone amp paired with my Mac laptop. During Christmas this year, Linn Acoustics gave away a slew of 24-bit, studio masters of songs. Not all of them are things I would listen to for pleasure, but the recording quality is about as good as it gets. On hand, I had the thinksound On1 on-ear headphones, the Denon AH-D1000 over-ear, and the V-MODA Crossfade M-100 over-ear headphones for comparison. The Emotiva DC-1 has dual headphone outputs so doing an A/B comparison was as easy as switching the headphones as fast as I could. The outputs don't have individual volume controls, however, so I had to make due with manually switching the volume during the comparison. While the Denons, when they were available, were about half the price of the M500s, the On1 and Crossfades both retail for about the same price (around $300 a pair).

Input is located at the hinge, the earcups rotate forward and back for better fit

First I spent some time checking out the extension and frequency response of the KEF M500 headphones with some sweeps. I didn't notice any glaring abnormalities or noise in the sweeps. The M500s easily played down into the mid-20Hz range. The top end was clear and well extended without being overly harsh (this is hard to tell with sweeps but we'll get more into that during the listening tests). All in all, there was very little to complain about with the raw performance of the M500 headphones from KEF.

The listening tests, of course, took a lot longer than I had hoped. At the $300 price point, most of the headphones are all very good. The easy comparison was to the Denon AH-D1000 headphones. One thing I really love about these Denons is that they might not have the performance of the more expensive headphones, but they really don't have any of the problems that you'd expect. They don't try to have too much bass so they don't have bass bloat issues or low-end distortion. They don't try to have a high end that is overly dynamic so they don't have the fatigue issues other headphones in their price point might have.

Hinge

 

The comparison between the KEF M500 and the Denon AH-D1000 made both look very good. If you reduced the extension of the KEFs on both ends, you'd have the Denons. As I know that the Denons are a very flat and neutral headphone, that reassured me that the performance of the M500s were similar. The KEFs were, surprisingly, a little easier to drive than the Denons which caused the Denons to be slightly softer. Compensating the best I could, I felt that the Denons, in general, sounded less clear than the KEFs. It was as if the dynamic range of the headphones were less and the quieter passages just didn't quite come through. The KEFs were punchier, a bit better extended at both ends, and generally more engaging than the aging Denons. At nearly twice the price, I would expect no less.

The V-MODA Crossfade M-100s were designed with the input of audiophiles. You can hear V-MODA's owner, Val Kolton, talk about it on the AV Rant podcast here. The Crossfades are a bass heavy headphone, in my opinion, that have top notch build quality and comfort. The KEF M500 headphones have a similar level of build quality and comfort though I may give the Crossfades a bit of an edge. When evaluating the sound quality, however, it was clear that V-MODA was after bass and KEF was after crystal clear highs. While, again, the KEFs were easier to drive, the top end of the Crossfades sounded veiled and subdued compared to the M500s. Bass was clearly in the V-MODA's favor and I can see how people that like specific music might pick one headphone over the other. To my ear, the KEF M500's clarity was much preferable.

Bendy headphones are fun to photograph

Lastly, I compared the thinksound On1 on-ear headphones. These were designed to be studio quality which suggests that they should have a very flat frequency response. I found in my review of them that they sounded very good but that I couldn't wear them for long periods of time. Clearly, KEF won the comfort war with the same type of headphone. Here, I really had to pick the nits (so to speak) to come up with differences. I felt that the On1's had slightly better bass extension but that the KEFs had cleaner bass. In some music, specifically female vocalists with minimal background music, the midrange was slightly richer with the KEFs than the thinksounds. Really, in the end, these two headphones sounded remarkably similar. If I could guarantee that I had level matched the two perfectly, I might have been able to make some claims as to which I liked better, but I couldn't. In the end, they were both great sounding headphones. But the KEF's are the ones I could wear all day.

Conclusion

In the world of on-ear headphones, few can actually be called comfortable. The KEF M500 headphones are the only ones I've ever encountered that were as comfortable, and in some cases more comfortable, than over-ear headphones. For some, that would be enough to justify taking a closer look at these little beauties. Add the fantastic build quality, superior performance to other headphones in the same price bracket, and great noise isolation, and KEF has a winning package with the M500s. I won't say these are some of the best sounding and most comfortable headphones in the on-ear category, I'll say they are some of the best and most comfortable in any category! Highly recommended!

KEF M500 On-Ear Headphones

MSRP: $299

www.kef.com

The Score Card

The scoring below is based on each piece of equipment doing the duty it is designed for. The numbers are weighed heavily with respect to the individual cost of each unit, thus giving a rating roughly equal to:

Performance × Price Factor/Value = Rating

Audioholics.com note: The ratings indicated below are based on subjective listening and objective testing of the product in question. The rating scale is based on performance/value ratio. If you notice better performing products in future reviews that have lower numbers in certain areas, be aware that the value factor is most likely the culprit. Other Audioholics reviewers may rate products solely based on performance, and each reviewer has his/her own system for ratings.

Audioholics Rating Scale

• — Excellent
• — Very Good
• — Good
• — Fair
• — Poor

Metric	Rating
Ergonomics & Usability
Build Quality
Appearance
Treble Extension
Treble Smoothness
Midrange Accuracy
Bass Extension
Bass Accuracy
Imaging
Soundstage
Dynamic Range
Fit and Finish
Performance
Value