Mu6 Ring Open-Ear Wireless Air Conduction Sports Headphones

The Mu6 Ring Open-Ear Wireless Air Conduction Sports Headphones are fairly good at reproducing sound, but they're too bulky to work comfortably with most helmets, and while your glasses are supposed to sit beneath them many designs just don't fit. If you cycle without a helmet or glasses they may be worth a look.

In recent years, bone conducting headphones have become increasingly popular – the benefit being there's nothing in your ears to block the sounds around you – and while the Mu6 Rings look similar, they don't vibrate your skull.

Instead they're 'air conduction,' just as regular headphones are, but instead of covering your ears their small speakers sit in front of them.

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They have a single button that does everything. It works okay – once on I can easily turn the volume up and down, skip, pause and restart without any issues. The challenge I have is turning them off afterwards – the apparently three-second press is unpredictable, and doesn't work more often than it does.

When I'm cycling I only ever listen to podcasts or audiobooks, which these are perfectly adequate for. For music they lack much punch or bass, so if top-notch sound quality matter to you, look elsewhere.

While the Ring handles phone calls pretty effectively when walking, the windnoise while riding made me inaudible to the person on the other end.

Pairing these with other devices is fairly simple, and I managed to connect to my phone, my wife's phone and my laptop without any issues or dropped connections.

The battery life is also good, with Mu6's claimed nine hours of run time and 200 hours of standby time being roughly what I found. Charging is via micro-USB port, which is protected behind a dust cover.

What really lets the Mu6 Ring headphones down is the shape and size – they're just too big to be easily usable for cyclists.

I tried them with four helmets (a POC Octal, Lazer Z1, Giro Syntax and a Spiuk Korben), and only one (the POC) left enough space above my ears to fit these in. Even then, the Octal sits higher than any helmet I have recently used, so I'm confident these will not work with the majority of modern helmets.

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I also tested these with pairs of Oakley Jawbreakers, Oakley Racing Jackets, Rudy Project Defenders, Roka CP-1Xs and Koo Spectro glasses. Of these five, only one (the Jawbreakers) had arms thin enough to work with the channel inside the Ring. The rest either did not fit at all, pushed the headphones up, or made the glasses sit too awkwardly to be usable.

If you wear neither helmets nor glasses, they work just fine, but still aren't the most comfortable on the ears – mainly due to the plastic, rather than rubber finish. Arguably, if you're not worried about wearing helmets or glasses, you're probably not worried about putting regular earphones in either.

Either way, it's best not to adjust these while they're on, as the hinge can pinch the top of your ears or trap your hair.

Value

At £63.77 the price is reasonable if you want them for jogging or similar, and at the time of writing Mu6 is discounting them to £56.61. The only really comparable headphones we've tested are the Aftershokz OpenMove Wireless Bone Conduction Headphones which prove comfortable and don't interfere with glasses or helmets. Even though they're £79.95, they represent far better value for cyclists.

Overall

While the Mu6 Ring headphones sound fine for spoken word, and should work fine for sports that don't use helmets or glasses, they're bulky, awkward and very poorly designed for keen cyclists. They simply did not work with the majority of helmets and glasses I tried – and are unlikely to work well with yours.

Verdict

Adequate off the bike, but do not work with the majority of helmets or cycling glasses