Sony WF-SP700N Wireless In-Ear Sports Headphones review: Sony's best truly wireless earphones have great sound, comfortable fit

We've seen a lot of new truly wireless earphones hit the market in 2018, all trying to compete against the most well-known member of the breed, Apple's AirPods.

Sony's latest, the WF-SP700N, retails for $180 (£180, AU$300) and is essentially the sports version of Sony's earlier WF-1000X. Both have an active noise-cancelling feature that helps muffle ambient noise -- something missing from Apple's slightly less expensive AirPods.

With a sweat-resistant design courtesy of a PX4 "splashproof" rating, these earphones have a few things going for them. For starters, they're relatively lightweight and fit me comfortably and securely -- even while running -- thanks to the included sports fins (the same ones found on the Sony MDR-XBX50BS). They also sound very good for truly wireless headphones and worked mostly reliably, with only minimal dropouts.

Each bud has a single "power" button that doubles as a universal button for pausing and playing your music, answering and ending calls, and skipping tracks forward and back with a double or triple click. The button is a little small but it worked well enough. There are no volume controls on the buds themselves.

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Using the app you can tweak the sound by toggling through various pre-set equalizer modes, including one that boosts the bass, but you can't create your own custom setting. I found that the default "off" setting offered the best and most balanced sound. The bass has good kick to it but doesn't come across as bloated (like it does in the bass boost mode), and there isn't the treble push found in some of the other modes like "Excited," "Bright" and "Treble boost" that can lead to some listening fatigue. My next favorite setting was "Mellow."

If you get a tight seal, these earphones deliver more bass and richer sound than the AirPods, particularly in noisier environments. They're among the best sounding truly wireless earphones, measuring up well against the Bose SoundSport Free and Jabra Elite 65t and Jabra Elite Active 65t (the Bose has more bass than the Jabra). However, I should point out that these types of wireless headphones still don't sound as good as a decent set of in-ear wired headphones that cost less, so keep your expectations in check.