“The more experienced listeners are, the less bass-heavy they want the sound”: JBL is changing the way its flagship headphones sound, and I've heard the difference — here’s how I rate it

When the JBL Tour One M3 released last year, we rated them as generally strong, albeit flawed flagship headphones. While we appreciated their solid ANC and handy Smart Tx transmitter, their audio output left us feeling conflicted. See, their soundstaging and dynamism impressed, although we felt that bass could be a tad overstated, and the highs could do with some refining.

But it seems that JBL has listened to critics and users alike, and in turn, has launched a major update to its flagship cans, including a reimagined sound curve.

So, how has JBL changed the sound of the Tour One M3? What were the motivations behind the change? And just how good do they sound now? I put these questions to Mikael Herje, the global director of JBL’s headphones business, and also gave the upgraded headphones a go myself — here’s everything I learned.

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