The Sony WH-CH520 suits listeners who tolerate on-ear fit: a 147-gram frame, balanced sound with an app EQ that works, and battery life that published tests put above its 50-hour rating. Call quality is weak, there is no noise cancelling or wired fallback, and TechGearLab's low comfort score warns against very long sessions. Check the price on Amazon before buying.
— THE VERDICT · JUDGEANY EDITORSWhat the WH-CH520 is
Sony launched the WH-CH520 in February 2023 as the cheapest way into its wireless lineup, according to TechRadar. The earpads sit on your ears, not around them. There is no active noise cancelling and no 3.5mm jack. In return you get a 147-gram frame, multipoint pairing, app EQ — and 50 hours of rated playback. What follows comes from published reviews — and aggregated owner feedback. JudgeAny runs no test lab — the scores below are editorial judgments drawn from that published evidence.
Sound: balanced, and better with the app
TechRadar described the sound as clear and well-rounded. Bass underpins tracks without taking over, mids give vocals room, and treble has space to breathe. The same review noted the sound opens up at around 40% volume — and feels more compressed below that. Tom's Guide landed in a similar place from a different playlist, praising bass that thumps without being overbearing and a midrange that came through crisp and clean. Both outlets liked the Sony Headphones Connect app — TechRadar found its EQ unusually effective, saying adjustments shift the balance instead of just stamping down on the bass, and Tom's Guide called the equalizer simple but effective, with presets and manual bass control. DSEE upscaling is included, though TechRadar felt it added warmth to the midrange more than extra detail.
Comfort: light, but on-ear fit divides people
At 147 grams this is a genuinely light headphone. Tom's Guide wore it on and off for several hours in a day, including two hours straight, and found it pleasant throughout before a slight ache set in toward the end. TechRadar, which says it personally avoids on-ear designs, still wore the CH520 more happily than most it has tested — while warning of fairly notable clamping on the sides of the head and suggesting people with larger-than-average heads might not love it. Physical buttons on the bottom of the right earcup handle play, pause, volume, and track skipping — and a double-press summons the phone's voice assistant. The earcups swivel flat, but the headband does not fold inward.
Battery: the strongest argument for buying
Sony rates playback at up to 50 hours, with a 3-minute quick charge giving 1.5 hours of listening and a full charge taking about 3 hours. Published testing beat the headline figure — SoundGuys, in its best Sony headphones roundup, put playback at over 55 hours, and a budget-headphones roundup summarizing lab tests reported 52 hours from RTINGS and 55 hours 25 minutes from SoundGuys. Tom's Guide found the quick-charge claim close but not exact in its own check — around five minutes on a MacBook Pro cable got the headphones switched back on with over an hour of playback. One habit to watch, flagged by TechRadar: there is no auto-pause when you take the headphones off, and they stay on for a long time when idle, so careless use can run the battery down.
Calls, controls, and the missing pieces
Call quality is the weakest part of the package. TechRadar described the single microphone as functional, quiet, and not especially clear. Tom's Guide found calls clear in quiet rooms but tinny and echoey at times, with callers reporting plenty of picked-up background noise, and concluded the headphones suit quiet environments best. Bluetooth 5.2 covers SBC and AAC only — no LDAC or other hi-res wireless codec — and with no 3.5mm jack there is no wired fallback for flights or dead-battery listening. Multipoint pairing and Google Fast Pair are the practical compensations, letting the headphones sit on two devices at once and switch to an incoming call.
The evidence that cuts against this review
TechGearLab's lab-based review is the outlier, and it should not be hidden. It scored comfort just 2.4 out of 10, rated comfortable listening at only 2.0 hours, gave the headphones an overall score of 44, and concluded it would not recommend them over higher-performing options in the budget range, citing average sound, the lack of active noise cancelling, and the uncomfortable on-ear design. That verdict sits against TechRadar's and Tom's Guide's much warmer listening notes and against Best Buy's owner aggregate — 4.6 out of 5 stars from 2,533 reviews, with 94% of reviewers saying they would recommend the headphones. The fair reading is that the disagreement is mostly about on-ear fit tolerance — not battery life or basic sound quality, where the evidence lines up. So the recommendation here is conditional: the WH-CH520 is an easy pick for casual listeners who already know they tolerate on-ear headphones, and a riskier buy for anyone who needs hours of uninterrupted wear or quiet on loud transit. A durability warning from the same budget roundup points the same way — owners report snapped hinges and broken earcups, and Amazon's summary rates durability as mixed, so these are headphones to treat gently.
Who should buy them
Buy the WH-CH520 if you want a light, long-running pair for home, office, and walks — you are happy with on-ear fit, and you do not need noise cancelling or a wired connection. Skip them if you commute on loud transit, take lots of calls in noisy places, or wear headphones for many hours at a stretch without a break. Check the current price on Amazon before buying, since street prices move and the value case depends on the deal you find.