Come for the ANC, Stay for the Killer App

The Skullcandy Sesh ANC Active earbuds are not all they’re cracked up to be on paper. While they sound fine for the most part, I’m willing to bet a lot of folks will have many of the same functionality complaints as me. They’re not the worst buds in the world, but they’re definitely not the best, either.

Price and Availability

The Skullcandy Sesh ANC Active is a steal at $90 at full price and can be purchased at popular retailers like Amazon and Best Buy, as well as through Skullcandy.

Caution: Overly Sensitive Touch Controls

The Sesh ANC Active buds boast a sleek and functional design. The black plastic exterior, accented with a neon-orange skull on the back of each bud, serves as a touchpoint for single, double, triple-tap, and long-press commands. These commands control a range of features, from playback to ANC mode, volume, voice assistants, and more, all of which are customizable in the Skullcandy app. The USB-C charging case mirrors this striking colorway. However, the design, while stylish, can be a bit bulky and may cause discomfort when worn for extended periods.

IP67-rated, the Sesh ANC buds are great for running in the rain or hitting the gym. They’re also compatible with Google Fast Pair and support Bluetooth Multipoint (the ability to pair the buds to more than one device simultaneously). This versatility empowers you to use the buds in various situations, enhancing your overall experience.

Unfortunately, one of my least favorite parts of my Sesh ANC experience was how finicky the controls were. Without fail, I’d perform an unwanted action whenever I’d try to insert the buds into my ears. While comfortable, the overall bulk of the Sesh ANC buds starts feeling overbearing when worn for long periods.

These earbuds work with Spotify Tap, which is a pretty nifty feature that automatically starts playing your Spotify playlists and recommendations with just a single touch command to one or both buds. Once Spotify starts up, tap your earbud to cycle through your Spotify content.

Other box contents should include a USB-C charging cable, replacement ear gels (small, medium, and large), along with a user manual and a quick start guide.

An Exercise in So-So Sound Quality

The Sesh ANC Active earbuds use 12mm drivers and a handful of audio optimization features, including Personal Audio by Mimi and the Clear Voice Smart Mic, to fine-tune the decibels getting dished to your ears. Running on Bluetooth 5.3, the Sesh Active buds bring an energetic, bass-heavy sound profile to the table. I found most music genres to sound best when listening with the Music preset, though you’ll be able to cycle between Bass Boost, Podcast, and Custom presets, too.

I thought the Sesh Active buds sounded best when listening to rock and R&B tracks. Songs like The Dear Hunter’s The Dead Don’t Starve maintained fidelity at higher volumes, though a lack of distortion didn’t make up for the narrow soundstage this track delivered past 70% volume. Kick drum hits and bass guitar were the real standouts, with the occasional guitar cutting through the top end of the mix.

Switching over to Timeless by The Weeknd & Playboi Carti, the low-end drone that carries throughout the track was the star of the mix and was one of the few test songs that I felt benefited from the Bass Boost preset. Vocals and sampling tended to get shoved to the side, though, with only a few lines getting sonic space to shine.

Billie Eilish’s BIRDS OF A FEATHER sounded the best overall and gave me a chance to test out the Custom preset. For the most part, I copied the five-band settings of the Music mode but added a little extra kick in the treble range. Eilish’s vocals were crisp and clear, but I could hear additional instruments that I wanted to hear more of. Mind you, these were just gentle keyboard chords and other details, but it was still distracting to know I’d probably hear these small touches better with my AirPods Pro 2.

Taking cinematic content for a spin, I used the Sesh Active buds to listen to the first dogfight scene from Christopher Nolan’s Dunkirk and switched the Low Latency Mode on. I thought the earbuds did an excellent job of delivering an immersive surround experience with two small drivers. This was also another case where the Bass Boost preset provided a solid boost for airplane noise.

The Sesh ANC Active buds’ overall sound quality isn’t anything to write home about. In fact, I thought most of the music and movies I listened to sounded somewhat compressed.

Noise Canceling Needs a Boost

The Sesh ANC Active earbuds use an adjustable four-mic array to pick up and cancel out unwanted frequencies. Similar to my sound quality experience, though, the ANC on these buds isn’t much more than “pretty good.” First off, though, I’m always pleased to see an adjuster for less or more noise-canceling. The only problem is I really couldn’t tell the difference between minimal amounts of ANC and maxed-out noise-canceling.

The same can be said of the Stay-Aware mode, which sounded the same to me as having ANC turned on. Usually, this kind of ambient mode amplifies nearby sounds, but I didn’t notice much difference, even when it came time to share dialogue with someone. Oddly, there was also a constant hiss when using the Stay-Aware mode.

In my experience, ANC listening was always best when music or a movie was playing. As soon as track audio dropped out, the mic system’s performance was barely noticeable at times. Even my usual HVAC test (standing in front of my apartment’s blower unit) returned lackluster results, with there not being much difference between ANC enabled and disabled.

Callers Come Through Loud and Clear

The call quality of the Sesh ANC Active buds was what I expected from the earbuds: just fine. One big bummer, though, is you can’t use ANC when taking calls. Even if the Skullcandy app has ANC enabled, you can hear ANC turn off the moment someone calls you or you accept a call.

I think this must have been the Natural Voice Sidetone feature kicking in. Unfortunately, this feature doesn’t work very well, as only the sounds of my environment (and not my speaking voice) were honed in on.

Between both buds, the volume and clarity were actually pretty good sans ANC assistance. My girlfriend claimed I sounded audible and loud enough, and I thought the same about her call voice.

Skullcandy claims the Sesh ANC Active buds should last up to 7 hours on a full charge with ANC enabled and 12 hours with ANC disabled. A fully-charged case can hold between 21 and 36 additional playback hours, and just 10 minutes in the case gives your buds an extra two hours of battery life.

While there’s no wireless charging support to speak of (USB-C only), I only needed to recharge the Sesh Active buds once, and sure enough, they were charged to full battery in less than three hours.

One of the Best Earbud Apps I’ve Ever Used

There are plenty of solid earbud apps out there, but so far, nothing has beaten my experience with the Skullcandy app (available for iPhone and Android devices). Going above and beyond “intuitive,” not only does the Skullcandy app list all the most critical settings on one scrollable dashboard, but the company is kind enough to provide blurb explanations of what many of these features and settings actually do. It’s also nice to see a companion app free of typos.

A graphic of both earbuds is shown at the top of the page, along with a battery life indicator for each bud. I recommend doing the Personal Sound test, which creates a custom sound profile based on your hearing sensitivity. When the calibration is complete, you’ll be able to raise or lower the effect of this custom preset.

Under Hearing Mode is where you’ll adjust ANC and Stay-Aware settings and overall strength. And as I’ve alluded to a few times, you’ll be able to use Skullcandy’s Equalizer to toggle between audio presets and create your own custom listening mode. I was also pleased to see that Skullcandy uses a simple five-band EQ that reacts to adjustments in real-time.

Button mapping, software updates, and Skullcandy support are a few of the other functions you’ll find. Admittedly, the app could be difficult to load up, sometimes forcing me to manually disconnect the buds from my iPhone, followed by a reconnect. When the app was being finicky, this was the only thing I could do to force a re-pair.

Should You Buy the Skullcandy Sesh ANC Active?

The Skullcandy Sesh ANC Active is one of the few disappointments I’ve had with Skullcandy products. For less than $100, I’d steer clear of these ANC buds in favor of a budget-friendly set that delivers as promised. (The Nothing Ear (a) certainly comes to mind.) You may also want to check out our roundups of the best wireless earbuds and best noise-canceling headphones.

SkullCandy Sesh ANC Active

Looking for one pair of active earbuds to do it all? Sesh ANC Active features all-day battery, fully waterproof construction and a specially designed Fit Grip that keeps it comfortably in place whether you’re at play or at home. Plus, adjustable 4-Mic Active Noise Canceling helps you get in the zone before, during and after the action.