They’re comfortable and have a decent sound, but the Powerbeats Fit are a little too expensive for what they offer.
Pros
Cons
Decent battery life
Lacks wireless charging, because…?
Physical buttons are very easy to use while working out
Physical buttons are also a bit too easy to hit when putting them in your ears
Works across both iOS and Android (and other Bluetooth devices, of course)
ANC isn’t as good as it should be at this price
Score: 2.5/5
In this review
Powerbeats Fit Specifications
Powerbeats Fit Design
Powerbeats Fit Performance
Powerbeats Fit Battery
Powerbeats Fit Verdict
Ethical disclaimer: The set of Powerbeats Fit headphones used in this review were sent to me by Beats, and the typical deal with headphones is that most manufacturers don’t tend to ask for them back, because, well… handling used headphones, especially bud headphones invites all sorts of personal hygiene issues.
(Note to headphone PR: If you send me used headphones, I’m sending them right back, untested and unreviewed. Blech.)
That aside, Beats has no influence or oversight on this review, and as always I’ll call them like I see them – or in this case, hear them.
For more on ART’s Ethics position, see here.
Design
The last time I checked out a set of Beats headphones, they were the sporty Beats PowerBeats Pro 2 headphones, built in an over-ear style that put them in contention against the like of Shokz.
Also read:
Beats Powerbeats Pro 2 review
The Beats Powerbeats Fit headphones are more regular style buds with a single flexible fin on each but that’s designed to more comfortably into your ears once they’re twisted in place.
I’ve been testing them out over the past couple of weeks (alongside the Nothing Ear (3) headphones, switching out day by day) and they are generally comfortable in my ears up to 3-4 hours; beyond that I tend to struggle having any set of buds fully in place for any longer.
The Powerbeats Fit buds use button controls built into each bud, which means you have to physically press them in to activate play/pause commands, or longer presses for virtual assistant or noise cancelling functions.
I do prefer this for exercise buds as it’s easier to hit directly when I’m running, but the flip side of this is that it’s also quite easy to inadvertently press them when putting them into your ears, starting up music or other content when you didn’t mean to.
The Powerbeats Fit sell in four different colour styles. Beats sent a pair of the Jet Black Powerbeats Fit my way, but they also come in Gravel Grey, Spark Orange or Power Pink, which is to say that there’s a grey/beige pair, a bright orange pair or a pastel pink style if that’s more to your taste. The Jet Black pair do have a more subtle feel than the Spark Orange or Power Pink, which I personally appreciate, but tastes can vary.
Your choice of colour will also determine the colour of the battery charging case you get. On the plus side, the case does include a physical charging button, which I always prefer to capacitive touch pairing.
On the minus side, the charging case is one big slippery pebble. More than once it’s slipped out of my hands or out of my pockets, tumbling to the floor as a result. The case appears reasonably robust with no scratches (yet), but dropping it can make the buds fly out, which raises the possibility of them falling somewhere you might not be able to retrieve them, like a storm drain, which would be less than ideal.
A storm drain would be a bad place for a Powerbeats Fit headphone, partly because of all the clowns, but also because they’re only rated at IPX4, which means that they’re good for light sprays of water, but not full immersion.
IPX4 isn’t unusual for fitness headphones not specifically sold as swimming style headphones, because the idea there is that you’d mostly sweat on them, not drown them in drain. So, once again, don’t do that.
Also read:
Shokz OpenSwim Pro Review
Performance
Like most Bluetooth headphones, when you first open up the Powerbeats Fit they’ll be ready to pair with just about any suitable source, though with Beats being an Apple company, they’ll preferentially pair to any Apple devices nearby with a direct popup inviting you to pair if an iPad, iPhone or Mac is nearby.
On the Apple side of the fence all of the settings for the Powerbeats Fit are handled natively, but unlike Apple’s AirPod lineup of headphones, there is support built in for additional features on Android devices as long as you download the Beats app for Android.
There are a handful of Apple-only features, though most of them are very Apple-specific, like direct support for the Find My network and fast switching between Apple devices. You also get Hey Siri direct access built in if you’re on an Apple device, while Android users can invoke their assistant of choice if they configure one of the touch controls on either ear to do so. The default action on Android platforms is to switch between the Powerbeats Fit’s ANC and transparency modes.
While the Powerbeats Fit could be accused of being fitness-centric versions of Apple’s AirPods Pro lineup, there are internal differences between the current generations of both, with the newer AirPods Pro 3 (review coming soon, not my specific fault they’re running late) for example running on Apple’s newer H2 chip while the Powerbeats Fit use the older H1 chip; this does give them the fast pairing ability with Apple devices but means you miss out on other Pro specific features like hearing test support and heart rate monitoring.
Given that the cheaper AirPods 4 and AirPods 4 ANC run on the H2 chip, using the older hardware on the pricier Powerbeats Fit is an odd choice.
Given they’re the Powerbeats Fit, I’ve primarily used them while running, my exercise of choice, which has given me enough opportunity to test out both their audio quality and their ANC quality.
Here I am wearing the Powerbeats Fit and looking so VERY happy as I exert myself.
The glee positively radiates off my visage, doesn’t it?
Taking on noise cancelling first, at their $329.95 price point I do expect good ANC, and Apple can deliver that when it wants to.
This was a distinct weakness of the Powerbeats Pro 2, and the good news here is that to my hearing, the Powerbeats Fit do a better job of handling blocking out noise than the Pro 2s did. Still, they were on the average side given that high pricing, and definitely below (for example) the AirPods Pro 2’s audio – I’m still testing out the AirPods Pro 3 at the time of writing but don’t expect them to be worse than their predecessors.
“Better than the Powerbeats Pro 2” is still a relative term, however, and while I could enable ANC to block out basic background hum, at this price I do want a little more than that from my headphones. There’s perhaps a fine balance here because having ANC that’s too strong in exercise-centric buds might not be the best safety move for the obvious not-getting-hit-by-a-garbage-truck reasons, but that’s what stepped levels of ANC are for, no?
Audio presentation on the Powerbeats Fit is decent, helped by the fact that the fins and default medium sized tips fit into my ears quite well; Beats does supply you with a wide range of sized tips to try to get the ideal seal but I didn’t find that I needed to use them. Your ears may of course vary.
The Powerbeats Fit follow what I’d call the classic Beats formula in terms of their audio presentation, with a noticeable slant towards bass-heavy presentation. That’s likely to suit a lot of workout routines where having that kind of regular heavy beat can be a real upside, though you are free to listen to whatever you like when working out.
For more regular or treble-centric audio they presented well across tracks such as ABBA’s classic “Mamma Mia”, Howard Jones’ “Revolution Of The Heart” and Frank Sinatra’s “My Way”.
All of this is just basic table stakes for any set of buds costing as much as the Powerbeats Fit do, though. They’re fine, but they’re not exactly high-end audio — but again, Apple has other plays in that market.
Also read:
Apple AirPods 4 ANC Review
Battery
Beats rates the battery life of the Powerbeats fit as good for “up to 7 hours” of usage, with the usual caveat that “up to” gives it a lot of wriggle room. Checking the specific details of Apple’s testing of these headphones reveals something rather curious here. Quoting directly from Beats’ page on this here:
Testing conducted by Apple in May 2025 using pre-production Powerbeats Fit units and software paired with iPhone 15 Pro units and pre-release software. The playlist consisted of 358 unique audio tracks purchased from the iTunes Store (256Kbps AAC encoding). Volume was set to 50% and Active Noise Cancelling and Transparency were turned off. Testing consisted of full Powerbeats Fit battery discharge while playing audio until the first Powerbeats Fit earbud stopped playback. With ANC turned on, total battery life is 6 hours of continuous playback from the earbuds and 24 hours in total with the case. Battery life depends on device settings, environment, usage and many other factors.
Source: Beats
It’s not suprising to see an audio brand testing with ANC disabled, because every single one of them does this to pump up their perceived figures. It’s not upfront and honest, but it’s totally an industry standard approach.
What’s less standard are the claims around expected battery life with ANC enabled, at 6 hours compared to 7 hours for the ANC disabled version. That’s some very power efficient ANC you’ve got going there, Apple, and maybe the reason why the ANC feels a little softer than it should be, because it’s trying to more gently sip at its power supplies.
My own testing of the Powerbeats Fit saw them hit quite close to that six hour figure too, which is pleasing. While I did have issues as noted above with the case slipping from both grasp and pocket, I had no such issues dropping the Powerbeats Fit buds into their case for recharging duties.
Recharging the case itself is via USB-C, but Apple/Beats do not provide either a charger or a USB-C cable in the box to let you do this. Despite their slightly higher asking price in the true wireless headphones pantheon, there’s no support built in for wireless charging.
Powerbeats Fit: Alex’s Verdict
The Powerbeats Fit do have their positives; I do like fitness headphones that don’t rely on capacitive touch controls because physical controls are much easier to access when you’re busy sweating. Their audio presentation is decent, and the colour choices on offer can either be subtle or as subtle as a brick, depending on your own personal sense of style.
That being said, they’re also somewhat underpowered when it comes to ANC, they lack wireless charging and unless you really do want a pair of Apple-built buds that’ll work nicely across both Android and iOS, it’s hard to see why you’d opt for these particular headphones – at least at their $329.95 asking price.
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Beats Powerbeats Fit: Pricing and availability
The Powerbeats Fit headphones retail in Australia for $329.95.
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