Parrot has made the second generation of its advanced wireless headphones lighter and given them better sound and battery life.
Slimmer, lighter, more comfortable
Released in 2012, the original Philippe Starck-designed Zik headphones were feature-packed but heavy, uncomfortable to wear for any length of time and had mediocre battery life.
For version two, Parrot has shaved off 55g, slimmed down the ear cups and made the band more comfortable. The Zik 2.0s weigh 270g – still heavy for a generic set of headphones but similar to wireless competitors including the Beats Studio Wireless at 260g and lighter than the excellent Plantronics BackBeat Pro (340g).
The new design is comfortable to wear, feels light on the head with a padded band and they stay put on the move. The ear cups completely encase the ears and double as effective earmuffs in cold snaps.
Compared to many garish headphones, the Zik are streamlined and elegant, covered in leather and with brushed aluminium arms and small orange accents. Beyond the single power button, they forgo buttons for an intuitive touch control scheme.
The right-hand ear cup is touch sensitive. A tap pauses and plays. Swipes up and down adjust volume and left and right skip tracks. It works very well - although not through gloves.
The headphones also have a sensor that pauses the music when you remove them from your head and plays again when put back on, which again, works very well.
App-controlled
Everything else is controlled by a free app on an iPhone or Android smartphone, including turning on, off or adjusting the level of noise cancelling, adjusting the equaliser and soundscape, and monitoring battery level. The app requires a user account, but periodically signs the user out, which can get annoying.
The soundscape can be adjusted to recreate the acoustics of a silent room, a living room, jazz club or concert hall, while the angle of attack of the sound can be adjusted from 180 to 30 degrees, making the music sound like it is coming from above.
Manual tuning of the equaliser using a circular visualiser is easy, but a collection of presets are also available, created by artists and DJs including Eurovision winner Conchita Wurst and DJ Jazzy Jeff from Fresh Prince of Bell Air fame, and for genres across electronic, hip hop, rock, pop and jazz.
A “producer mode” is also available that allows the user to tune the sound for each song and have the app remember the settings to switch back to when the song is next played.
Most of the features can be safely ignored and the equaliser left alone for decent sound, but it is there should the user fancy getting more involved with their music.
Overall, the sound quality from the Zik 2.0s when powered on is excellent, with a well rounded, energetic sound, solid definition in the highs and punchy bass. Of course all that can be adjusted to taste, making the Zik 2.0s some of the most flexible and configurable headphones available.
Wirefree
The headphones are wireless streaming over Bluetooth from any modern smartphone, tablet or computer, with solid signal and without interruptions. They also have NFC for one-touch pairing with an NFC smartphone or tablet.
A cable is provided in the box and they can be used with anything with a headphones port, either powered on or turned off, and will continue to work when the battery runs out.
The headphones last about six hours per charge with everything going and can cut out without warning, as there’s no battery indicator apart from inside the app.
Turning off noise cancelling adds another couple of hours, while they last around 10 hours with everything but Bluetooth turned off. A flight mode, which has noise cancelling but everything else including Bluetooth turned off, will give about 16 hours of use in my testing.
The battery is removable and spares are available, but they take 2.5 hours to charge and that can only be done in the headphones.
Noise cancelling
The Zik 2.0s also include adjustable noise cancelling from a maximum of 30 decibel reduction through to “street mode”, which pipes the sounds of the outside world in through the headphones negating any passive noise isolation the ear cups might provide. The effect is surreal, especially in an office where the tap of keyboards is dramatically enhanced making it sound like it is raining indoors.
The headphones block out noise very well and the noise cancelling is some of the best I have experienced - similar to some of the best noise cancelling headphones on the market.
Price
The Parrot Zik 2.0 cost £299 and are available in black, blue, brown, orange, white and yellow.
Verdict
The Parrot Zik 2.0 are some of the best wireless headphones available. They are more configurable for personal audio taste using a simple app than any other headphones available in Britain.
They sound great, the noise cancelling is also top notch, and the touch controls are the best available on any wireless headphones. The battery life could be better, but a second battery helps.
Pros: solid bluetooth connectivity; excellent noise cancelling; great, customisable sound; useful app
Cons: app logs users out periodically; battery life could be longer; no on-headphone noise cancelling control or battery indicator.
Other reviews
• Philips M1BT: Bluetooth headphones that sound good but have fiddly controls
• Beats Studio Wireless review: expensive headphones with lacklustre sound
• Six of the best noise-cancelling headphones to silence the commute
