ANC

Introduction: A New Challenger in Premium Headphones Bose’s QuietComfort line has long been synonymous with top-tier noise-canceling headphones. On Sept 5, 2025, Bose introduced its second-generation QuietComfort Ultra headphones, a flagship pair designed to fend off growing competition from Sony and Apple bloomberg.com. Priced at $449 – the same as the previous model – the new QuietComfort Ultra 2 arrives with a suite of upgrades aimed at maintaining Bose’s ANC leadership and delivering more immersive sound for listeners bloomberg.com. The headphones go on sale October 2, 2025, with preorders already live bloomberg.com. This report dives into the QuietComfort Ultra 2’s

Sony WH-1000XM6 uses the Integrated Processor QN3 with 12 microphones to deliver best-in-class ANC, with tests reporting about 87% external noise reduction and a RTings isolation score of 9.9/10. Bose QuietComfort Ultra features CustomTune ANC calibration and Immersive Audio with head-tracking in Still and Motion modes, offering up to 24 hours in Quiet/Aware and 18 hours with Immersive on. Apple AirPods Max use eight ANC microphones and computational audio, delivering strong noise cancellation but generally behind Sony and Bose for pure ANC power. Comfort is strongest with Bose QC Ultra (~253 g), with Sony XM6 at ~254 g and AirPods