Huawei FreeArc Review: Are These Open-Ear Headphones Perfect for Sports?

Open-ear headphones, like the Huawei FreeArc, meet a growing demand: allowing athletes – runners, cyclists, fitness enthusiasts – to listen to music or podcasts while remaining aware of their surroundings. External sounds, crucial for safety, are not blocked thanks to a design that does not obstruct the ear canal. This format, which has recently seen good models like the SoundCore AeroClip or, to a lesser extent, the Honor Earbuds Open, excels in comfort, lightness, and non-intrusive feel, unlike traditional in-ear headphones.

However, these benefits come with well-known acoustic compromises. The lack of isolation leads to an inevitable loss of low frequencies, which robs the sound of depth and impact. Additionally, the tonal imbalance, often skewed towards the mids and highs, can make listening tiring or unnatural.

Unlike the FreeClip, which clips onto the ears, the Huawei FreeArc wraps around them. They aim to win over athletes with flawless ergonomics and solid battery life. But do they deliver on their sound promises?

Huawei FreeArcTechnical Specifications

This review was conducted with earphones provided by Huawei.

Huawei FreeArcA Design Crafted for Effort

The Huawei FreeArc features a minimalist and functional design typical of open-ear earhook headphones. Each earphone consists of a main body made of matte plastic, housing a 14.2 mm dynamic driver extended by a soft titanium-core hook. This perfectly conforms to the shape of the ear. These earphones are well-finished, with a subtle metallic trim adding a touch of elegance. Weighing just 6.5 grams per earphone, they are almost unnoticeable, even after several hours of use.

Comfort is clearly a major strength. The hooks, made from a soft, slightly rubberized material, adapt to all shapes without creating pressure points, even during extended sessions.

In our tests, the FreeArcs remained perfectly in place without slipping or causing irritation. With an IP57 rating, they are resistant to sweat and splashes, making them reliable partners for intense workouts.

The charging case, compact and with rounded edges, easily slips into a pocket or gym bag. Its matte finish is pleasant to the touch, and its USB-C port ensures easy recharging. In summary, a design that’s crafted for sports with impeccable ergonomics.

Huawei FreeArcA Smooth Experience

Pairing the FreeArc is quick and stable thanks to Bluetooth 5.3, which maintains a reliable connection up to 10 meters, even in environments crowded with smartphones or through thin walls. The earphones support SBC, AAC, and L2HC codecs, the latter being exclusive to Huawei smartphones running EMUI 13 or higher. The observed latency is negligible, painless in video games and non-existent when watching videos.

The Huawei AI Life app is easy to use. It allows you to check the battery status, customize touch controls, and access a 10-band equalizer for fine tuning. However, even with these adjustments, the sound deficiencies detailed later are difficult to correct, with the limitations of the drivers and the open format prevailing.

Somewhat Capricious Touch Controls

The touch controls, located on the earphone housings, rely on intuitive gestures: double tap to play/pause, triple tap to change tracks, and vertical swipe to adjust the volume. While swiping poses no issue, tapping, on the other hand, tends to move the earphone, which sometimes requires repeating the gesture. Without a wear sensor, the FreeArc does not offer automatic pause when an earphone is removed. This feature would have been helpful for resuming music or podcast playback without having to manipulate the device.

A positive feature, the support for dual Bluetooth connection, allows simultaneous connection to two devices, such as a smartphone and a smartwatch. Switching from one device to another is seamless. Overall, the experience is successful, but the imperfect tapping slightly tarnishes the overall impression.

Huawei FreeArcAn Unbalanced Reproduction, Far from Thrilling

The Huawei FreeArc features a 14.2 mm dynamic driver, which is intended to provide clear and detailed sound reproduction, suitable for music and podcasts. Huawei highlights an optimized design for open-ear headphones, but in practice, the result is disappointing. The sound signature is unbalanced, marked by an almost total absence of bass below 100 Hz, decent but slightly forward mids, and excessively dominant highs, which become tiring over time. This output, typical of poorly mastered open-ear headphones, lacks the impact and warmth needed to “pump up” a sports playlist.

The frequency response curve confirms this imbalance. Below 100 Hz, the low frequencies are practically non-existent, depriving the sound of any depth or impact—a real drawback for sports earphones, where a punchy bass is not too much to ask for motivation. Between 200 Hz and 2 kHz, the mids show a balanced level but remain very recessed compared to the highs. From 4 kHz onwards, the high frequencies take over, with a marked peak around 8 kHz, representing a huge gap of about 30 dB compared to the bass, and 20 dB compared to the mids. To put these values in context, a 6 dB difference corresponds to a doubling of intensity. This imbalance unsurprisingly produces a shrill sound.

Listening Impressions: Suitable for Sports, Insufficient in Quiet Settings

To evaluate the FreeArc, we tested them across a variety of musical genres and settings, from running to office listening. On ‘Sweet Dreams‘ by Eurythmics, the central synthetic bass line is reduced to an anemic throb, and the drum kick lacks impact, which deprives the track of its energy. The vocals, carried by the mids, are clear but lack body (throat or chest sounds are missing). The highs, too emphasized, make electronic sounds become piercing at high volumes.

On ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit‘ by Nirvana, the distorted guitars take on an unpleasant metallic hue, and the cymbals, boosted by the 8 kHz peak, sound aggressive. Hip-hop tracks, like ‘Humble‘ by Kendrick Lamar, suffer severely from the lack of bass to support the deep lows, making the listening experience flat and unengaging. Even podcasts, which are less demanding, suffer from this imbalance, making male voices sound nasal. In short, the sound signature struggles severely to convince.

One positive aspect, however: the soundstage, wide and deep for open-ear headphones, offers pleasant spatialization, with good separation of instruments. On ‘Hotel California‘ by the Eagles, the guitars and backing vocals unfold with some breadth. But as soon as one settles in for extended listening in a quiet setting, the deficiencies become apparent.

The equalizer in the Huawei AI Life app only has marginal effects and certainly does not correct the deficient balance of the earphones.

In summary, the FreeArcs are suitable for a sports session where vigilance takes precedence over musicality, but for enjoying an album or a podcast in good conditions, they are quickly surpassed.

Huawei FreeArcCall Quality: Honorable, But Limited by the Format

The FreeArc incorporates two microphones per earphone, paired with a bone conduction sensor that captures jaw vibrations to enhance call clarity. In quiet environments, such as an office or a park, the quality is satisfactory because one is not too disturbed by surrounding noises. However, next to a busy street or on a bus, while one’s interlocutor can hear without too much distortion in the voice, surrounding noises sometimes prevent hearing what is being said clearly. Compared to noise-canceling in-ears, like the excellent Huawei FreeBuds Pro 4, the FreeArc is obviously less effective.

Huawei FreeArcDurable Companions

Battery life is an undeniable strength of the FreeArc. Huawei claims 7 hours of listening per charge, a figure confirmed in our tests, with a volume at 50% and mixed use (music, podcasts, calls). The case, with a 450 mAh capacity, allows for three full recharges, bringing the total battery life to about 28 hours.

A full charge of the earphones takes 50 minutes via USB-C, and a quick 10-minute charge provides 2 hours of listening, ideal for an impromptu session. The case recharges in 1.5 hours, a reasonable time.

Huawei FreeArcPrice and Availability

The Huawei FreeArc is priced at €99, a fair price slightly lower than brands like SoundCore and Nothing for open-ear headphones. They are available in three colors: green, black, and gray.