Quick review
The good
The not-so-good
One of Beats’ best pairs returns for a refresh, as the Beats Fit Pro become the Powerbeats Fit, a pair that’s so similar, you might struggle to see the difference.
It probably won’t surprise you to learn that not every earphone or headphone is made for the same purpose, beyond that of listening to something from a device (usually your phone).
There are so many ways to listen to music on the go and so many choices, but what you can find isn’t always the same, or even made for the same purpose. Between the assortment of over-ears, around-ears, in-ears, and open-ears, it’s no wonder it can be difficult to pick your next pair, or even the pair to replace whatever you’re sporting now.
But the focus of each model is a little different, and if sports is your focus, or at least athletics, fitness, running, and losing weight, you might need to look beyond the basics, and more at something that won’t fall out.
It’s a bit of a #firstworldproblem, we’ll admit, but not every pair will stay in your ears or on your head when you’re jumping around, running, flexing, yoga-ing (it’s apparently a word), or generally just trying to work out while listening to your tunes.
There are solutions, though, and Beats has offered them for ages. In the latest pair, the Apple-owned brand is reviving something familiar, releasing the Powerbeats Fit, what is arguably (and rather obviously) the Beats Fit Pro 2, a model for people who want something to stay in place.
Design and features
Appearing like a smaller version of the previous generation, the Beats Powerbeats Fit isn’t like a pair of AirPods. They’re a little different and more compact, with a design more like that of their predecessor: a pair of rounded earbuds with pinched edges, a button in that side where the Beats “b” logo is, and wings that pop out to nestle in the folds of your ear.
It’s a style designed to hold, which is exactly what that wingtip is there for, providing four ear-tip sizes to improve the fit, and a custom driver designed to work with the Apple H1 wireless chip.
You’ll find support for spatial audio on iOS and noise cancellation, too, the latter of which works across Android and iOS, though there’s also a transparency mode to hear through the buds and an adaptive EQ setting, too.
They’re also IPX4 water resistant, which is the rating you largely give when something is sweat resistant.
In-use
Getting them in your ear is pretty easy: find the right tips, insert them in your ears, and twist slightly.
That little twist move will help the wing find its way to nestle in the fold of the concha of your ears, just under the antihelical fold, the scientific way of saying the folded bit of skin in the middle of your ear.
Using that spot means the Powerbeats Fit are held in place firmly, letting the earphones hold as you move, shake your head, jump around, and generally just try your best to be active without the earphones falling out.
It’s a great design, even if the controls are a little old school, which is fine for this purpose.
The “b” button on either side can be held down to switch in and out of ANC modes, pressed once to pause and play, twice to skip a track, and three times to back. It’s fine, we’re used to these old school approaches to earphone controls, and you may be, too.
Performance
Next up is the performance, an area we feel like we’ve covered on its predecessor before. Since these aren’t very different on the inside, we’re largely expecting much the same, but as usual, we’re testing with the Pickr Sound Test, which you can use for your own headphones and earbuds, too.
That starts with electronic, and a decent amount of balance delivering comfy and clear highs and mids, alongside a decent drop from the lows of the bass, as well. Tycho’s “Glider” sets us off, while Daft Punk’s “Contact” gives us more of that strong balance, as well.
The likes of the pop and R&B punch from Carly Rae Jepsen and Ariana Grande bring the dynamics, with solid hits from the bass fitting comfortably with the highs of the vocals while the instruments make up the rest.
There’s a decent amount of detail on offer, too in the rock of David Bowie and The Beatles (though not playing together!), while the sense of space is quite nice, as well. We grooved to the jazz, got into the classical, and genuinely just reminisced about the balance on offer in a pair that basically repackaged everything that was great about their predecessors’ sound, just made slightly smaller.
Noise cancellation
The performance has largely stayed the same, and so has the noise cancellation, which is acceptable by 2020 standards, but not the amazing performance you can get from other pairs today.
That means some of the noise of the outside world will be quelled and dulled, and when you listen to music, your bubble will be mostly that: your music. But we found the outside world was still able to be heard, and while there’s less of it, the earbuds aren’t with today’s standards for noise cancellation.
By comparison, the AirPods Pro 3 offer some of the best noise cancellation in the world and are barely $100 more. They’re a different breed of earphone, sure, but it just shows you how much the technology has improved, with the Powerbeats Fit using ANC tech back from 2019, rather than 2025.
Spatial audio
Like the other pairs of Apple-owned earphones — which Beats products technically count as — the Powerbeats Fit support spatial audio with dynamic head-tracking, using the first generation version of the tech that Apple rolled out for support with Apple Music and video apps on the iPhone.
It means if you have an iPhone and the Powerbeats Fit, the audio can sound more directional, as your head orients to the position of the soundtrack.
With an Apple Music account on an iPhone, Atmos tracks sound more immersive and interactive, while services such as Spotify don’t benefit at all. Fortunately, Apple TV and Netflix do, so you get a surround sound experience on the iPhone with these earbuds.
Android users aren’t quite as lucky.
Even though spatial audio with head-tracking exists on Android — see the equally excellent Technics AZ100 and Bose QC Ultra Earbuds 2 for examples — there’s no support for spatial on Android. The sound is fine, and the cancellation is the same, but that extra feature is missing in action.
Battery
Battery life by comparison is still acceptable, even with noise cancellation switched on. You’ll find between 4 and 6 hours of battery life, closer to the former if head-tracking spatial is on and more the latter when it’s just ANC sans-spatial.
An extra four charges can be found in the box, roughly, equating to a total of 24 hours of use, which isn’t terrible, even if it’s also not spectacular. There are better batteries out there, though the 24 hour total is about normal for flagship noise cancelling earbuds.
Turn off the ANC, though, and you’ll squeeze a little more life out, offering a total of 30 all up.
Value
The price is a problem, though, because it just doesn’t make sense in 2025.
The original pair was $299, and while a move to $329.95 in Australia (and $350 NZD in New Zealand) doesn’t seem like an extraordinary cash grab given inflation and cost of living increases, you can probably begrudgingly forgive a little change in the price tag. Maybe.
But the problem is that little beyond the design has changed, and that shouldn’t warrant the price even staying the same, let alone rising some.
The Beats Powerbeats Fit are technically old technology wrapped into a marginally smaller and tighter design, and while they’re a nice pair of earphones, they’re not worth $300 anymore.
As it is, the AirPods 4 with ANC can be picked up for less than $300 at retail, and come with a better IP rating, boasting IP54 versus the Powerbeats Fit’s IPX4. The AirPods 4 may not offer as great a fit for exercise as the Beats model, but there’s a clear difference between water resistance and sweat resistance, while also seeing Apple’s model arrive with a better price.
This pair just isn’t worth the price tag in our neck of the woods.
What needs work?
That confusing price tag is only one part of the problem, because getting there, the lack of hardware updates that could have made the Powerbeats Fit better just boggles the mind.
Beats is still using the H1 chip from the original AirPods Pro, and while it’s still good, it’s not 2025-level tech. So while these earphones sound fine, they’re not on the same level for audio or noise cancellation as the 2022 AirPods Pro 2nd-gen.
In fact, three years ago in the first pair, we noted a surprising omission of a wireless charging case. That’s not been fixed either.
Sure, Beats has made the case smaller, which is nice. It’s now marginally easier to carry around, but the change isn’t super dramatic, and wireless charging is still missing in action, as is the head-tracked spatial audio support on Android.
What we love
At least you get Android support, something we like immensely.
You get an app on Android (yay!), but that’s been the norm for Beats for years. It’s one of those things that separates the Apple-owned brand’s gear from the Apple-branded gear. Both can technically work on Android, but only the Beats gear supports most of the features across both.
And we love the fit, which is really what the Powerbeats Fit seems to be about.
You thought the “fit” word implied that they’re made for fitness? You’re probably right, but the physical fit of the Powerbeats Fit is one of the things that makes them easy to like.
Between a decent assortment of tips and the excellent angled ear-wings Beats uses, the Powerbeats Fit manage a hold in your ears that may as well be the perfect fit.
Beats Powerbeats Fit vs the competition
The problem is competition, and some of it comes from within.
Never-mind that the original pair of Beats Fit Pro can be found for below the $280 mark as they’re replaced and are practically identical save for sizes, Beats also offers the Powerbeats Pro 2, its other 2025 release with ANC on-board.
These are the pair that get the H2 chip from the AirPods Pro 2nd-gen, and get a whole lot more, too. At only $70 more than the Powerbeats Fit, the Powerbeats Pro 2 offer better sound, better noise cancellation, better stabilisation with ear hooks like the old Powerbeats design, and also include a new heart rate sensor that works on iOS and Android.
Whereas the original Fit Pro represented great value in the fitness-focused earphones world, the new generation doesn’t feel as though it hits the same target.
It’s the same when comparing against other earphones, as well.
There aren’t a heap of noise cancelling earphones with the same level of ear-holding wings or fins, but the Bose QuietComfort Buds 2nd-gen aren’t bad, and offer the same IPX4 water resistance with better ANC for less, while there are plenty of other earphone models without wings that hold well, as well.
And if you don’t care about noise cancellation, Shokz has some pretty clever approaches to fitness earphones, too.
Beats doesn’t have as much direct competition here because it seems like fitness-earphones have fizzled slightly, but that’s also because regular earphones now do the same thing as fitness models.
So you really just need to pick any pair and see if it matches up. We’re not sure the Powerbeats Fit necessarily competes well using its bed of old technology ourselves.
Final thoughts (TLDR)
There’s technically nothing wrong with the Beats Powerbeats Fit — they’re basically slightly revamped versions of the Beats Fit Pro we loved years ago. Slightly smaller and somewhat more stable, they’re an improvement in the design, while leaving everything else largely where it is.
The problem is more that of time: the Fit Pro were introduced over three years ago back when the first-gen AirPods Pro were on the verge of being retired, and the second-gen would arrive only a few months later. It made sense for the Beats to use the same hardware as the first AirPods Pro, because it was only just about to be replaced.
Things are very different this time around.
The AirPods Pro first-gen are now quite old, at least by our standards. That technology launched six years ago in 2019 almost to the date from when this review would go live.
That’s quite a long time in the world of technology, and makes us wonder… why not the AirPods Pro 2 tech instead?
We don’t have an answer, even if we have something that’s a bit of a rerun of sorts, because that’s largely what these are.
While this year’s Powerbeats Pro 2 weren’t perfect, they were at least new technology. This year’s Powerbeats Fit aren’t. They’re the same but smaller, and not really worth the price.
If Beats can drop the price to below $249, these will start to make more sense. Right now, they’re just a familiar rerun. That’s not a bad thing, but you can probably do better, even if it’s from an upgrade in another Beats model.
