Sennheiser Momentum 5 reviewed: top tier

The look mightn’t standout, but the Sennheiser Momentum 5 is one of the better pairs you can check out in 2026, with great sound, ANC, and then some.

Whether you’re planning to jump on a flight, catch a train, or simply sit around a bunch of people talking in the background, there’s a good chance you’ve considered noise cancelling headphones, or at the very least are eyeing a pair right now. And it makes total sense.

A technology originally developed for quelling engine noise on aircraft has changed over the years, developed to support more noises, more spectrums, and ultimately let you hear less of the world and more of your music.

Lots of companies make noise cancelling headphones, with options that go in your ear and options that go on your ears, while the best typically go around your ear. The reason why the latter is often seen as the best is that of size: the larger headphones have bigger drivers, more microphones, and an increased amount of space for processors, batteries, and sizeable pads that can encase and encapsulate your ears.

Less may be more, but more can give you some extra capabilities the compact gadgets don’t always have. You can usually see the difference between the small and the big models quite easily, but usually the tech in the larger pair should be better and more capable.

With the Sennheiser Momentum 5, that rich feature set and expanded capability is definitely what the 81 year old company is focused on, building a pair of headphones that not only delivers in ways its in-ears can’t, but finds a way to take the fight to all of those other noise cancelling headphones.

Is the Sennheiser Momentum 5 one of the best pairs of noise cancelling headphones you’re likely to find this year?

Design and features

Take the Momentum 5 out of the box, and if you’ve ever seen Sennheiser’s Momentum ANC headphone range before, you may struggle to see any obvious differences. They’re definitely subtle, that’s for sure.

The flat look for the cups are designed to be unobtrusive and won’t draw attention, while the fabric encased band differs from the usual assortment of metal and vinyl, or more obvious plastic elements. These are designed to be both different and subtle, and that works.

It’s a little plain Jane, but it’s not going to draw attention, and for many, that can make all the difference. Inside, those differences may be hard to spot, not that you’ll ever really pry them apart and look beneath the hood.

If you did, you’d see a 42mm driver on each side, four digital microphones per ear making eight in total, plus some chips and circuitry providing the hybrid active noise cancellation approach. Wireless transmission is handled using Bluetooth 5.4 with a promised upgrade to 6.0 later down the track, though you can also go wired with a cord should you choose to.

And the 700mAh battery offers as much as 57 hours of battery life, and for a curious feature can actually be replaced. That’s a new feature for any major headphone released in the past decade or so.

In-use

Wear the headphones, and the first thing you’ll be treated to is comfort, plain and simple. The pads are wide, spacious, and easy to wear. So much that we managed to wear them for several hours at a time, sitting in the comfort of large pads.

The padding isn’t quite as spacious as say what Bose offers in its aptly named Quiet Comfort Ultra, but they’re also as comfortable as Sony’s WH-series, and that means they are excellent all the same.

If you’re trying to place why, you really need to glance at the Momentum 5 versus the Momentum 4. Sennheiser has made some obvious design changes that show up when compared directly, but can be difficult to place without.

Simply put, you need to glance at the angle of the cans.

In the Momentum 4, the cans sit more to the side, while in the Momentum 5, Sennheiser has straightened things considerably while still leaving them at an angle. It’s enough to make the difference, and between the spacious padding and design, helps keep the headphones comfortable for longer.

No joke, this reviewer has worn the Momentum 5 for hours and hardly realised they were there. These are comfy cans.

Using them is also fairly easy, with a combination of swipes and taps to get what you need done. Most of the swipes are pretty obvious — up and down for volume, across and back for track control — but you may find you need to consult the Sennheiser app to change the settings, or if you’re not a fan, you can even turn them off entirely.

Performance

Next up is the performance, arguably the most important part of the headphone review process. Tested with the Pickr Sound Test (which you can hear for yourself), the performance delivered largely what we expected from a pair of Sennheiser cans: balance with a splash of warmth.

That’s certainly what our test delivers, with a balanced sound from Tycho and Daft Punk, alongside some hefty bass that renders without any obvious loss of detail. The drop in Tycho’s “Glider” is there, a key part of the start of our tests, while Daft Punk’s lows kick nicely.

Over into pop and R&B, and the modern music of Carly Rae Jepsen punches nicely with emphasis, delivering a fantastically inviting stereo sound, while Ariana Grande’s “Into You” offers a sharp attack with balanced bass and a hint of warmth.

The vibe so far is a good, solid sound, though the warmth isn’t quite as obvious.

For instance, in Marvin Gaye’s “Ain’t No Mountain”, the bass felt a little flat, particularly from the rounded electric bass in the background. The delivery was still nice, but it sounded more balanced than warm, which isn’t a bad thing.

You’ll still find the warbling lows when you need it; both FKA Twigs and Muse delivered some controlled bursts of bass, though the drive wasn’t overloaded or too hefty.

Across most tracks, however, the sound is just good and solid. We heard fantastic separation across David Bowie and Paul Simon, as the beautifully mastered rock pieces shined, with similarities stretching into classical and jazz.

Whatever you listen to, the Momentum 5 is sure to match. They’re seemingly balanced for nearly everything.

Noise cancellation

One of the major changes comes in a category that is becoming hotly contested: noise cancellation. It’s a technology that changes every few years, and this year, it’s Sennheiser’s turn to show how it has improved.

The big test isn’t on flights; cancelling aircraft noise is where the tech started, and has largely been proved several times over. Rather, the big change is to make the cancellation work better with the day-to-day: trains, crowds, and general people sound.

There’s only so much it can actually do, but the tech is improving, and the Momentum 5 is clearly showing that.

Large pads, eight microphones, and a solid comprehension of active noise cancelling technology helps put the pair ahead of where you might expect them.

Used on trains and walking throughout the city, the only noises that made it in were the occasional people talking or announcements, and they were quite muffled. All you needed to do was dwell on what you were playing, putting them up there as one of the best in the business.

Spatial audio

The other inclusion is one we’re seeing on more headphones: spatial audio.

While active noise cancellation is about stopping the world, spatial is about the world melting with you, to quote a Modern English track that ironically hasn’t made its way into spatial just yet.

The idea takes stereo and gives it a little more, dripping into your earcups with a surround sound that can either correspond to a real soundtrack (like how AirPods works with Apple Music on the iPhone), or can emulate the feeling by moving your head through an expanded stereo soundtrack.

If you use Apple Music on an iPhone (where spatial is included in the music service), you need a pair of Apple- or Beats-made headphones or earbuds to partake, while Android’s assortment of spatial-supported services works with a true Atmos soundtrack on only a handful of services. It can get messy.

With the Momentum 5, Sennheiser has taken an approach similar to what we’ve seen from Bose and other players, emulating the spatial soundtrack and monitoring the direction of your head to nail the sound. So if you turn your head to the left, the music sounds like it’s more coming from the left, and so on and so on.

Tested on both iPhone and Android, neither appeared to run a real Dolby Atmos track rendered over Apple Music. You’re really getting more of a virtualised rendition.

It does the job, but it’s not always reliable. At times, you’ll swear that you’re faced forward, while the app will think your head is turned more to the left. Frustrating.

Interestingly, Sennheiser had noted earlier that head-tracked spatial would likely be unlocked earlier, giving us something to look forward to. And yet here ahead of release, it’s already switched on, so we could easily be seeing a buggy take on the tech.

If this is a preview of what’s to come, it’s hopeful that it gets better. At launch, spatial on the Momentum 5 feels more like a bolt-on than a made-for-purpose feature.

USB-C audio

A surprise addition not mentioned ahead of time is the inclusion of USB audio, something that shouldn’t be a surprise — Sennheiser is a sound company, and USB-C sound is a very audio-focused feature to include — but Sennheiser hadn’t noted it at release.

Given it also has the HDB 630 headphones, a pair literally designed for lossless audio, that should come as little surprise. While the HDB 630 are a stellar pair offering wireless lossless thanks to its special little USB connector, the Momentum 5 is also focused on lossless provided you bring the USB-C cable, something we’re all too happy to do.

Plug the Momentum 5 into your player of choice — phone, tablet, laptop, desktop — and you can get a decent high-resolution playback going. Connecting the pair to a Mac desktop automatically set them to 44.1kHz at 16-bit, but playing in the settings made it possible to deliver 96kHz at 24-bit. That’s as high as the Focal Bathys from a few years ago.

While you won’t see the extreme levels of 192/24 or higher, maxing out at 96/24 is going to be perfectly fine for most audiophiles, particularly those who are fine with staying tethered to their sound. Each to their own.

Battery

Improvements to the sound features aren’t the only place that has seen work done. The battery has seen a jump, which is impressive enough given the Momentum 4 previously offered around 50 hours of life.

There’s a slight increase in the Momentum 5, sporting up to 57 hours with noise cancelling switch on, and potentially more when the headphones turn the ANC off. It’s a little more life, and should see the headphones survive roughly two Qantas Project Sunrise trips with spare change, provided you wanted to fly for in 22 hour brackets.

For everyone else not spending nearly 24 hours on a plane, the extended battery life provided by Sennheiser means never having to think about whether your headphones will have battery life. Simply assume they will, because they probably will.

After three hours of use, the battery metre on the Sennheiser Smart Control Plus app was still firmly saying we had 100% life. We’re not sure that’s ever happened before.

Value

The only real question mark is the price, which sees the price rise considerably from its predecessor.

While the Momentum 4 were priced at $549.95 at launch, the $750 price tag on its follow-up is a full $200 higher. That’s quite a jump.

Technically it’s not out of kilter with other premium headphone offerings, and with the cost of living at present. Everything feels more expensive these days, and given Sony and Bose charge these sorts of recommended retail prices before discounts kick in, Sennheiser isn’t entirely out of order for doing the same. They’re actually less than Apple’s AirPods Max 2, while offering similar features.

We’re not sure if the price quite delivers value, though; you’re definitely getting a killer pair of headphones, it’s just a pair that costs serious dollars at launch.

What needs work?

The price is possibly the major point that will give you pause, but the other issues don’t feel like true red flags in any sense.

For instance, there’s a 2.5mm to 3.5mm cable if you use wired, but you can also use USB-C, so it’s not as if it’s your only option. You’ll mostly use wireless, we’re sure, so this isn’t that big of a deal.

And then there’s the spatial audio, which does the job, but isn’t a real sense of the stuff. Sometimes it just doesn’t get your head positioning right, because what even is centre.

These are minor. About the only major issue is the fact that the headphones don’t fold up, meaning they lie flat, albeit in a new case. To Sennheiser’s credit, the new carry case is smaller than prior models, but the cans don’t fold up to be smaller.

It’s not a major issue in the grand scheme of things, and very little in these headphones is a real deal breaker.

What we love

You can get over these niggles quite easily, and when you do, you’ll quickly see that Sennheiser has nailed more or less everything else about the headphones. They look good, sound great, and come with a pretty solid feature set.

And there’s also one more extra we weren’t expecting: the battery is technically replaceable. Sennheiser dropped that little tidbit when the news broke about the Momentum 5, and it’s still such a delight to think about. It moves the idea of a five- or six-year pair of headphones to one that could potentially last a lot longer.

The bigger point about the Momentum 5 is less about a pair of headphones that can last a while, but more one where the company producing the headphones realises the price of the product has to be justified over time.

While the $749 price tag of the Momentum 5 is relatively high, knowing you’ll be able to replace the battery later on lends more credibility to its life. It means that when the already impressive long life of the headphones starts to weaken, it shouldn’t be much more than a replacement of a feature you might just be able to do yourself. That can make all the difference.

Given the 3.5mm headphone cable takes the unfortunate approach of using the less common 3.5mm to 2.5mm option — something Bose has been doing for ages, as well — knowing Sennheiser is at least thinking of the future for the wireless capability is important.

As it is, the company has promised Bluetooth 6.0 support later on with an upgrade. It’s almost as if Sennheiser is acknowledging that the 2.5mm port is annoying, sure, but you’ll be able to use wireless for ages, because the battery can be fixed and the wireless connections will improve.

That’s a great message: this is a long-lasting pair of headphones that has the tomorrow in mind. These are top tier and thinking about the future.

Sennheiser Momentum 5 vs the competition

Not every pair of headphones is the same, and the Sennheiser Momentum 5 shares something in common with models it competes with: a high price. That’s a feature almost every brand is dealing with today.

Consumers find may it annoying, but that doesn’t change the fact that manufacturers are doing it. The Sony WH-1000XM6 retails at $699 before discounts, and the Bose equivalent in the Quiet Comfort Ultra 2nd-gen headphones are much the same. Apple’s AirPods Max 2 are even higher at $999, while a few others manage to fetch even higher prices, such as those from Bang & Olufsen and Bowers & Wilkins.

Great headphones aren’t inexpensive, that’s for sure.

In terms of how they compete, Sennheiser’s Momentum 5 seems to have Sony and Bose targeted quite well. The noise cancellation on this new pair is as strong as Sony and up there with Bose, while the sound is solid, too.

Sennheiser’s interpretation of spatial audio isn’t quite as playful as what you get on the Bose pair, and it’s certainly not real and using the actual Dolby Atmos soundtrack on music services like the Apple AirPods Max 2 does, but the result isn’t bad.

And frankly, you’re not going to be focused on spatial in the Momentum 5, which can feel a bit like an extra. Nice to have, but not really why you’re here; you’re coming for the sound, the battery life, and the fact that the battery has long-term promise due to it being replaceable. That’s just so unlike the industry.

Final thoughts (TLDR)

There’s clearly a lot to choose from in noise cancelling headphones, much of which is premium these days, and Sennheiser’s is no exception. While the Momentum 4 felt like a solid attempt at the best out there, the latest reads like it’s in a different class altogether.

These are better in just about every way. You might not want to take them off.

Made for mono maniacs and supports of stereo, the Sennheiser Momentum 5 are a top tier return for a company that knows its sound.

This is the comeback, with a pair of headphones as top tier as you could want. They’re just made for wireless sound without the gimmicks, plain and simple.

Bose and Sony have real competition this year, with Sennheiser bringing a pair that stands out in just about all the ways you’d want it to.

These top tier headphones are an easy choice. Easily a contender for headphones of the year and highly recommended.