The Sony WH-1000XM5 are back down to their Black Friday pricing
Save $151.99: The Sony WH-1000XM5 headphones are back down to their Black Friday pricing of $248 at Amazon and Best Buy. Originally $399.99, you'll score a 38% discount on this deal.
A foolproof way to save on headphones this holiday season is by checking out deals on older models.
As of Dec. 22, there's one worth checking out: a $152 markdown on the Sony WH-1000XM5, which brings them down to just $248 at Amazon and Best Buy. Considering most new flagship models are $450 and up at full price, this is an especially worthwhile deal.
I had the chance to test the Sony XM5 headphones directly against the XM6 headphones, and though I appreciated the return of the folding ear cups to the XM6 headphones (from the XM4 model), I was also surprised by the minimal difference between the two. The noise-cancelling ability isn't all that different and though the sound quality was better in the newer model, it was a jump only noticeable as I tested the headphones on the same songs back to back.
Mashable editor Timothy Beck Werth also noted in his XM6 review that between the XM5 and XM6 headphones, the changes were "more iterative than innovative." The inputs, 30 hour battery life, and connectivity support remain the same between generations.
Though the XM6 headphones are also on sale as of Dec. 22, they're still $150 more than the XM5 headphones, making the latter a better buy from a pure value perspective (and the superior choice for anyone who doesn't need the latest and greatest tech from Sony). The XM5s still hold their own, and with this deal, you can also take your choice of colorway between the four available options.
Bethany Allard is a Los Angeles-based shopping reporter at Mashable covering beauty tech, dating, sex and relationships, and headphones. That basically means she puts her hair through a lot, scrolls through a lot of dating apps, and rotates through a lot of different headphones. In addition to testing out and rounding up the best products, she also covers deals for Mashable, paying an especially obsessive amount of attention to Apple deals and prices. That knowledge comes in handy when she's covering shopping holidays like Prime Day and Black Friday, which she's now done for three years at Mashable.
