For $150, Samsung's Galaxy Buds Plus offer clear and crisp sound that's suitable enough for casual listening. Compared to last year's earbuds, the new Galaxy Buds have a two-way dynamic speaker with a woofer and tweeter, improvements that Samsung added to boost the earbuds' audio capabilities.
But I still preferred the $130 Echo Buds when it came to overall sound quality. Amazon's earbuds generally provide more depth and weight when listening to music, making Samsung's earbuds sound somewhat shallow in comparison. You can customize how Samsung's earbuds sound in the Galaxy Buds Plus companion app, but I generally felt like they sounded best on "normal" mode anyhow.
The AirPods Pro unsurprisingly sounded richer and more full-bodied than the Galaxy Buds Plus too, but they're also $100 more expensive.
The Galaxy Buds Plus don't offer active noise cancellation, but they do seal your ear enough to adequately block out some noise from your surroundings. In this regard, they're much better than Apple's standard $160 AirPods, which don't provide any seal. Still, Amazon's Echo Buds go one step further than the Galaxy Buds Plus by offering active noise reduction.
Samsung says its new Galaxy Buds can provide 11 hours of playback and an additional 11 hours of battery life from its charging case. That's far higher than the battery life of the standard AirPods and Echo Buds, both of which provide five hours of playback.
I haven't had the opportunity to use the new Galaxy Buds Plus for 11 consecutive hours, but if Samsung's claims hold up then that would mean its new earbuds should come in handy during long flights. Otherwise, the earbuds offer roughly 22 hours of battery life total considering they get an additional 11 hours from the charging case, which roughly puts them on par with AirPods and Echo Buds. After using the earbuds for roughly three days, the case had 55% of its battery left.