Acceptable for mixed usage. The JBL Live 500BT has a decent sound profile that is versatile for a wide variety of music genres. They are also decently comfortable but are a bit tight for some. They don’t have an ANC feature like higher-end similar models, which means they might not be the ideal choice for commuting. However, they can be a pretty decent option when playing music; since they don’t leak too much, you’ll be able to mask more ambient noise, which can be useful in an office setting. Even though they are stable headphones, they weren’t designed for sports and you will experience more sweat than usual when wearing these. Additionally, like most Bluetooth headphones, their latency will be too high for watching TV and gaming, but you can use them wired to nullify these issues.
Review of JBL Live 500BT: Bass Power
1. Design
Available in black, blue, green, red, or white models, the 500BT’s circumaural (over-ear) design features exceptionally comfortable memory foam on the earpads and the underside of the headband. The outer earcup panels are matte plastic, and the headband is covered in fabric. Large JBL logos are emblazoned on the outer panels of both earcups, and they are both Live buttons—more on that in a moment.
There are controls located along with the side panel of the right earcup. There’s a power/pairing switch that includes a status LED, a multifunction button that controls playback and calls management, and plus/minus buttons that adjust the volume when tapped or track navigation when held. We’re not fans of combining these two functions on the same button, as it’s too easy to skip a track accidentally when you mean to adjust the volume. You can also summon voice assistants with the multifunction button, though the outer panels also allow for this.
There’s an Ambient Aware button, as well as a Bluetooth button, along the same control panel edge. Pressing the Ambient Aware button cycles between two modes we’ll describe in a moment. The problem with all of these buttons is that there are small and feel similar, and it can be hard to memorize which does what.
Near these controls, there’s also a jack for the included 3.5mm headphone cable, which has a sporty cloth-lined look to it, and features a single-button remote and inline microphone. The included micro USB cable is of generous length and connects to an uncovered pot on the left earcup.
2. Sound Quality
The bass performance of the JBL Live 500BT is great. Their LFE (low-frequency extension) is down to 10Hz, which is excellent. The 4dB overemphasis in the low-bass results in a bass that has a bit of excess thump and rumble, but fans of bass-heavy music may prefer this. The mid-bass, responsible for the kick of drums and body of bass guitars, is also slightly over our target curve. However, there’s a small dip in high-mid, which could thin out the bass a bit.
The Live 500BT’s mid-range is also great. There’s a small underemphasis in low-mid, which thins out the vocals and lead instruments a bit, but this won’t be very audible to most people. Also, the rest of the response is virtually flawless throughout the range, resulting in an accurate reproduction of vocals and leads.
The treble performance of the Live 500BT is good. However, the response is slightly uneven and may sound overly bright and piercing, especially on already bright tracks. On the other hand, there’s a dip centered around 6kHz, which will negatively affect the detail and brightness of those frequencies. However, not everyone hears treble frequencies the same way, so your experience may vary.
3. Battery
With the LIVE 500BT headphones, JBL promises to deliver up to 30 hours of battery life, and true to its word, the battery of these newly launched headphones does deliver the promised performance when used in the wireless mode.
I used the JBL LIVE 500BT headphones for over a week averaging five to six hours every day and we had to charge the headphones only once in a span of roughly 10 days. With a battery life like that, you can go on a mini-vacation and forget about your headphones running out of juice in between.
What we particularly liked about these headphones is that while the battery takes a long to discharge, it gets charged completely in one and a half hours. Besides this, you can also track the battery status from the My JBL Headphones app.
4. Calling Quality
The recording quality of the integrated microphone is sub-par. LFE (low-frequency extension) is at 392Hz, which means transmitted/recorded speech with this mic will sound noticeably thin. The HFE (high-frequency extension) of 3.4kHz indicates speech that lacks detail and is noticeably muffled. This will have a negative effect on the intelligibility of speech, but it should still be understandable in quiet environments.
If you are looking for a pair of headphones that you can use as your second skin or maybe in this as your second pair of ears, the JBL Live 500BT are a great pair of headphones to roam around with. They are comfortable and compact. They offer a battery life that will serve you for almost a week. And they come loaded with features that make them ideal for outside (and even inside) use, which is all anyone, can ask for in a pair of headphones.
