JBL’s new elite headphones include a touchscreen audio transmitter to connect to anything easily… and to share audio with anyone else easily
- Adaptive noise cancellation and spatial audio with head tracking
- Included wireless transmitter to stream from almost any source
- $399, on sale April 2025
JBL makes some of the most interesting headphones around, and the newly announced JBL Tour One M3 have a very interesting component. JBL calls it the SMART Tx, and it’s a little wireless transmitter that makes it easy to stream to your headphones from pretty much any audio source, and to share that audio with others, too.
The specification of the headphones is pretty tasty too, with adaptive ANC, hi-res Bluetooth streaming and lossless audio too. Battery life is a promised 70 hours, and you can get five hours playback from a five-minute fast charge.
JBL Tour One M3: key features and pricing
The Tour One M3 headphones are built around newly developed 40mm mica dome drivers, and the sound they make can be personalized via the JBL headphones app using the JBL Personi-Fi 3.0 custom hearing profiles. Those profiles include 12-band EQ and separate optimization for the left and right stereo channels. The headphones also have JBL Spatial Sound with head tracking.
The Tour One M3 come with version 2.0 of JBL’s adaptive noise cancelling, which uses eight microphones to listen to the world around you and which also offers customizable Ambient Aware and TalkThru modes to control what audio you want to let in. There’s adaptive beam-forming via four microphones to make you sound clear in calls.
Bluetooth is 5.3, and there’s support for Auracast broadcasting as well as receiving, and there’s a built-in DAC to deliver lossless audio over USB-C.
Auracast is one of two tricks that the SMART Tx transmitter offers. First, the box enables you to connect your headphones to almost any audio source – USB-C or analog – and then stream its audio to your headphones in high-quality audio that also promises to be latency-free. But you can also share audio over Auracast to compatible devices, so you can connect the transmitter to your laptop and broadcast to as many people as you want. It’s an interesting idea and could potentially be a lot less fuss than constantly pairing devices or trying to find cables to connect to.
The JBL Tour One M3 headphones with JBL SMART Tx will go on sale on April 13, 2025, in a choice of Black, Mocha or Blue. The US price will be $399.95, which is roughly £322 / AU$640.
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Adaptive noise cancellation and spatial audio with head tracking Included wireless transmitter to stream from almost any source $399, on sale April 2025 JBL makes some of the most interesting headphones around, and the newly announced JBL Tour One M3 have a very interesting component. JBL calls it the SMART…
