[DoubleF]

I got the XM5 and after playing with them, I'm wildly confused at what I think of these headphones. It ranges from amazing to brutal. When it shines, it blows everything else I've tried away and I can't help but smirk. When it's weird, I legitimately cannot help but grimace and make faces. It is as if I must display an opinion when listening to these.

Overly simplified and I've only had a few hours with these...

ANC, office usage (calls, webinars etc). Amazing to go from ambient room of people to feeling like the only person in the room.
Music... It depends. Blegh to damn good, but you have to play with the EQ. I listen to a wide variety of music so it's constant fiddling. Someone who listens to albums or music with less variation in styles wouldn't notice this as much.
Doom scrolling... Wtf? Not wrong but enjoying ANC to hearing detailed sounds in the recording that ANC would typically eliminate completely... eww.

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Features and settings... This thing is ridiculous in good and bad ways. You would really need a little bit of time to make these your own. Coming from primarily wired headphones the features were obvious and weird to me right out of the box.

They're super comfy and light. Things like speak to chat automatically pausing music is weird when you've never had that feature. A test to create your own EQ and spatial sound exists. Auto turning off of headphones when they're removed is also odd if you're coming from wired that don't do this. Touch controls are awesome, until you keep activating a voice assistant. Cupping the right headphones allows for a temporary "mute" which I think is great. All of these are things you can easily edit in an app and I assume they're there by default so you know the feature exists. But I felt kinda confused, annoyed and lost at first before I realized what was going on. Clicking a button announced battery life which was great. It didn't do this for ANC, ambient mode and off which would have been more useful than battery life notification IMO.

Updated firmware didn't change anything. And you'll really need the app.

So... Yeah. I'm kinda torn. I don't feel like these will ever be headphones I can simply plop on my head and enjoy in all scenarios with little intervention. It did this thing where it really shines somewhere but means compromise elsewhere. When I reread the descriptions of the PX7/PX8, I think the intention is something you plop on your head and are happy in almost all scenarios without fiddling with anything. The PX7 is intended to be closer to critical listening vs the PX8 more intended to be emotional like the XM headphones. I think someone coming from higher end wired headphones would prefer them over jumping directly into the XM/Quietconforts.

I read that the Bose Quietcomfort have similar "issues". The fact these two are in a league of their own for ANC might be a double edged sword. I think these would be amazing for an office only application or loud commute application. For an all scenarios application, I'm not as convinced. It's obvious there are scenarios where these headphones shine and blow the competition away. I think there are many that would be extremely happy with these headphones. I just think the vast majority of my time is not in the scenarios where these shine.

I didn't imagine I would, but I am leaning towards returning these headphones. They excel in ways I rarely deal with. These are great for media I want to listen to in a vacuum like movies and music. But certain types of media just sound so strange. If my preferences differed, I'd totally keep these. But alas. Now that I've experienced these, I think I'd also skip the Bose QC and PX8. I think PX7 would be closer to how I personally enjoy using the headphones.