Philips Sleep Headphones review: interesting idea, but nope

I love sleeping with my earbuds. The calming noises of an airplane interior or a distant thunderstorm help me unwind and fall asleep faster. However, my AirPods Pro 2 is not the most comfortable pick for this purpose, so when Philips asked if I wanted to try their earbuds made specifically for sleep, I readily jumped on the opportunity.

The reality turned out to be a bit disappointing.

The Philips Sleep Headphones arrived in a pretty big and slim box made of recycled cardboard—typical eco-friendly stuff. Inside, you will find an insert with the headphones in a carrying case, a short USB-A to USB-C cable for charging, and five sets of ear tips of different sizes. The smallest, number one, comes pre-applied on headphones. Each tip has a small hook for a secure fit, and they work very well.

I use my AirPods with their medium-size tips, so I immediately switched from number 1 to number 3 just to discover that they are too small. I had to go all the way to number five, but they were still not enough. Although they do not fall out of my ears (hooks do a great job at securing them), the sound isolation is poor for this type of earbuds. This left me feeling like the headphones were designed for kids or something.

The headphones have an unconventional shape and size. Philips brags about the thinner headphones, and it is true—they are indeed small. They drown in my ears and do not stick out or press against my head when sleeping on a side. Very comfortable.

However, because of this, all controls and the battery are located on a special pad that sits on your neck with twisted wires coming out of it. It is also well-made, with buttons all three buttons (power and volume) having nice tactile feedback and the pad covered in fabric.

The back pad is very light and thin, and you can barely feel it when wearing the headphones. But (and it is a big but), despite the tiny weight and thin profile, I just could not sleep on my back with these headphones on. The pad rubs against my neck, quickly becoming uncomfortable, forcing me to sleep on a side or on my stomach. I think Philips knows about it because all the promo materials showcase people sleeping on their side. Even the box says "Side Sleep Comfort."

I would say, if you prefer side-sleeping, these headphones will be good comfort-wise.

The Philips Sleep Headphones have a tiny battery that is only good for one (!) night. Yes, you should charge these every night. Also, charging is very slow—5V at 0.15A, which roughly translates to 0.75W. Even with a small battery, topping these headphones up requires nearly two hours, which is a big deal. Forgot to charge them before heading out to bed? No sleeping headphones for you tonight. Such a slow charging probably helps preserve the small battery, but it is still way too slow.

Also, the carrying case is just a case. Having a built-in battery for quick recharging (say, via pogo pins) would be awesome, and it would make up for slow wired charging. But no, the case is just a fabric case with a mold to stick the headphones. A bit disappointing, especially for the price of $219.

Now, let's talk about sound quality.

As usual, you cannot beat physics. It is not easy to make small, tiny drivers sound good. Add to that tips that struggle with sealing your ear, and you get quite underwhelming sound. Listening to anything but background noises or having a short phone call is nearly impossible. The bass is non-existent, and overall, they sound like a cheap pair of wired headphones from 40 years ago. Oof!

But let's not bog down on this. These are sleeping headphones, so the primary goal is to help you fall asleep to some pleasant sounds. This is where we come to the Kokoon app from Philips' partner in making these headphones.

Where do I begin? The application is... not good. I should address the elephant in the room: you cannot use the app without a $35/year subscription. Yes, these are $219 headphones that require a yearly subscription to make the most use of them. Say whatever you want, but I hate this approach, and stuff like this is an almost instant no-go for me. Although there is a free trial, you will lose access to a lot of the features of the headphones once you stop paying. The app simply won't let you log in without the subscription.

You can connect the headphones to your phone and use them without the app, but you will not be able to track your sleep, which, to me, is one of the main reasons to use the app. Speaking of sleep tracking, it offers plenty of data: bedtime, fell asleep time, wake time, estimated time to sleep, sleep duration, the number of awakenings, and sleep stages (awake, light, REM, deep, and off-head). There is also a tab with trends like time to sleep, bedtime vs target, and awakenings.

Although the app cannot sync with Apple Health (come on), I noticed that sleep tracking is pretty on par with my Apple Watch Series 10. Sleep and wake time match 100%, so a thumbs up for accuracy. I asked my contact for more information about sleep tracking, and I received the following:

The headphones use a combination of PPG sensing (you’ll see this under the right earbud) and movement detection to stage sleep and most importantly determine wake sleep. (PPG) is a non-invasive optical technique used to detect blood volume changes in the microvascular bed of tissue by shining an LED onto the skin then capturing this to measure Heart Rate Variability (HRV) which when combined with movement sensing is processed by our algorithms to determine the wearers sleep. It is the same technology used in the Apple watch, Oura ring and most home medical sleep trackers.

What I do not like is that the sleep timeline does not show the exact time for each stage—all you get is a simple chart with colorful segments, which is not very informative. This makes the need to pay for the app extra hard to swallow.

Besides tracking your sleep, the app offers various sounds, music, and meditation sessions to help you unwind and fall asleep. Most of them are alright, but some are very hard to listen to due to the low quality of the drivers. Stuff like white/brown noise was a bit too harsh on my ears.

The number of built-in sounds is pretty rich and includes stuff like campfire at the beach, rain in a car, fireplace, windy winter with owls in the background (loved it), rainforest, lake shore, night in the forest, underwater (also very cool), meadows, and more. The app says it can auto-fade the audio as you fall asleep, but to be honest, it was very difficult to check how that feature works. The app shuts down the audio when detecting sleep, so to me, it was either on or off. I mean, I tried, but I just could not notice how it works. I will take Kokoon's word for it.

Additional features in the app include a battery saver that pauses audio and shuts down headphones when you take them off (not sure why it is in beta, but okay), the ability to update firmware (I received one update during one month of testing), and that's it. Overall, the app feels a bit rough at the edges—it often logs me out, and the UI lacks polish and intuitiveness. Many other free and premium apps offer much better background noises for sleeping. Heck, iOS has built-in background sounds, so if you have an iPhone, you do not even need to download any apps for that.

Also worth noting is that the app received zero updates in over one month, which is quite a red flag for a subscription-based service and a pretty expensive device itself. I am okay with scarce updates for one-time purchases, but for subscription-based hardware, the bar is set high, and Kokoon is not delivering it. There were no updates at all, not to mention new features that would justify the hefty subscription.

Philips also says that the headphones can compensate for noises around you by using "smart white noise." At $219 plus a subscription, I would expect to see a more traditional noise suppression, but it is what it is. During testing, I noticed that headphones would add or amplify additional sounds at different volumes. I can say the feature works to some extent, but I would much rather have better tips with better passive noise cancelation.

I cannot say if the Philips Sleep Headphones improved my sleep. Sleep is a very personal subject, and I can imagine someone benefiting from what this device offers. However, at $219 with a yearly subscription, it is very hard, if not impossible, to recommend. Other, much more affordable sleep-focused headphones might not be the "world's thinnest," but they also have no irritating pads on your neck and probably no expensive subscriptions.

Yes, they help me fall asleep, but so do my AirPods. And just like with AirPods, I cannot spend an entire night with Philips Sleep Headphones on—despite the lightness and thinness, they become uncomfortable in the neck area, forcing me to take them off mid-night. Add to that a subscription, underwhelming software, and a hefty price tag... I wanted to love these, but sorry Philips and Kokoon, it is a no from me.