Pros:
Retro modern looks
Retro modern build
The wooden knobs
Light and comfortable
Great bass depth and quality for 40mm drivers
Natural and rich mids where vocals shine
Smooth treble – never fatiguing
Cons:
Not the end game in resolution (but they’re $50)
As good as it looks, the thin plastic frame may not last
Nothing else at this pricepoint
Product links:
Preamble:
The lovely bloke Yellow at Fiio has kindly sent out the EH11s for review with no expectations of a positive review – and that’s exactly what he’s getting.
These are the latest retro design Bluetooth over-ear headphones. They house a 40mm Dynamic driver and retail for $50 USD.
I like to add on all my reviews –
I’m listening with my dual-mono aural side-pancakes, not yours.
I’m listening with my gear, not yours.
I’m listening with my love of audio, and not yours. YMMV…..
Now let’s get our aural hands dirty!
Gear:
For this review, my portable gear consists of my Samsung Z Fold 7 phone.
Unboxing and first impressions:
It’s a nice enough box. It shows the dark wood model on the front. I receive the light wood model inside.
It comes with orange pads and there’s a spare set of grey ones to swap.
There’s also a manual and USB A-C charging cable, and a packet of those awful Silica lollies too – I don’t know why I keep trying them, hoping they’ll get tastier. They don’t………..
Playlist:
A stack of new stuff across MANY genres
Cike Cike – Bebe Rexha
One – Primal Fear
Hollow (Instrumental) – Smash Into Pieces
The Fever Mask – At The Gates
Drag Path – twenty one pilots
Enter the Jungle – Diptyque x A COLORS ENCORE
The Important Stuff:
The FiiO EH11 is one of those products that shouldn’t work on paper — a retro‑styled, on‑ear, Bluetooth headphone in a market drowning in ANC flagships and TWS buds — yet somehow it walks in with a cheeky smirk, a biker’s leather jacket, and a bloody competent sound signature. It’s a nostalgia piece, sure, but it’s also a legitimately well‑tuned portable headphone with more technical ability than you’d expect from something that looks like it should be plugged into a Walkman.
This is the kind of gear that makes you go: “Oh sh*#… this is actually good.”
FiiO didn’t just slap a beige shell on a modern headphone and call it “retro.” The EH11 feels like a deliberate throwback to the 80s/90s portable era. It has a metal and plastic headband with exposed sliders, slim, lightweight on‑ear cups with soft foam pads that look like they belong on a vintage Sony.
They’re light, comfortable, and extremely portable. The clamp is mild, the pads are breathable, and the whole thing feels like a modern reinterpretation of the classic on‑ear portable headphone — but with better materials.
I do wonder how long the thin frame will last though.
They fit very well and don’t wiggle around when I’m walking around.
This is the headphone equivalent of a restomod car - old‑school silhouette, new‑school engineering.
Despite the retro look, the EH11 is fully modern under the hood. It supports Bluetooth 5.4, LDAC (one of the best BT codecs out there), multipoint pairing with on‑ear controls that don’t suck.
There’s no ANC, no transparency mode, but you can connect to Fiio’s Control app to test different sound signatures to find the right sound for you.
Cike Cike has an exciting beat and goes low. Well, blow me down now but the EH11s go low……REAL low!!!!!! Too low for this kind of headphone. Insane. And it’s clean bass, it’s not bloated or boomy. Bebe’s voice is really nice in the middle and it’s powerful. Treble is there aplenty but it’s not extended to the top frequencies. It is however still clean, detailed and free from crispness or crunch. Cymbals hit without any sibilance.
Colour me impressed after just the 1st track.
Hard-hitting Primal Fear up next and it’s frenetic from the first 3 seconds.
Again, the EH11s sound good. Too good for $50. Everything is clean but it has backbone too.
And for Bluetooth, the quality of sound is pretty bloody decent. It’s not the end in resolution but for what it is, it does it well!
Hollow is a new track for me. Again bass, is just nether-region deep here and it’s commanding.
Bass is almost at the visceral level, especially at the volume I listen (sometimes……) don’t do this at home kiddies!!.
I went high and then a beep came on. I think it was a warning, subliminally shouting “Andy, you’re an aural idiot!”.
I love having the wooden cup on the right as the volume knob. The left knob skips to the next track and back.
Hollow is clean, vibrant, punchy and full. Timbre and tonality are natural but rich for a BT 40mm over-ear pair of cans.
The Fever Mask is a sonic cess-pit of sludge, drudge and cookie monster growls. It’s intense. It’s deep. It’s an aural maelstrom of electric tumult.
The EH11s actually handle it pretty well.
Treble is smooth, not crisp, which is good on this song, because it could grate on you very easily with too much upper-register sparkle.
Drag Path is another new song for me. Vocals are right up front but not in any way shouty. They’re full, rich and have great weight. Staging is actually quite good and separation and imaging are equally good. Not top-tier but for $50, really impressive.
Finishing up with Enter the Jungle. No it’s not a Guns ‘N’ Roses cover……… it’s a jazzy funk explosion and it sounds great on the EH11s.
Trumpet is off to the right, clean drum clicking behind me, piano all around and double bass digging deep in the background. It’s all cohesive and separated beautifully.
Quality bass, natural and full mids and smooth treble, these things are a really easy listen!
The EH11 doesn’t chase the typical “fun V‑shape” of portable on‑ears. Instead, it goes for a balanced, slightly warm, easy‑listening signature with enough technical performance to avoid sounding mushy or dull.
For a portable on‑ear Bluetooth headphone, the EH11 is impressively competent.
Imaging is well‑placed, with no smearing. Detail retrieval is above average for this price and type of headphone.
Dynamics are surprisingly lively — not planar‑fast, but not sleepy either, like Grandpa Joe after 9 quick Shandies at his local rub-a-dub (and sleepy’s not all he gets, trust me……..).
A quick comparison (or 2):
My comparison pair will be the Moondrop Old Fashioneds. Not completely fair, as the Old Fashioneds are only $25.
The EH11s blow the Old Fashioneds out of the water. In stock form (pads and 3.5mm cable).
Detail, bass, weight, imaging all go to the EH11s. Easily. Very easily.
BUT, with the Yaxi pads on the Old Fashioneds, and a balanced 4.4mm cable, the canyon divide becomes just a ravine.
The bass went deeper, the treble opened up and they became more dynamic in general. This was most evident on Hollow. Bass definitely dug down further, treble became cleaner and I could hear more than I did in the stock form.
They still didn’t match the EH11s, but for $25 with some small modding, they came close.
I won’t compare against the Koss Porta Pros as in my review of the Old Fashioneds (https://www.head-fi.org/showcase/moondrop-old-fashioned.28775/reviews#review-40887), I favoured them over the Porta Pros (with pad and cable mods), so the EH11s will best the Porta Pros, given that logic.
Now on a side note, I don’t know if this is psychosomatic or just plain psycho, but I swapped the orange pads for the supplied extra set of grey pads. The grey pads seemed less vibrant, with reduced bass and dynamics. I put the orange ones back on and the bass, treble and dynamics returned. They look identical, save for the colour……
Conclusion:
For a portable on‑ear Bluetooth headphone, the EH11 is impressively competent.
LDAC is very clean and clear, near lossless.
Bass is excellent on these bad boys. It’s deep and powerful.
Mids are rich, strong and natural and the treble is smooth.
Imaging is very good for the price and dynamics punch much harder than they should.
I can’t remember enjoying a retro, 40mm Bluetooth pair of headphones in a looooong time.
I can highly recommend these as an excellent budget pair of very portable over ear headphones that punch way outside their weight division!
Thanks to Yellow at Fiio for allowing me to review the EH11s, I’ve really enjoyed them.
And thanks again readers for sticking with me, it means a great deal!!!
