Audeze is back at it with a new gaming headset that takes advantage of their famous high-fidelity planar magnetic drivers. The Audeze Maxwell was designed from the ground up for accurate gaming, with quick response times and impressive directional details that makes every gaming session smoother — whether you're a pro gamer or an enthusiastic hobbyist like me.
I got to spend some serious quality time testing these excellent wireless gaming headphones out. Read on for my firsthand impressions.
The Maxwell has a wildly long battery life of over 80 hours. You can play on and off for days (even weeks) at a time before you'll need to charge the headset again. Even then, it supports fast-charging. You can plug them up for a quick 20-minute charge and net more than enough power to play for the rest of the day unimpeded.
This headset comes with an embedded Dolby Atmos license. This provides high-quality spatial audio that boosts your immersion with compatible games, from single-player sandbox adventures to competitive co-op titles. Just download the free Dolby Access app to activate your license and personalize your spatial audio.
This headset includes both a detachable, flexible boom mic and onboard array of four beamforming microphones. The built-in noise suppression system is powered by an advanced AI algorithm that kills background noise, removing distracting sounds like you chewing on your lunch or the washer kicking on in the background. This keeps your chat clear, helping you hear and respond to important call outs for improved teamwork.
While playing on PC you can also control your game-chat mix in real-time with a dial built into the headset or use the Audeze HQ app. If you're playing on PS5 you'll need to tinker with the onscreen console settings instead.
Audeze has a stellar reputation with my coworkers, especially our headphone expert Jeff Miller, so I was pumped to take part in the Beta test for these high-performance gaming headphones. I had the opportunity to run the Maxwells through their paces over the course of a couple weeks, playing a variety of games almost nightly on my PS5. I also spent hours listening to music via Bluetooth while I typed away during the day.
To make a long story short, the Audeze Maxwells sound straight-up awesome and really brought my gaming sessions to life. My PlayStation experience should be comparable for folks on Xbox systems, but keep in mind that there may be some differences.