- Cleer Arc 5 has been revealed
- Premium open earphones with sports loop
- Offer Dolby Atmos and THX Spatial Audio
I was under the impression that the best open-back earphones were designed for sports users, but I must have missed a memo. The Cleer Arc 5 has just been revealed and they are targeting a very different market.
Unveiled just four months after the Arc 4, these new earphones are undoubtedly premium buds; they’re $219.99 (about £170, AU$340), and in my opinion, the $299 / £299 / AU$449.95 Bose Ultra Open Earbuds only cost more – although the Shokz OpenFit Pro, launched in 2026, are roughly the same price as these new Cleer audio groups (and also offer spa-certified sound).
From a glance at the spec list, there’s a lot to like from Cleer here. The buds have 16.2 mm drivers, up to 12 hours of endurance in the buds (up to 60 with the case), support for a wide range of wireless codecs – LDAC, aptX Adaptive and aptX Lossless – and a case with a built-in touchscreen. But it doesn’t seem like that’s all.
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The name of the Cleer Arc 5 game, according to the company, is the special kind of spatial sound. Not only are the earphones optimized for Dolby Atmos, but they are also certified for THX Spatial Audio using head tracking. As far as I can remember, that’s brand new for open earphones (the aforementioned Shokz set can do main track immersive sound, but they don’t come with the THX seal of approval).
Traces of spatial sound
Spatial audio tools like Dolby Atmos and THX aren’t just useful for movies or games; they help build on the soundscape of your music. It’s a feature popular with some (but not all) audiophiles, as it can bridge the gap between budget and high-end kit.
But you know what’s not so popular with audiophiles? Open earphones. This form factor is useful for safety when you’re in busy public areas, but the nature of the beast is typically that sound quality suffers.
In this type of earplug, the driver is held slightly further away from your ear – there is no seal created between the ear canal and ear tip to maximize the sound wave’s journey from the driver to the eardrum. Ambient sound comes in and detail, definition and impact (especially through the bass) is lost as a result. Even the best open earbuds usually struggle with sound quality compared to budget in-ears.
So it feels like an odd choice for Cleer to offer fancy codec support and features in open-back earphones, since you might not really appreciate them because of their physical design.
Despite features like Dynamic Bass Enhancement, which could go some way towards solving this problem, I’d still be surprised if you can really appreciate spatial sound when noisy traffic is zooming and honking around you.
I bet they’ll sound great when you’re somewhere quiet: the spec list puts them above most alternatives I’ve tested recently.
I’ve been proven wrong with open earbuds in the past, and hopefully I will again. Otherwise, it will be hard to justify the hefty price tag of open-back earphones that you can’t appreciate…
The best open-back earphones for all budgets
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