SteelSeries Arctis Nova 61466

A 36-hour battery and 95th-percentile build in a 266g wireless headset. Sound quality is the price you pay, but for gaming, it's a steal.

The battery is the star here. 36 hours is over a day and a half of gaming, and the 15-minute USB-C fast charge giving you 6 hours back is genuinely useful. Build quality surprised us too, it's top of the charts for this category. But the sound is where things get rough. The 20Hz-22kHz range and 36Ω drivers are fine on paper, but our data shows music performance at 29.8 out of 100, which is a real letdown. The AI-powered mic does a decent job cutting background noise, but it's middle of the pack overall.

The Sennheiser MOMENTUM 4 absolutely destroys this thing on sound quality, but you'll pay a lot more for it. The JBL Tune 670NC is a closer budget competitor with better ANC, but its battery and build don't touch the Nova 4X. The Bose QuietComfort 2nd Gen is the pick if noise cancelling matters more than gaming features. For pure gaming value with multi-platform support, the Nova 4X holds its own against all of them, but it's not the best at any single thing except battery and build.

At USD 70 in the US, this is a solid deal for a wireless gaming headset with this battery life and build quality. But the CAD spread is annoying, CAD 134 to CAD 160 across two listings. If you're in Canada, hunt for the CAD 134 listing and skip the CAD 160 one. For the features you get, especially that 36-hour battery and retractable mic, it's worth it if gaming is your main use. Just don't expect it to double as your music headset.

The SteelSeries Arctis Nova 4X is a wireless gaming headset that nails the basics and skips the fluff. The one thing to know: you're getting a 36-hour battery, a retractable AI noise-cancelling mic, and multi-platform wireless in a 266g package that feels way more premium than its price suggests. Our database puts build quality in the 95th percentile, which is wild for a headset at this level. But sound quality lands in the 18th percentile, so if you're expecting audiophile-grade music, keep walking.

If you're looking for a headset that sounds amazing for music or has top-tier active noise cancelling, this isn't it. Go get the Bose QuietComfort 2nd Gen or the Sennheiser MOMENTUM 4 instead. The Nova 4X is a gaming headset first, and it shows in the sound department.

Buy the SteelSeries Arctis Nova 4X if you want a wireless gaming headset with killer battery life, a retractable mic, and build quality that punches above its weight. It's not for music lovers or ANC snobs, but for gaming across multiple platforms, it's a no-brainer at this price. The sound is the only real compromise, and for most gamers, the trade-off is worth it.