Skullcandy has always been one of the coolest names in the audio space, known for its edge design language and fairly impressive sound experience. Over the last couple of years, the American company has also thrown its hat in the ring when it comes to wireless earbuds. I tried out the latest Skullcandy Mod True Wireless earbuds and here’s how it fared.
Opening the nifty charging case, and the two buds are nestled inside. I’ve got the True Black colour, although there’s a nicer Light Grey and Blue variant available. Along with these, there’s three pairs of ear gels and a USB-C charging cable, in the box.
The Skullcandy Mod fits my ears well and is designed to pause a track with a single press on any earbud, and change volume with a double press. The touch-sensitive button to pause, play, and enter pair mode is on the top half of the earbud and unfortunately, doesn’t respond to a light touch. Often requiring a hard press to activate, the earbud pushes annoyingly against the ear canal.
The sound quality is fairly captivating, regardless of whether I was listening to music, or watching TV shows. In Divenire by Ludovico Einaudi, the piano and the string orchestra shine through the Mod earbuds, and it does justice to pop hits by The Chainsmokers and Coldplay as well.
The bass is impactful and you do have the option to customise the soundstage of the TWS. The app features three built-in EQ presets – Music, Podcast, and Movie – which are fully customisable.
The Skullcandy Mod is easy to pair with Skullcandy app on both Android and iOS. The app lets you switch on the ‘Stay Aware’ mode, apart from letting me access user guides to re-pair with devices and tweak the media controls.
The Mod earbuds feature Tile support for locating the earbuds in case they’re misplaced. However, the Skullcandy app doesn’t facilitate this. I had to download the Tile app separately to locate the Mod.
Pros: Excellent multi-device pairing, great audio, and great battery life
Cons: Position for touch gestures
Call quality
The Mod features clear mic technology that seems to be aimed at people taking calls on their phones and laptops. On calls, I often heard the other person clearly, but sometimes my voice came across as a bit synthesised to the listener.
While commuting, the ‘Stay Aware’ mode helped me hear ambient noise, though I’ve heard better with over-ear headphones that offer the same feature.
Battery life
The battery life of the earbuds is stellar, getting through 7-9 hours at a stretch based on varied usage. The company claims that the carry case provides an additional 27 hours to the earbuds. The battery indicator LED at the bottom of the case is a bit confusing – it shows a blinking yellow light below 95 per cent charge and red below 40 per cent.
Conclusion
The Skullcandy Mod is undoubtedly worth the price for having a multi-point connection that lets you connect seamlessly to the laptop and phone at the same time.
Despite competition from Samsung Buds 2 Pro, Apple Airpods 2, and Sony WF-1000XM3, the Skullcandy Mod holds its ground to become one of the best options for overall sound, multidevice support, and battery life.
