A modern head-fi great is bringing out planar magnetic headphones with huge drivers and an even bigger frequency range — and yet the headband might be the coolest part

  • Open-back headphones with 100mm planar drivers
  • Full Drive Tech for larger effective area
  • $799 (about £595 / AU$685)

Moondrop has unveiled its new Skyland planar magnetic headphones, with very large and efficient drivers – but the thing I’m most intrigued about is its headband.

The Skyland’s headband consists of a flexible, hollow, carbon-fiber strap and headband that’s been 3D-printed in a multi-segmented adjustable design to deliver good support, light weight and superb breathability for heads of all sizes.

The headband might not be the most technically impressive part of these very high-spec headphones, but if it’s as comfortable as it looks it’ll make a big difference during long listening sessions.

Of course, the headband isn’t the key selling point here: that’s the very large 100mm planar magnetic driver with 500nm diaphragms and fine mesh protective grilles.

The driver features Full Drive Technology to put the planar circuits across the entire vibrating section of the driver rather than in a rectangle down the middle of it, and Moondrop says that results in performance “comparable to that of electrostatics” and with treble “far superior to that of traditional planar magnetic headphones”.

Moondrop Skyland headphones nestled inside their protective aluminium case

(Image credit: Moondrop)

Moondrop Skyland headphones: key features and pricing

The Skyland headphones are open-back with a low-diffraction matte surface and a metal protective grille placed quite far from the diaphragm so it can provide protection without interfering with the audio. The earcups are fitted with soft lambskin earpads that have been modelled to ensure they don’t impede the sound.

The headphones themselves are made from a high-strength all-aluminum alloy CNC hollow structure, and feature a thin suspension system for the drivers that Moondrop says is “challenging to manufacture” but delivers abundant detail.

The headphones’ cables are replaceable and use a universal 3.5mm interchangeable design with an inclined angle. The supplied cable is a 4.4mm balanced one with a 4.4mm to 6.35mm adapter and a 4.4mm to XLR balanced Cannon four-core adapter.

The Skyland headphones have an impedance of 60 ohms, and a claimed frequency response of 8Hz to 34kHz, which is pretty impressive. Sensitivity is 96dB/Vrms.

The Moondrop Skyland planar magnetic headphones are available now with a list price of $799 (about £595 / AU$685).

Follow TechRadar on Google News and add us as a preferred source to get our expert news, reviews, and opinion in your feeds. Make sure to click the Follow button!

And of course you can also follow TechRadar on TikTok for news, reviews, unboxings in video form, and get regular updates from us on WhatsApp too.

Read more @ TechRadar

Latest posts

Georgia Tech announced the finalists in its wild musical instrument competition

There’s a playable henge of fiddles. | Image: Georgia Tech / The Verge Georgia Tech has announced the finalists in its annual Guthman Musical Instrument...

iBuyPower’s gaming desktops are discounted for Presidents Day

Buying a pre-assembled gaming desktop makes sense for some. It can save you time and money, too, compared to buying PC components piecemeal. If...

Watch the NASA SpaceX Crew-12 mission dock with the ISS

The Crew-12 mission, SpaceX’s 20th human spaceflight, launched at 5:15 AM Eastern on February 13 from Cape Canaveral in Florida. It’s expected to...

OpenAI has officially retired the controversial GPT-4o model

OpenAI's GPT-4o may have survived its first brush with going offline, but it won't be as lucky this time. OpenAI has officially retired GPT-4o,...

What to read this weekend: The unsettling new horror novel, Persona

Need something new for your reading list? Here are two titles we think are worth checking out. This week, we read Aoife Josie Clements'...

Disney accuses ByteDance of ‘virtual smash-and-grab’ when using copyrighted works to train its AI

Disney is going after another generative AI tool, accusing ByteDance and its recently released Seedance 2.0 of using its copyrighted material without permission. As...