“The boAt Nirvanaa Tres features a trio of drivers inside each earpiece”
Gone are the days when you had to spend an arm and a leg to acquire a good-sounding pair of IEMs. In fact, over the course of last year, I have reviewed a number of in-ear type headphones from various companies which blew the cost-to-performance ratio out of the water. One such brand which recently got on my radar is boAt lifestyle, a company popular for its affordable earphones and headphones. Recently, the brand launched triple-driver IEMs in the country dubbed the boAt Nirvanaa Tres at a wallet-friendly price point. Since most triple-driver IEMs still cost a significant chunk, I decided to give the Nirvanaa Tres a shot and here’s what I think after using them for a week.
Table of Contents
The lowdown
I am conflicted over the design of the boAt Nirvanaa Tres. On one hand, the IEMs look really cool, thanks to the stunning two-tone finish and are an eye-candy to say the least. On the other hand, the plastic-y build feels cheap and try as I might, I couldn’t find the right set of eartips which would keep the earphones from falling out of my ears. Furthermore, the earphones don’t weigh a whole lot either which would’ve been a good thing if they would just stay anchored in my ears. Suffice it to say, if you are looking for a pair of earphones for the gym, you should probably steer clear of the Nirvanaa Tres.
You’ll find the same theme throughout the course of this review. The boAt Nirvanaa Tres is a solid pair of IEMs, but I feel that the product requires a bit more polish. Take the earphones’ in-line remote control for instance, which comes with three buttons, all offering a satisfactory tactile feedback. However, I noticed that the controls don’t play well with Android smartphones and the Nirvanaa Tres refused to switch to a different song if the display on my OnePlus 5T was off. With the display turned on, the controls worked seamlessly, but that defeats the purpose of having music controls on the earphones in the first place.
Thankfully, the boAt Nirvanna Tres deliver where it matters the most and offer a fun sound signature with ample bass and clear mids. For all the spec-heads out there, the IEMs ship with two 6mm dynamic drivers and one balanced armature driver inside each earpiece. The earphones are rated at an impedance of 32 ohms and therefore, users won’t need a dedicated DAC to drive them. In terms of sound quality, the Nirvanaa Tres undoubtedly favour the low-end over other frequencies owing to which, the vocals, as well as the instruments, sound a bit deeper than they should. That said, the bass output has been finely tuned and the earphones give other frequencies room to breathe too, which is a rarity in most budget IEMs.
You can obviously enjoy songs from other genres on the Nirvanaa Tres too, but the IEMs’ forte is hip-hop/EDM genre. Regardless of how chaotic the beats got, the IEMs didn’t muddy the details and the more I listened to the earphones, the more I liked the IEMs’ sound signature. Simply put, the bass output of the Nirvanaa Tres is a thing of beauty.
You’ll get your money’s worth if you listen to a lot of rock songs on the Nirvana Tres too. The IEMs offer excellent instrument separation and you won’t lose out on any details even when there are four different guitars ripping power chords at the same time. The earphones don’t sound sibilant at higher volumes either, which is often the case with budget IEMs.
Verdict
You can pick up the boAt Nirvanaa Tres for around Rs 2,990 from Amazon (at times even less) and for the price, you get a pair of fun-sounding IEMs which can reciprocate almost any song as it was intended without butchering the details. Now, I had a problem with the fit of the IEMs but since earphones aren’t a ‘one size fits all’, your mileage might vary. Everything considered, if you are in the market for a pair of affordable triple-driver IEMs, then you should definitely check out the boAt Nirvanaa Tres. They might not be able to compete with some other high-end triple-driver offerings, but come eerily close while retailing for significantly less.
Editor’s rating: 3.5 / 5
Pros:
- Good bass output
- Clear mids and highs
- Eye-candy design
Cons:
- Earpieces don’t stay anchored in the ears
- In-line remote control doesn’t play well with Android devices
