A quest for the best headphone mics

The Vergecast

Vox Media Podcast Network

News, Tech News, Technology

4.4 • 4.1K Ratings

🗓️ 8 July 2025

⏱️ 63 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

On this episode of The Vergecast, we kick off Hot Girl Vergecast Summer with a classic Vergecast segment: the mic test. Guest host Victoria Song is joined by Vergecast producers Andru Marino and Erick Gomez to see how the Nothing Headphone 1, Sony WH-1000XM6, Apple AirPods Max, and Bose QuietComfort Ultra hold up against what’s possibly the noisiest street in Brooklyn. After that, Victoria is joined by Ladder CEO Greg Stewart to talk about what it takes to build a successful strength training app — especially for people just starting out. As it turns out, it’s quite challenging, between curating playlists, accommodating users’ different access to equipment, skill levels, and preferences for coaching styles. (And maybe, some occasional beef with Peloton?) Lastly, we answer a question from the Vergecast Hotline (call 866-VERGE11 or email [email protected]) about AI fitness summaries, whether people actually like them, what’s frustrating about them, and what scenarios they might actually be useful for. Want to learn more about the topics in this episode? Here are some handy dandy links for your reference: Nothing Headphone 1 review Sony WH-1000XM6 hands-on Apple AirPods Max review Bose QuietComfort Ultra review A lazy person’s guide to getting into shape Ladder isn’t done trolling Peloton The unbearable obviousness of AI fitness summaries Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello and welcome to the inaugural episode of Hot Girl Vergecast Summer, the flagship podcast where the hot girls of The Verge replace our stinky old men for a summer.
0:15.1	No, we love you. We love you. You're not stinky and you're not old. But anyway, I'm your friend Victoria's song,
0:23.2	and I'm filling in this week for David Pierce now that he's officially on parental leave.
0:28.4	I'll be your guest host for the next two weeks, and then I will be handing it off to another
0:33.2	one of my beautiful colleagues. It's going to be a really fun summer, and I think you guys are
0:37.8	totally going to have a blast with us. But today, the itinerary for today's show is we are going
0:43.9	to be testing out the mics from a bunch of different over your headphones, and I'm bringing in
0:48.3	our producers, Andrew Marino, and Erica Gomez to help me out with that, because they are the
0:52.3	audio kings, and I'm just a
0:54.9	wearable lady. You know what? That's not true. I test a bunch of fitness headphones, so I'm an
0:59.2	audio queen in my own right. And then, you know, once we're done with a microphone test,
1:04.5	we're going to talk to the CEO of a strength training app called Ladder. And the reason why is
1:10.4	because it turns out it's very difficult to build the strength training app. Trust me, I've tested dozens. Cardio apps, really easy. Strength training, for whatever reason, it's a lot more challenging. Anywho, I really enjoy Ladder. So I wanted to get him on and to talk about the challenges of making one that's actually pretty good.
1:32.1	And once we're done with that, we are going to take a question from the Vergecast hotline.
1:37.6	So, you know, all that coming up today and more, but first, I want to know what you're going to listen to on these over-your headphones
1:45.2	once we figure out which one is the winner from this mic test. I personally will be listening
1:51.0	to the entire soundtrack of K-pop Demon Hunters because I was not expecting it to rock as hard as it
1:57.6	does, but it does. Let me know if you watch this movie what your favorite
2:01.5	song from it is and why it's takedown, because that song is Chef's Kiss. Don't come at me if you
2:07.9	like soda pop. Anywho, we'll be right back. Avoiding your unfinished home projects because you're
2:14.4	not sure where to start, Thumbtack knows homes, so you don't have to.
2:19.2	Don't know the difference between matte paint finish and satin,
	...

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