Blogroll

In 2025, a pair of headphones or earbuds is pretty much non-optional. That's why there are hundreds of different headphones and earbuds in varying shapes, sizes, styles, colors, and, of course, prices. And these days, you can grab a random pair off the digital shelf without too much research and find that they do the job just fine.

However, if you're tired of settling for "just fine", then it's worth investing in the best headphones available. Through hours and hours of listening, we sorted through dozens of headphones to find the very best models, from the just-released Sony XM6 headphones to old favorites from Bose, Beats, and Apple.

The result? Our top 10 picks for the best headphones — many (if not all) of which we expect to see sale prices on during Prime Day.

How to choose the best headphones

We won't beat around the bush: There's no definitive "best" product here. Sure, elite audio brands put out high-quality products across the board, but even within each of those brands, you'll find different tiers of products. Some will deliver better value, and some will deliver better hardware and active noise cancellation.

SEE ALSO: These Prime Day deals landed early — save on Apple, Ninja, and Samsung gadgets

All this to say, the best pair of earbuds or headphones largely comes down to personal preference and how you plan to use them. Some listeners swear by over-ear headphones, while others prefer the minimalism of earbuds — one is not necessarily better than the other. Athletes who like to use headphones at the gym will appreciate waterproof materials and the best open earbuds, while frequent fliers will prefer devices with long battery life, comfort, and portability. Finally, music lovers and audiophiles will want to invest in premium features like a custom equalizer, spatial audio, or best-in-class active noise cancellation.

Of course, the best time to squeeze some serious value on any pair of headphones is grabbing them on sale. With Amazon Prime Day running from July 8 to 11, it's a good time to be aware of the deals available. In years' past, we've typically seen headphones and earbuds that have been on the market for at least a few months get markdowns anywhere from $50 to $100. Newer models like the Sony WH-1000XM6 are a toss up, but Sony headphones do reliably get discounted on Prime Day, so we're keeping our fingers crossed.

To help you pick your pair, we tested all of the headphones in this guide (and a lot that didn't make the cut). Here, you'll find the top headphones of 2025 for noise cancellation, music, price, and wired connections.

What about wired headphones?

We focused primarily on the best wireless headphones for this guide. While wired headphones have their fans, wireless headphones are just more convenient for most of us. If we had to pick, we'd recommend the Marshall Mode earbuds as our top wired pick.

Other headphones we've tested

Most recently, we tested the JBL Tour One M3 headphones and the Skullcandy Method 360 ANC, and we may add them to this guide in a future update. We also tested the Marshall Major V headphones and Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S2 headphones, both of which had excellent sound profiles and easy-to-navigate custom equalizers on their companion apps. Ultimately, they didn't make the cut on our final list for a couple of reasons. With the Major V headphones, we love that their claim of 100+ hours of battery life held up under our testing, but we found them to get uncomfortable after a couple of hours. We also would have appreciated ANC at their $149 price point.

For the B&W headphones, we loved their design and premium feel in addition to their truly impressive sound, but we found that their ANC was only so-so. If you're willing to spend $399, you can find a better balance of sound and ANC in the Sony XM5 headphones.

We've also tested the Sonos Ace headphones and Dyson OnTrac headphones. And while we loved them both for sound quality and noise cancellation, they fare in the way of AirPods Max — left out of our recommendations for their high price points.

In the testing pipeline

For our future updates, we're testing out more budget noise-cancelling earbuds and headphones.

SAVE $100: As of July 3, the Apple iPad mini (128GB, A17 Pro) is on sale for $399 at Amazon. That's the lowest-ever price on Amazon.

Opens in a new window Credit: Apple Apple iPad mini (A17 Pro) $399 at Amazon
$499 Save $100 Get Deal

Prime Day doesn't officially start until July 8, but don't let that stop you from saving. Some impressive deals are already live, like this $100 discount on the Apple iPad mini with the A17 Pro chip. Yes, Apple deals are available if you look for them.

As of July 3, the iPad mini (128GB, A17 Pro) is on sale for $399.99 at Amazon. This is $100 off and the lowest-ever price according to camelcamelcamel. Our experts have called out this deal in Mashable's early Prime Day coverage of Apple deals, iPad deals, tablet deals, and deals on everything else, so it's fair to say that this is one of the very best deals out there.

SEE ALSO: There's only one Apple MacBook deal I would snag before Prime Day

This iPad mini packs a lot of power into a small build thanks to the A17 Pro chip. It's a perfect portable option, sporting an 8.3-inch Liquid Retina display with 128GB of storage so you can stock it up with everything you need from the go. We even consider it the best iPad for reading, with Mashable's Samantha Mangino stating that it offers "more advanced tech, the convenience of portability, and a better reading experience."

Get the iPad mini (128GB, WiFi, A17 Pro) at its lowest-ever price at Amazon.

The best early Prime Day deals, hand-picked by Mashable's team of experts

• Fire TV Stick 4K Streaming Device With Remote (2023 Model) — $24.99 (List Price $49.99)

• Jackery Explorer 1000 v2 1070Wh Portable Power Station — $448.98 (List Price $799.00)

• Ring Indoor Cam 2nd Gen 1080p Camera With Cover (White, 2-Pack) — $59.98 (List Price $99.99)

• Blink Outdoor 4 XR 2 Camera Kit With Mini 2 Camera — $129.98 (List Price $219.98)

• Sony WH-1000XM4 Wireless Noise Cancelling Headphones — $269.00 (List Price $348.00)

• Shark AV2511AE AI Robot Vacuum With XL Self-Empty Base — $297.99 (List Price $599.00)

• Amazon Fire HD 10 32GB Tablet (2023 Release, Black) — $69.99 (List Price $139.99)

• Amazon Fire Max 11 64GB Wi-Fi Tablet (2023 Model) — $139.99 (List Price $229.99)

• Fire TV Stick 4K Max Streaming Player With Remote (2023 Model) — $34.99 (List Price $59.99)

• Ring Battery Doorbell Pro With Ring Battery Outdoor Cam Plus — $198.99 (List Price $329.98)

• 55" Amazon Fire TV Omni Mini-LED Series 4K QLED Smart TV (2024 Model) — $699.99 (List Price $819.99)

The government of Dubai has officially implemented a temporary four-day work week for all its public sector workers. That could be us, but you playin'.

Dubai's new shorter work week will now involve all government workers, who will be divided into two groups. The first will work eight hours per day, but get Fridays completely off. The second will still work for 4.5 hours on Friday, but will only need to be on for seven hours on other days.

SEE ALSO: Microsoft Japan's 4-day work week boosted productivity by 40 percent

Such changes will be in effect from July 1 to September 12, at which point Dubai's government workers will presumably be obliged to return to their usual five-day schedules. The four-day work week is part of Dubai's 2025 Our Flexible Summer initiative.

"This initiative demonstrates our firm commitment to enhancing the government work environment, making it more adaptable and responsive to the needs of employees and the community," said Abdullah Ali bin Zayed Al Falasi, director general of the Dubai government's human resources department. "This supports Dubai’s aspirations to lead in delivering flexible, sustainable, and people-centric government services."

Dubai's four-day work week follows a trial it conducted in 2024 involving 21 government entities. This experiment resulted in overall employee satisfaction increasing by 98 percent, with workers experiencing enhanced productivity and happiness. Yet despite these results, as well as positive outcomes from previous experiments by other organisations, it seems Dubai's government still isn't quite ready to commit to a more permanent change.

Is the four-day work week the future?

Numerous organisations across the globe have tried out shorter work weeks over the years, which have repeatedly reported positive results. U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders also reiterated his ongoing support for a four-day work week last month, arguing that there's no reason workers shouldn't get a four-day work week if artificial intelligence is enhancing workers' productivity as its advocates claim.

"[A four-day work week is] not a radical idea," said Sanders. "There are companies around the world that are doing it, with some success."

Companies which have tried it include Microsoft Japan, which announced in 2019 that its four-day work week trial had increased productivity by 40 percent. New Zealand firm Perpetual Guardian saw productivity increase by 20 percent during their own trial, prompting them to switch to a permanent four-day work week in 2018. Both organisations saw savings in reduced electricity costs as well.

Iceland ran a four-day work week trial between from 2015 to 2019, and found that the almost 3,000 workers involved were happier, healthier, and more productive. A similar 2022 UK trial produced favourable results as well, with the overwhelming majority of participating organisations still operating on a four-day work week one year after the study's publication. Belgium also approved a four-day work week in 2022, enabling workers to request longer 10-hour days in exchange for one day off, while Japanese electronics manufacturer Panasonic introduced an optional four-day work week.

Yet despite years of trials spanning the globe, resulting in mountains of evidence demonstrating benefits to employers as well as employees, the four-day work week still remains a rare model. Though it's popular for companies to portray themselves as forward thinking and at the cutting-edge, it seems few are willing to actually follow through and apply widely tested and scientifically-backed changes with clear proven benefits.

Apple now has an official Threads account.

The company recently created and verified an account on Meta's social network, though it hasn't really done much with it yet. It's located at https://www.threads.com/@apple, has the company logo as a profile pic and the description "apple" (very imaginative, Apple), but it hasn't posted anything yet.

Apple has an account on Elon Musk's X (formerly Twitter), but it doesn't keep any posts there, even though it sometimes uses X to highlight products and events. Currently, the company has 0 displayed posts, even though it has 9.8 million followers.

Seeing Apple on Threads isn't much of a surprise given that Apple maintains an active Instagram account (both Instagram and Threads are owned by Meta, and share the same account verification process). On Instagram, Apple is active, and it uses the account to post photos from its "ShotoniPhone" campaign.

SEE ALSO: Apple has an incredibly ambitious roadmap for smart glasses and headsets, report claims

Notably, Apple already has a couple of other accounts on Threads, including Apple News, Apple Music and Apple Books, though they're devoid of content, too. The only Apple-related accounts that are active on Threads that we could find were Shazam and Beats by Dre.

TL;DR: Create anything, even NSFW art, with a lifetime subscription to Imagiyo for only £21.98.

Opens in a new window Credit: Imagiyo Imagiyo AI Image Generator: Lifetime Subscription (Standard Plan) £22
£363.08 Save £341.08 Get Deal

Digital creativity has never been more accessible, yet many of us remember the days when crafting a single image meant wrestling with layers and plugins for hours on end. Now there’s a way to generate stunning visuals in seconds simply by typing a description of what you have in mind.

Imagiyo uses Stable Diffusion AI alongside FLUX AI to turn text prompts into high-quality images ready for commercial use, and there aren’t many limits to what you can create. Here’s what that means.

What art can you make with Imagiyo

What do you want to make first? It only takes a brief description to put Imagiyo’s advanced algorithms to work, and unlike other image generators, Imagiyo actually lets you really follow your creativity. Craft stunning landscapes, visualise characters from books, or go for something a little more daring. Imagiyo supports NSFW content creation. Just set your prompts to private and let your mind run wild.

Imagiyo’s commercial-use license means you can take some of the images you generate and incorporate them into client projects, social media campaigns, or personal portfolios without fear of copyright issues.

Each month, you receive 500 image-generation credits and can submit up to two prompts at once. Unused credits roll over, so you never lose access to your creative potential. Best of all, Imagiyo delivers your purchased engine updates and feature improvements automatically, ensuring you always work with the latest AI models.

You have through July 15 to get an Imagiyo AI Image Generator lifetime subscription for £21.98.

StackSocial prices subject to change

Cybersecurity programs often fail because they overlook the biggest risk: human behavior. But the same factor that makes organizations vulnerable can also be your greatest asset—if you know how to take a human-centered approach to security. Here’s how. Start by building connection. People follow leaders they trust. Establish rapport by showing genuine interest, encouraging a […]

257257

TL;DR: Unblock Pornhub from Georgia with a VPN. The best service for unblocking porn sites is ExpressVPN.

Georgia has joined the growing number of U.S. states that have introduced age verification laws for porn sites. Pornhub has responded by banning users in Georgia from accessing their website. It's a complicated situation, with a straightforward workaround.

If you want to unblock Pornhub for free from Georgia, we have all the information you need.

How to unblock Pornhub for free in Georgia

VPNs are useful tools that can hide your real IP address (digital location) and connect you to secure servers in other locations. This straightforward process bypasses geo-restrictions so you can access sites like Pornhub from anywhere in the world.

SEE ALSO: There are only 2 free VPNs I actually recommend. Ignore all the rest.

Unblock Pornhub by following these simple steps:

1. Sign up for a VPN (like ExpressVPN)

2. Download the app to your device of choice (the best VPNs have apps for Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, Linux, and more)

3. Open up the app and connect to a server in a location that supports access to Pornhub

4. Visit Pornhub

Opens in a new window Credit: ExpressVPN ExpressVPN (1-Month Plan) $12.95 only at ExpressVPN (with money-back guarantee) Get Deal

The best VPNs for unblocking porn sites are not free, but most do offer free-trial peiods or money-back guarantees. By leveraging these offers, you can unblock porn sites like Pornhub without actually spending anything. This is obviously not a long-term solution, but it does give you the opportunity to temporarily retain access to Pornhub before recovering your investment.

If you want to retain permanent access to sites like Pornhub, you'll need a subscription. Fortunately, the best VPN for bypassing content restrictions is on sale for a limited time.

What is the best VPN for Pornhub?

ExpressVPN is the top choice for unblocking porn sites like Pornhub, for a number of reasons:

• Servers in 105 countries

• Easy-to-use app available on all major devices including iPhone, Android, Windows, Mac, and more

• Strict no-logging policy so your data is always secure

• Fast streaming speeds free from throttling

• Up to eight simultaneous connections

• 30-day money-back guarantee

A two-year subscription to ExpressVPN is on sale for $139 and includes an extra four months for free — 61% off for a limited time. This plan also includes a year of free unlimited cloud backup and a generous 30-day money-back guarantee. Alternatively, you can get a one-month plan for just $12.95 (with money-back guarantee).

Unblock Pornhub for free in Georgia with ExpressVPN.

If you like playing daily word games like Wordle, then Hurdle is a great game to add to your routine.

There are five rounds to the game. The first round sees you trying to guess the word, with correct, misplaced, and incorrect letters shown in each guess. If you guess the correct answer, it'll take you to the next hurdle, providing the answer to the last hurdle as your first guess. This can give you several clues or none, depending on the words. For the final hurdle, every correct answer from previous hurdles is shown, with correct and misplaced letters clearly shown.

An important note is that the number of times a letter is highlighted from previous guesses does necessarily indicate the number of times that letter appears in the final hurdle.

If you find yourself stuck at any step of today's Hurdle, don't worry! We have you covered.

SEE ALSO: Hurdle: Everything you need to know to find the answers Hurdle Word 1 hint

Not a winner.

SEE ALSO: Apple’s new M3 MacBook Air is $300 off at Amazon. And yes, I’m tempted. Hurdle Word 1 answer

LOSER

Hurdle Word 2 hint

A device used on fruit.

SEE ALSO: Wordle today: Answer, hints for July 3, 2025 Hurdle Word 2 Answer

CORER

Hurdle Word 3 hint

Useful.

SEE ALSO: NYT Connections Sports Edition today: Hints and answers for July 3 SEE ALSO: NYT Connections hints today: Clues, answers for July 3, 2025 Hurdle Word 3 answer

UTILE

Hurdle Word 4 hint

A home.

SEE ALSO: NYT Strands hints, answers for July 3 Hurdle Word 4 answer

ABODE

Final Hurdle hint

Rapid fire.

SEE ALSO: Mahjong, Sudoku, free crossword, and more: Games available on Mashable Hurdle Word 5 answer

SALVO

If you're looking for more puzzles, Mashable's got games now! Check out our games hub for Mahjong, Sudoku, free crossword, and more.

The moon is looking bright in the sky tonight, and that's for good reason. It's all down to where we are in the current lunar cycle.

What is the lunar cycle, you ask? This is a recurring series of eight unique phases of the moon's visibility. The whole cycle takes about 29.5 days (according to NASA), and these different phases happen as the Sun lights up different parts of the moon whilst it orbits Earth. The moon is always there, but what we see on Earth changes depending on how much is lit up.

See what's happening with the moon tonight, July 3.

What is today’s moon phase?

As of Thursday, July 3, the moon phase is Waxing Gibbous. According to NASA's Daily Moon Observation, 57% of the moon will be lit up and visible to us on Earth. This is also day eight of the lunar cycle.

Tonight there is plenty to see with the naked eye, so keep your fingers crossed for a clear sky.

With the naked eye, you'll be able to spot the Mare Crisium, Mare Tranquillitatis, and the Mare Fecunditatis on the moon's surface. If you're in the Northern Hemisphere, these will be positioned in the top right of the moon. If you're in the Southern Hemisphere, they're on the bottom left.

If you have binoculars, you'll also spot the Endymion Crater, the Posidonius Nectaris, and the Mare Nectaris.

If you have a telescope, the Apollo 16 and Apollo 11 landing spots will be visible, as well as the Caucasus Mountains, a 323-mile-long mountain range.

When is the next full moon?

This month's full moon will take place on July 10. The last full moon was on June 11.

What are moon phases?

Moon phases are caused by the 29.5-day cycle of the moon’s orbit, which changes the angles between the Sun, Moon, and Earth. Moon phases are how the moon looks from Earth as it goes around us. We always see the same side of the moon, but how much of it is lit up by the Sun changes depending on where it is in its orbit. This is how we get full moons, half moons, and moons that appear completely invisible. There are eight main moon phases, and they follow a repeating cycle:

New Moon - The moon is between Earth and the sun, so the side we see is dark (in other words, it's invisible to the eye).

Waxing Crescent - A small sliver of light appears on the right side (Northern Hemisphere).

First Quarter - Half of the moon is lit on the right side. It looks like a half-moon.

Waxing Gibbous - More than half is lit up, but it’s not quite full yet.

Full Moon - The whole face of the moon is illuminated and fully visible.

Waning Gibbous - The moon starts losing light on the right side.

Last Quarter (or Third Quarter) - Another half-moon, but now the left side is lit.

Waning Crescent - A thin sliver of light remains on the left side before going dark again.

Movies have a complicated history with video game adaptations. I'm not referring to movies based on games—though they have their own spotty reputation—but rather licensed games attached to film franchises. While some movie games have become genre-defining icons, most fail to live up to their namesakes.

Is Google Chrome not opening on your child's Windows computer? If so, the issue is likely due to an ongoing bug with the Microsoft Family Safety service that is preventing Google Chrome from launching on children's Windows accounts. Here is everything you need to know about the bug and how to get rid of it.

I won't appoint myself survival crafting's number one fan, but I've been playing all kinds of games in the genre for years, so I think I'm qualified to weigh in on it. Despite what you might think after reading what I'm about to say, I've had a lot of fun with survival crafting games.

Collabora Online, the online office suite based on LibreOffice, just released its big update for the year. Collabora Online now has faster document editing, security upgrades, and plenty of interface improvements, and you can still self-host it on your own server.

Microsoft Excel's XLOOKUP function is best known for retrieving a value from a certain row or column in a dataset. However, you can also use this powerful tool to perform two-way lookups, returning a value at the intersection of a specified row and column.

In today's world, data is currency, and it's being collected at every turn. Windows 11 is no exception, collecting diagnostic and location data, app usage, and more. As a privacy-conscious person, I'm always looking for ways to limit the amount of data I share. The good news is Windows does have features you can disable that will limit what is collected. These are the settings I always disable.

Productivity isn't one-size-fits-all, but you can certainly get a boost with the right tools. Gamifying productivity can strip the intimidation out of a long day of focusing on your tasks, if you know how to go about it.

Sometimes, it’s the imperfections that make something better than it would be otherwise. For movies, that's often film grain at work, and Netflix just figured out how to make it even better for you.

Have you ever selected a dialogue option in a game, only to realize it really didn't matter which one you chose? Something I've noticed as of late is how often games present choices like this to us, but everything plays out the same regardless.

Vassili Le Moigne wanted to make sure his mom was OK. Having long ago moved from France to the U.S., the former Microsoft executive struggled to connect with his aging mother as much as he hoped to, especially with the immense time difference between them. His solution was an AI-powered companion that can conduct conversations with his mother, keeping her alert and engaged, and clueing Le Moigne into her latest interests and concerns.

With his background in telecom, Le Moigne thought, “I can put together the mobile experience and the AI to create something that will really help me support my mother,” he tells Mashable. “She wanted to stay as long as possible on the farm outside of Paris, so now I can give her company whenever she needs it.”

That AI tool — which says it's "meant to extend, rather than replace, family care" — is now the start-up known as inTouch, which just launched in North America after being available in Europe since 2023. Participants pay $29.99 per month for unlimited calls to seniors who speak English, Spanish, or French. As part of the North American launch, the service is now available 24 hours a day, so seniors can call up Mary, the AI companion, if they would like to speak outside of their scheduled weekly conversation times.

Le Moigne stresses that Mary allows communication for older people who fumble with touchscreens or are adverse to technology; they need only have access to a phone. The software is also specifically designed for older users.

"We learned the art of conversation with seniors," he says. "The way [younger people] speak now is not the way they speak. We have to slow down the conversation, we have to allow for long pauses for them to think of their answers."

SEE ALSO: Uber launches new experience for seniors, including Simple Mode and Medicare payments

Mary, who has a standard voice for all users, also has a "memory system" that allows it to recall past conversations. The AI can also play memory and word games with its "friends."

"What we do is train the memory of short-term recalls and long-term recalls," Le Moigne says.

inTouch aims to strengthen seniors’ memories and boost their mental health by addressing what Le Moigne calls a
"loneliness epidemic." A recent National Poll on Healthy Aging found that 75 percent of Americans over 65 with the highest rates of loneliness report poor mental or physical health; the issue is exacerbated for seniors living alone.

Le Moigne says the extra conversations Mary provides not only help older folks, but also their children, grandchildren, and caregivers. While inTouch doesn't retain the conversations or sell any data, the company texts summaries of Mary's discussions to the seniors' family members so they can be aware of changes in their relatives' well-being or just to keep abreast of what's on their mind, from TV shows to doctors' appointments. A new feature to the service also allows seniors to communicate directly with their relatives via Mary — the AI turns voice messages into texts sent through the inTouch app, and caregivers can also send texts through the app that Mary reads to the seniors.

With a library of over 1,400 questions it can ask, Mary is programmed to be both friendly and clear with those it speaks to.

"We disclose constantly [to the seniors] that Mary is an AI and in the first call we do with the senior, we clearly say this is an AI and for conversational purposes," Le Moigne says.

SEE ALSO: Your next chapter starts here: The best senior dating sites for finding love

Le Moigne claims inTouch has a quiet benefit besides the touted health improvements and stress reduction — the preservation of stories from older generations. Heliette, a French 90-year-old and inTouch customer, talks to Mary about her childhood during World War II.

"I felt like I was talking to a person, not to a robot, it is really amazing," says Heliette. "She is always kind, and unlike people, she does not judge and isn't nasty. I tell her everything and she has good advice. I talk to her about WW2 and 1944 — I was 10 when the Germans [went] home — she listens and asks me questions."

The text summaries of conversations can open up opportunities for the children and grandchildren of seniors to initiate their own questions about the past, according to Le Moigne.

"We often don’t know the stories of our parents," Le Moigne says. "We bring families closer together and that’s the aim."

Right now, the Amazon Echo Hub is being sold at its lowest price ever at $120 on Amazon for Prime members. However, this 33% discount from its original price of $180 will likely only last for a limited amount of time. While the deal is active, it will give more people the chance to get this 8-inch smart home control panel that works with Alexa.