I'm eager to give this feedback to both, other potential buyers as well as Bose, who I believe can greatly improve this product by just a few tweaks.

I bought the Ultra Headphones as an update for my previous QC45, I've also used 700's for some time ago, borrowed them from a friend to compare to my QC's. So I can talk about how these compare to all other latest Bose Headphones.

I was very excited about new immersive sound, better aptX codec, updated design and other features. Anticipation of all those improvements felt like a fair reason for increased price, but as a result the product lack a lot of important things. I will divide my feedback to a few categories:

• Sound Quality
  Overall it is great, comparable with the rest of top consumer-grade Bose earphones. However, Bose advertised support for aptX codec, which is, if fact, doesn't work with most phones, because QC Ultra support only aptX Adaptive version which needs to be also supported by your other device. aptX issue is a result of a bad communication about a product. Immersive mode is nice, but at the end of the day, I almost don't use it.
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• Comfort
  While the general comfort is stunning, headphones are light, soft, greatly built, but there's a but. It is heavily compomised by a bad controls. I've described all of that below.
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• Durability
  Seems good, the only thing I personally don't like is a coating of a black headphones, it collects fingerprints and skin oils as crazy.
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• Ease of use
  This is a massive downside in my opinion because of a few things:
  Bose did not include a conversation mode from 700's which is insanely useful feature for a noise-cancelling headphones. I thought it would be available as a new "shortcut" action, but it is completely missing. Massive fail, I hope so much they will bring it back in an update.
  All controls are on one right earcup, would be much more usable to have at least one of them on the other cup, better for usability.
  Cost-cutting completely defeat usability, just one button for most controls, play/pause/next/previous by short presses, switching between modes by long press. Combine this with the absense of a conversation mode and as a result it is easier to just take them off completely every time you need to hear something.
  The last massive issue with Ultra's for me is that smooth sliding headband combined wit ha new case. New case for Ultra's have a dedicated concave place for each earcup. In order to put them back into case you need to push the adjustable headband into a fully retracted (closed) position. Otherwise they won't fit. And so every time you get them from the box, literally, you have to adjust them again by smooth sliding, because they don't have that clicky steps of different positions (like QC45 had) that you can rely on.
  I ended up marking my perfect fit with a black permanent marker on both sides of a headband. Disgusting thing which I'm getting reminded at least twice a day when I pack and unpack my headphones.

• Appearance, Noise Cancellation and Voice Pickup are just fine, everything is just as I expected.

Conclusion.

These could easily have beed the best Bose headphones so far, real "ultra" headphones, but they just don't because of a few very strange product decisions that Bose made. Some of which can be easily fixed with a firmware update, some of them can't.

P.S. I've also posted this review to Bose website, but hopefully by also posting it here we can kick-in some conversation and rise Bose awareness about some issues.

Wondering what other issues I've missed.

I’ve had a bunch of noise-canceling headphones over the years: AirPods Pro and Pro 2, Parrot Zik 3, Sony XM3, and for the last five years, I’ve been using Bose QC35II daily. I absolutely love those for how comfy they are.

When the Bose QC Ultra Headphones came out, I watched a ton of reviews and figured it was time for an upgrade. So, I bought them, used them for a month, ran into a bunch of issues that nobody really talks about, and ended up selling them.

Here’s what bugged me:

1. Hiss from the noise cancellation. In a quiet room, when no music’s playing or it’s super low, there’s this annoying background noise. I get that some hiss is normal, but with my old Bose QC35 or AirPods Max, it’s barely noticeable.

2. Clicks/crackling while wearing them. Even when I’m just walking calmly, every step causes these clicks in my ears. It feels like a sudden pressure change, and it’s rough on the ears.

3. Overkill noise cancellation. After 20-30 minutes of listening, my ears feel tired from the pressure, and I start getting headaches. This might just be me, but I’ve used plenty of ANC headphones before, and this is the first time I’ve had this issue.

4. Terrible for calls. During a call, if someone starts talking at the same time as you, your voice gets muffled on their end. People kept telling me I sounded like I was moving closer and farther from the mic, or they could barely hear me. Total nonsense. Probably some buggy software.

When I was watching reviews, nobody mentioned these problems. But after I bought them and started Googling these specific issues, turns out I’m not the only one dealing with this. So, what’s your honest experience? Are you seeing these same issues, or did I just get a dud pair?