Open or Closed Acoustic Gaming Headset? Your choice

EPOS H6PRO Gaming Headsets Review – EPOS H6PRO gaming headsets come with sleek design and lightweight profile, but more interestingly, are available in two different models: Open and Closed Acoustic.

They both offer different listening experience and picking one is completely up to your preference. Both offer the same, excellent audio quality and comfort, and you can’t really say that one is better than the other in a sense.

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The Open Acoustic model is designed for an expansive, natural audio experience in quiet environments. It also creates a more immersive sound stage. In my experience, it feels as if all sound are coming from the room you are in and not from the headphones itself. It feels real and somewhat scary if you are playing horror games.

The Close Acoustic model is like most other headphones out there, designed with good passive noise isolation to eliminate distractions and you can focus on every audio detail.

After trying both of them, I find that I prefer the Open Acoustic model more I game in a quiet study area at home. Also, it doesn’t mean that the Open Acoustic model can’t give you immersion compared to the Closed one. In fact, I was playing Back 4 Blood with the Open Acoustic H6PRO at some point and I was so immersed into the game that I didn’t hear my son crying in the Nursery until my wife nudged me. She also commented she could hear the growling zombies out of the headset (so yes, there is a somewhat audio leak from the Open Acoustic model though it doesn’t matter much to my opinion).

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The Open Acoustic ear cups also have more breathable foam compared to the Closed, giving a more comfortable feel.

But to be honest, I’ve always been using Close Acoustic gaming headsets for a number of years and I love them too. They feel like they are closer in contact with your ears and because you can barely hear your surroundings, you get the feel of being immersed into your content much more.

At lower volume, you’ll still be able to hear a lot of audio details compared to the Open Acoustic too.

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So in short, which one should you get: The EPOS H6PRO Open or Closed Acoustic? It probably depends on your gaming environment. If it’s usually noisy, definitely get the Closed Acoustic model (or if you are not sure whether you are going to like an Open Acoustic headset).

Something to make note of though, the EPOS H6PRO Open Acoustic weighs 13 grams less (309 grams) compared to the Closed (322 grams). In real life experience, I couldn’t really feel that big of a difference as they are both comfortable to wear.

The EPOS H6PRO has a really good, sleek, modern design and doesn’t feel flimsy. The ear pads and cushioned headband give good amount of padding so you can game for hours without feeling fatigued.

The microphone auto mutes itself when you raise the boom arm and can easily be removed if you are using an external, studio-grade microphone.

I plug my review headsets to the EPOS GSX 300 and the sound quality coming from the headset is superb. The audio is rich, detailed, and offers really good audio positioning. When reviewing Back 4 Blood and playing the campaign in harder difficulty mode, I could hear when a Ridden (i.e zombie) was about to land a blow on my back. Being able to hear this in the last second and react (turning 180-degrees and melee to kill) means you can preserve your precious health – something that is very important when playing in harder difficulty modes.

In a fast-paced, competitive, online game like Overwatch, I could also pinpoint many flankers many times and communicated that to my teammates. Here’s a gameplay montage video below when I was playing Overwatch with the EPOS H6PRO headset and CORSAIR SABRE RGB PRO Wireless gaming mouse.

You may notice a few moments where I solely relied on audio cues to pinpoint where the enemies are at 00:26-00:31 (when the enemy’s Soldier 76 unleashed his ultimate ability) and then 4:30-4:37 when I heard the enemy’s Widowmaker making her shots on our flank and then able to neutralise her quickly.

EPOS H6PRO is compatible with all major gaming platforms like PC, Mac, PS4, PS5, Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch. The headset (both Open and Closed Acoustic) retails for A$259 and available now for purchase in Australia. Also at Amazon.com.

Disclosure: EPOS H6PRO Open and Closed Acoustic review samples were supplied for reviewing