What do you look for when you are shopping for a pair of earphones? Ease of connectivity? Robust build? Decent audio quality, especially for the price? PLAY, a homegrown electronics brand co-founded by Micromax Co-Founder Vikas Jain, has released a pair of Truly Wireless Stereo (TWS) earbuds that tick all those boxes while not putting you out of your pocket.

The PLAYGO DURA earbuds, priced at Rs 1,499, are the latest in a flood of TWS earbuds to hit the Indian market, which grew 56 percent year-on-year with 37.2 million shipments last quarter, as per a report published by the International Data Corporation. Of these, earwear accounted for a whopping 25 million, becoming the fastest growing segment.

The PLAYGO DURA, if positioned well and gain traction, can easily become your favourite set of earbuds — stress being on their being "positioned well." There's stiff competition from the likes of other affordable TWS earbuds coming from Boult, Noise, BoAt, and Fire-Boltt, to name a few.

I had the chance to test the PLAYGO DURA for about a week, and I have thoughts. But before I delve into those, let's take a look at the earbuds and what they pack.

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The PLAYGO DURA earbuds sport a matte plastic built that seems a little on the cheaper side but, nonetheless, feels sturdy — you can tell it's an inexpensive product, but looks can only take you so far in the world of gadgets. It's what within that counts, right?

According to the company, the PLAYGO DURA offer 30 hours of playtime, with 10 hours on the earbuds alone, and more juice coming from the case. The earbuds also purportedly come with fast-charging capabilities — a unique boast, unless I'm mistaken — with a claimed five hours of audio in just 10 minutes of charging.

The PLAYGO DURA set packs the proprietary ‘enhanced bass extra loud drivers,’ which ensure that "user experiences zero ear-fatigue" even after hours of use. The drivers also ensure high-definition sound quality. The earbuds support Google Assistant and Siri — which I can confirm, having tested it both on iOS and Android — and also has what the company calls environmental noise cancellation (ENC): essentially PLAY's version of active noise cancellation except, ENC mimics ANC (active noise cancellation) without actually, actively cancelling noise. In my experience, this boils down to the PLAYGO DURA flooding your ear canal with a wide range of sound to drown out ambient noise — it's not an unpleasant experience, as I will explain later, but it's nothing that other, non-ANC earbuds don't already have.

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As with all other TWS earbuds, these too come with a variety of touch- and gesture-based controls to navigate your audio experience without touching your smartphone. And they work. Mostly.

Now, with the official details out of the way, how has my experience been with the PLAYGO DURA? Read on.

In the box

The PLAYGO DURA come in a minimalist package that contains the case, the two earbuds, a six-inch USB Type-A to Type-C charging cable and three sets of silicone eartips — the medium already installed, with large and small in a small pouch.

It has been my experience that the default eartips fit me the best — this stands true across a range of earbuds.

Setting up

Pairing the earbuds with your phone for the first time should be a smooth experience. Just pop the two earbuds into the case for the first time, charge the case for a few minutes, and then wear the earbuds. In your phone's pairing menu, under Bluetooth, the PLAYGO DURA should show up, ready to pair. Hit "pair," and you're good to go.

The experience

Over the course of the past week, I listened to a variety of music spanning genres, from original soundtracks to the latest Billie Eilish album to the music of my choice — classic rock — and the earbuds have always delivered. And, thanks to their plastic build, they are extremely light and thereby comfortable to wear for long periods.

The PLAYGO DURA reproduce a wide enough soundstage — the range of frequencies, such as highs, mids and lows — with emphasis on the bass (not that I'm complaining) — to allow you to fully immerse yourself in any song. That is quite impressive, considering what you're paying.

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The shortcomings

Now, it is not really fair to nitpick with a pair of earbuds that come at this low a price point, but it is my job to pick these nits — I really wish these earbuds had come with some sort of in-ear detection. I've never been a fan of tapping or stroking the earbuds to control my music, but it gets tiresome to constantly use your phone to play or pause music whenever you have to take the earbuds out of your ears. Then again, they cost Rs 1,499 and my gripe is about a feature that exists in earbuds that cost way more.

Battery life

While I cannot attest to the exact numbers that PLAY boasts of, I can say the earbuds — perhaps due to the lack of ANC, which is a battery sipper — deliver long hours of music, longer still if you account for the charging case. In my week with them, I've had to charge the case perhaps once, with at least 5-6 hours of playtime per day. That's pretty good by any standards.

In conclusion

Do not compare these to your AirPods (Pro), Galaxy Buds, or Pixel Buds. They cost a fraction and deliver decent sound. And that, in my book, is plenty of bang for your Rs 1,499.

If budget is your concern, or if you just want to dip your toes into the TWS pool without burning a hole in your pocket, you cannot really go wrong with the PLAYGO DURA. Even if they last you one year, that's still plenty. This is only after a week, but you can bet that I'll be trying these out in the long-term to see how they hold out.

The PLAYGO DURA buds are available on Amazon, Flipkart and PLAY's own online portal.

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(Edited by : Shoma Bhattacharjee)