Released all the way back in 2016 sans active noise cancellation and a few other sophisticated features found on their 2024 sequel, the Beats Solo 3 are clearly not among the best high-end Bluetooth wireless headphones money can buy this holiday season. But at an insanely low price of $69, they obviously don’t need to be as powerful as the Solo 4, let alone the Studio Pro or the extravagant AirPods Max.Hard to come by at any price nowadays at retailers like Amazon and Best Buy, the Solo 3 are way cheaper than ever before if you order them from Walmart right away in your choice of two very different colorways: black and rose gold. This early Black Friday affair, which is explicitly advertised as a Black Friday 2024 deal, is unlikely to last long, and even though this year’s actual Black Friday holiday is still more than two weeks away at the time of this writing, there are no guarantees the unprecedented $130 discount will ever come back.
As such, you are strongly advised to hurry and pull the trigger if you want to keep your Christmas spending to a minimum and still get a pair of undeniably premium-looking on-ear headphones with up to an outstanding 40 hours of battery life, decent all-day comfort, and excellent overall audio quality… for the sub-$100 bracket, at least.
Powered by an ancient Apple W1 chip, the Beats Solo 3 should have no problem connecting and staying connected to your favorite new or old iPhone or Android handset. The on-ear controls allowing you to take calls, control your music, and activate Siri with minimal effort are also pretty great (for $69), and the same goes for the Fast Fuel technology that promises to give you no less than 3 hours of uninterrupted listening time after just five quick minutes of charging.
All in all, the third-gen Solos are probably affordable enough to make a lot of you fine cash-strapped folks out there ignore their lack of ANC, spatial audio, dynamic head tracking, and other such state-of-the-art technologies present on the costlier Solo 4, Studio Pro, or AirPods Max.
View Full Bio
Adrian, a mobile technology enthusiast since the Nokia 3310 era, has been a dynamic presence in the tech journalism field, contributing to Android Authority, Digital Trends, and Pocketnow before joining PhoneArena in 2018. His expertise spans across various platforms, with a particular fondness for the diversity of the Android ecosystem. Despite the challenges of balancing full-time parenthood with his work, Adrian’s passion for tech trends, running, and movies keeps him energized. His commitment to mid-range smartphones has led to an eclectic collection of devices, saved from personal bankruptcy by his preference for ‘adequate’ over ‘overpriced’.
GIPHY App Key not set. Please check settings