Empire Ears (HiFi): Reviews, Used Pricing, and Dealers

Empire Ears

Headphones

Website

Best Known For

Headphones

In-Ear-Monitor (IEM)

Used Products

Available

Average Price

$2,501-$5,000

Brand Popularity

779

of 900+

Products Listed

Review Count

Founding Year

2015

Headquarters

United States

Empire Ears

What's on this page

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What's unique about the brand

Empire Ears is an American maker of in-ear monitors in universal and custom fits. Many designs are hybrids, with dynamic drivers for bass and balanced armatures for the mids and highs, and some add electrostatic drivers for treble. Its own Weapon IX and W9+ dynamic drivers use a bass-reflex system, and reviewers describe the bass as powerful and well textured. The Odin and Legend X come in both fits, and custom buyers choose the faceplate material and shell color. The universal Legend Evo is on our Best IEMs list.

Our interview with the brand

What are two key technological innovations or strong opinions that differ you from other brands?

What's your approach to customer support?

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From Julian's interview with

Products overview

Every Empire Ears model is a hybrid in-ear monitor that pairs bass drivers with balanced armatures, and many add electrostatic treble. The ESR MKII uses 3 balanced armature and 2 electrostatic drivers. The Legend X adds two W9 subwoofers across 7 drivers. The Legend Evo moves to W9+ subwoofers and adds a W10 bone conduction driver. The Odin brings 4 electrostatic drivers. The Raven adds bone conduction to quad electrostatic tweeters, and the Odin MKII uses dual bone conductors.

Start here. The ESR MKII (Universal) suits a first pair of high-end monitors, with a reference-like sound and strong isolation for critical listening in the lowest price bracket.
Sweet spot. The Legend Evo (Universal) is the pick for a desk where bass matters, with a tribrid design and a spot on our Best IEMs list.
All in. The Odin MKII and Raven suit a dedicated listening room, with the Raven offering an immersive, isolated sound and the Odin MKII the newest release.

Julian Shapiro

ExtremeHiFi Writer

Product list

Release timeline

Legend Evo (Universal)

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Legend Evo (Universal)

What reviewers are saying

We read all the reviews, and here's what stands out:

Empire Ears IEMs often employ a multi-driver hybrid design, combining dynamic drivers for bass, balanced armatures for mids and highs, and sometimes electrostatic drivers for enhanced treble, all managed by a complex crossover network.
The brand's proprietary Weapon IX or W9+ dynamic drivers, known for their innovative bass-reflex system, consistently deliver a powerful, impactful, and well-textured bass response.
They offer a high degree of customization for their custom IEMs, including a wide variety of faceplate materials, shell colors, and logo options, allowing customers to create a personalized aesthetic design.

Quotes we liked:

"A New Bass Standard Forget everything I've written about bass in my prior reviews, a new standard is being written. The Legend X's subbass reaches further down than anything else I've heard." (https://www.headphonesty.com/2018/07/review-empire-ears-legend-x-a-sterling-tour-de-force-of-showmanship)
"The EVO has God-Tier bass and is unequivocally the best bass I have had the pleasure to hear. The EVO has greater control and separation throughout the bass spectrum than the previous bass king Legend X." (https://audiorabbithole.com/empire-ears-legend-evo-review-2)
"When it comes to detail retrieval and overall sense of clarity, the Evo is without a doubt several cuts above anything else I've heard from IEMs--it's easily the best I've experienced for this category. The bass may be boosted, but it's tight and nimble; which when combined with the mids and highs that seem to perfectly surface all the intricate vocal and instrument tones, allows the Evo to create a pristine and well-structured image of the music." (https://headphones.com/blogs/reviews/empire-ears-legend-evo?srsltid=AfmBOopCoAe0wTITQn-A6TDbA2Xy25rLOuhHHeIXKi5TrW7rhsSjyX)

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Used

Empire Ears

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Unique Melody is a Chinese maker of in-ear monitors, founded in 2007. It was one of the first brands to put bone conduction drivers in wired IEMs and holds several patents on their use. Its bone conduction hybrids pair balanced armatures with piezoelectric bone conduction drivers, so sound reaches the listener through both air and bone. Some shells use titanium or zirconia, and the Mirage has an ultra-thin 3D-printed titanium housing. Some models take swappable parts such as the DB-GO bass module, so owners can adjust the low end.

Our interview with the brand

What are two key technological innovations or strong opinions that differ you from other brands?

What's your approach to customer support?

What are your favorite tracks for showcasing the strength of your products?

What other products pair best with yours?

Julian Shapiro

ExtremeHiFi

Brand Page

Known For

Headphones

In-Ear-Monitor (IEM)

Average Price

$2,501-$5,000

Used Products

Available

Brand Popularity

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of 900+

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Forté Ears is an in-ear monitor maker started by Riccardo Yeh, a musicologist and guqin player, and each model takes its name and tuning direction from a character in opera or theater. Yeh avoids stacking extra drivers, and a custom crossover called Forte Circuitry Relay controls each one. The Macbeth uses a balanced armature driver made for the brand to reach deep sub-bass, alongside vintage components chosen for the midrange. The Mefisto pairs a custom planar magnetic tweeter with two dynamic drivers in a sealed chamber, for listeners who want weighty, textured bass.

Our interview with the brand

What are two key technological innovations or strong opinions that differ you from other brands?

What's your approach to customer support?

What are your favorite tracks for showcasing the strength of your products?

What other products pair best with yours?

Julian Shapiro

ExtremeHiFi

Brand Page

Known For

Headphones

In-Ear-Monitor (IEM)

Average Price

$2,501-$5,000

Used Products

Available

Brand Popularity

787

of 900+

Headquarters

Germany

Featured products

About the brand

Vision Ears is a German maker of custom in-ear monitors, founded in 2013. Founders Marcel Schoenen and Amin Karimpour met in 2004 at another Cologne in-ear maker, and Schoenen spent ten years as a singer and guitarist in a band. Vision Ears builds its Custom and Premium Lines by hand in its Cologne workshop, and every pair is unique. Custom Line models are made from the owner's ear impressions, and one has a magnetic switch for flipping between two sound signatures. The PHÖNIX uses 13 balanced armature drivers per side on a passive five-way crossover.

Our interview with the brand

What are two key technological innovations or strong opinions that differ you from other brands?

What's your approach to customer support?

What are your favorite tracks for showcasing the strength of your products?

What other products pair best with yours?

Julian Shapiro

ExtremeHiFi

Brand Page

Known For

Headphones

In-Ear-Monitor (IEM)

Average Price

$2,501-$5,000

Used Products

Available

Brand Popularity

836

of 900+

Headquarters

Taiwan

Featured products

About the brand

oBravo is a Taiwanese maker of earphones and headphones, started by David Teng to bring the scale of a full-size speaker system to headphones. Its own miniature Air Motion Transformer and planar tweeters, patented in five markets, are mounted coaxially with neodymium dynamic drivers. Many models use a semi-open design for a more speaker-like sound. Housings are made from copper, zirconia ceramic or heat-treated Taiwanese acacia. The Venus uses a large dynamic driver for extra bass, and the HAMT-3 MKII lets owners adjust the amount of bass mechanically.

Our interview with the brand

What are two key technological innovations or strong opinions that differ you from other brands?

What's your approach to customer support?

What are your favorite tracks for showcasing the strength of your products?

What other products pair best with yours?

Julian Shapiro

ExtremeHiFi

Brand Page

Known For

Headphones

In-Ear-Monitor (IEM)

Average Price

$1,001-$2,500

Used Products

Available

Brand Popularity

776

of 900+

Headquarters

United States

Featured products

About the brand

64 Audio is an American maker of in-ear monitors, started by sound engineer Vitaliy Belonozhko, who saw the advantages of IEMs over stage floor wedges. Its tia drivers are open balanced armatures in custom acoustic chambers with no tubes or dampers. LID circuitry keeps the tuning consistent whatever the output impedance of the source device. Owners can swap Apex modules, which vent pressure from the ear canal to reduce listening fatigue and subtly change the bass. The U4s and Fourté are on our Best IEMs list.

Our interview with the brand

What are two key technological innovations or strong opinions that differ you from other brands?

What's your approach to customer support?

What are your favorite tracks for showcasing the strength of your products?

What other products pair best with yours?

Julian Shapiro

ExtremeHiFi

Brand Page

Questions? Ask their dealers.

Audio46

212-354-6424

New York

addicted to audio (Melbourne)

+613 9810 2999

Victoria

addicted to audio (Sydney)

+612 9550 4041

New South Wales

addicted to audio (Perth)

+618 6478 4816

Western Australia

addicted to audio (Auckland)

+64 9 302 0505

Auckland

addicted to audio (Adelaide)

+618 8354 2673

South Australia

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Empire Ears

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We'd love to hear from you on our . What's ExtremeHiFi? We're the encyclopedia of hifi. We read every review, talk to every brand, and help you figure out what to buy. We also have a large database of used products to browse. Much of the data, recommendations, and summaries on ExtremeHiFi are researched after thousands of hours of loving labor. We archive our site's data and its pages on Archive.org and monitor for those repurposing the data. We also fingerprint data to know when text and numbers came from us.