Battery first, arguments second
The headline number on the Edifier G5 Max is 305 hours, and every Edifier G5 Max review we read agrees it is real. PC Gamer hadn’t plugged it in after three weeks, and its writer says only the original HyperX Cloud Alpha Wireless comes close. Where critics part ways is everything wrapped around that battery: the plastics, the microphone and a $150 price tag.
Tom’s Guide lists $149 and £159, The Shortcut $149.99 and TheSixthAxis a £159 RRP, while PC Gamer quotes $150/$160. Same headset, same money, very different feelings about it.
The battery is the real headline
Tom’s Guide rates it at 305 hours over Bluetooth and 227 hours over the 2.4GHz dongle. Its reviewer used it for eight hours, left it running overnight with a PS5 on, and found the battery had dipped by only 7% after roughly 18 hours. The Shortcut charged it once and still had about 80% left by the end of its review.
TheSixthAxis calls the battery life “insane” and says it will be a surprise when the reviewer finally has to charge it. We think that settles it: when several reviewers report they barely touched a cable, the number stops being marketing. Tom’s Guide lists the Razer BlackShark V3 Pro and Alienware Pro Wireless at 70 hours each and Sony’s PlayStation Pulse Elite at 30.
Comfort is the other win
The G5 Max weighs 305 grams, and the reviews lean on that. Tom’s Guide wore it for six straight hours without discomfort and calls it comfortable for all-day wear. The Shortcut found “zero clamping force” and a headband that never drifted from where it was set.
TheSixthAxis titled its review “The comfort king” and scored it an 8, noting the earpieces seem set up for a slightly larger head or a voluminous hairstyle. PC Gamer agrees it’s comfortable in a normal gaming position, but says the light clamp lets it slip around and wonders how long the baggy pads will last.
There is one dissent on heat. The Shortcut reports its head got noticeably hotter than with other headsets because the earcups aren’t very breathable, and it noted a strong chemical smell on first unboxing. If you game in a warm room, that matters more than any weight figure. Our Corsair HS80 v2 MAX roundup covers another headset chasing the same battery-and-comfort pitch.
Build and microphone split the room
PC Gamer is the harshest on build: it says light is good but “shiny, tippy-tappy ear cup plastics are not”, finds the controls tinny, and likens the look to a Power Ranger’s codpiece. Tom’s Guide takes the opposite view, saying that at the same price the G5 Max’s build quality feels superior to the PlayStation Pulse Elite’s.
Microphones divide the panel just as sharply. PC Gamer calls the mic dull, slightly muffled and difficult to tweak, Tom’s Guide calls the boom mic fuzzy in places, and The Shortcut says the noise gate cut off the starts of words. TheSixthAxis, though, calls the noise-cancelling mic excellent.
Sound splits the panel too. PC Gamer found a boxy default profile and presets it calls blunt, though it praised the 53 mm drivers’ detail once tweaked. The Shortcut called it one of the best-sounding gaming headsets it had tested in a while, and TheSixthAxis found it surprisingly well-balanced.
Where the price argument lands
PC Gamer scored it 63, and its verdict is that it is a “fiddly, slightly cheap-feeling beast that doesn’t justify its $150 price tag”, and it points to the Razer BlackShark V3 and the cheaper PowerA LucidSound LS500 as better buys. Tom’s Guide went the other way with an Editor’s Choice badge, and The Shortcut scored it 4/5 (“Great!”). The same tug-of-war shows up in our Razer Barracuda V2 Pro roundup, where critics liked the headset but winced at the cost.
It isn’t a PC-only product. Tom’s Guide lists PS5, PS4, Nintendo Switch 2, Nintendo Switch and PC, TheSixthAxis says the dongle covers PC, Switch 1 and 2 and PS5, and The Shortcut used it on PS5 and PC. TheSixthAxis adds that the THX 7.1.4 surround is PC-only, and Tom’s Guide says the same of THX Spatial Audio.
Buy if, skip if
- Buy if you hate charging things, want a light headset and can live with a mic most reviewers found weak.
- Buy if you want one headset that connects to PC, PS5 and Switch.
- Skip if you game in a hot room, want a premium-feeling shell, or need a mic you can rely on.
- Skip if you won’t open an EQ app, which PC Gamer says the headset leans on.
Our take: we’d buy this for the battery and comfort and not much else, and ideally at a discount. Tom’s Guide and The Shortcut like it a lot, TheSixthAxis calls it the comfort king, and even PC Gamer, the harshest, calls the battery stellar. But with the build and the mic open arguments, $150 is the part we’d wait on. Our score of 74 is the mean of the three numeric verdicts: PC Gamer’s 63, TheSixthAxis’s 8/10 (80) and The Shortcut’s 4/5 (80). Tom’s Guide gives a badge rather than a number, so it isn’t counted.
