Hifiman Ananda Nano Headphone Review

[Robbo99999]

I don't know if I should bother to post this, but I've had 4 of these now, yes FOUR:

1- My 1st one was absolutely great, but I scratched it literally on itself, the cup scratched against its own headband's metal while turning it to remove the earpad.

2 - They allowed me to exchange it for a new one but made me pay the shipping, the cheapest option was $45. The new one arrived with a severe imbalance, the left cup side was many decibels too quiet, obviously defective. Yes, I tested it in every way possible with multiple sets of equipment & wires, tried mono audio, & had other people listen to it. The left was very obviously defective.

3 - The 3rd one sounded just like the 1st, I was relieved... then I saw the inside of the left cup (the part that covers the driver) was snapped/broken upward. This wasn't a minor crack, it was completely snapped off. This couldn't have possibly been from shipping damage, there is no possible way for it to be the way it was aside from it being ASSEMBLED BROKEN to begin with.

4 - I liked the sound so much I gave it another shot & got a 4th one... complete imbalance no matter how I tested it like the 2nd one, the exact same issue with the left cup. And yes, I had others listen to it & tested it in every way possible... then in under 1 hour the left cup just died. Pressing on it could get sound out of it for a second, then it dies again, it seems like it might be a wiring issue from the factory.

I'm convinced they have a manufacturing problem with the Nanos.

I'm at a loss. I've pissed away about $130 in shipping (which they now say they'll refund, we'll see, but only with paypal?) & many many hours. I'm beyond frustrated & I don't even see an alternative for what comes out to $770 CAD after 13% sales tax. I don't know what to do.

Right, so a fifth one on it's way!

 

[Neo Cyrus]

Right, so a fifth one on it's way!

I'm thinking about seeing the availability of the Moondrop Venus to ship here, assuming it's comparable to the Nano. As usual, I'm running into mixed info.

 

[Robbo99999]

I'm thinking about seeing the availability of the Moondrop Venus to ship here, assuming it's comparable to the Nano. As usual, I'm running into mixed info.

I noticed Oratory has measured the Moondroop Venus:

Dropbox

www.dropbox.com

Seems like it's an OK frequency response & platform on which to put some EQ. It does seem to be missing information at 5.5kHz though because there is a big dip there that can't be EQ'd out, so it doesn't look ideal though.

 

[staticV3]

It does seem to be missing information at 5.5kHz though because there is a big dip there that can't be EQ'd out

Are you sure about that?

Just because oratory decided not to EQ the 5.5kHz dip, does not necessarily mean it's impossible to do so.

For that, we'd have to look at excess group delay or similar.

 

[Robbo99999]

Are you sure about that?

Just because oratory decided not to EQ the 5.5kHz dip, does not necessarily mean it's impossible to do so.

For that, we'd have to look at excess group delay or similar.

I mean if you use sharp enough (High Q) filters then sure you can EQ that up, assuming it's still minimal phase there, but it would be generally poor EQ practice to use such sharp & large EQ filters and particularly high up there in the treble because you couldn't necessarily guarantee that your unit of headphone on your own head would have the dip in exactly the same place (due to unit to unit variation & anatomical differences) - therefore if you were to EQ up that dip totally to the target you may end up with a peak there in reality whilst having a dip still right next to it for instance. And there's the idea that High Q boost filters are more likely to create ringing, although it's not something I've tested in practice. It doesn't seem like the ideal frequency response to EQ to Harman, but I've seen worse.

 

[AryaStealth]

Did anyone order refurbished Ananda Nanos from Hifiman? Do they check for channel imbalance before repacking the returns with new earpads? If they do listen to them briefly to spot channel imbalance then it seems one should order refurbished headphones from Hifiman.

 

[Neo Cyrus]

Did anyone order refurbished Ananda Nanos from Hifiman? Do they check for channel imbalance before repacking the returns with new earpads? If they do listen to them briefly to spot channel imbalance then it seems one should order refurbished headphones from Hifiman.

They don't check for an imbalance before shipping new ones, so I seriously doubt they'd check the refurb ones.

 

[scolfaro]

I heard some of the mixing dudes I listen to every now and then praise these, but have also seen that it has the (misleading) higher-mids house resonances that @solderdude brought to my attention with very useful waterfall measurements (why aren't these here as well?). After a little over a month with my Audeze, if you're looking for planar sound and want to EQ, I can't recommend my LCD-2 Classic more, they are a canvas for EQing with perfectly dampened drivers. They just weigh a ton

*** edit: driver balance is great, when I flip the mono switch, they are mono, unlike my Sundara which remains somehow wide in the lower-mids

 

[thescarfydoc]

This is a review, listening tests, equalization and detailed measurements of the Hifiman Ananda Nano headphone. It was kindly purchased by a member for testing and costs US $499.
View attachment 361210
The Nano looks attractive although the feel is not that of luxury. It is a bit light. The forward part of the pad is quite a bit thinner and I had a bit of difficulty mounting it on my GRAS 45CA test fixture. The suspension headband is not adjustable but was comfortable enough for me. But again, causes some difficulty in measuring as it would not let the cups go lower.

Hifiman Ananda Nano Headphone Measurements
Let's start with our usual headphone frequency response tests and comparison with our desired target:
View attachment 361211
As noted, we have good compliance over an important range of frequencies. Above and below we have some deficiencies. There is quite a bit of wiggliness in the response. Relative response shows variations that should be relatively easy to EQ:
View attachment 361212

Distortion response is disappointing especially for a headphone with such large drivers. It should be cruising but it is not due to many resonances:
View attachment 361213
We have seen this type of problem in Hifiman Ananda as well but it is worse here. Company really needs to start measuring this and find and fix the source of these. I think some don't see these issues because they apply too much smoothing in frequency response and distortion tests which hides much of the problems here. Absolute distortion measurements despite being smoothed more, still is problematic:
View attachment 361214

We could tolerate bass distortion but having lower treble distortion could cause more more audible issues.

Group delay is not pretty, likely due to those internal resonances:
View attachment 361215

Impedance is low and flat:
View attachment 361216

Sensitivity is better than average, making the Nano an easy headphone to drive:
View attachment 361217

Hifiman Ananda Nano Listening Tests and Equalization
Immediate impression of the headphone is one of rather flat sounding with some exaggeration of high frequencies. Definitely listenable but substantial improvements can be had with EQ:
View attachment 361218
That bit of bass boost really balances the response, taking the headphone from cold sounding to pretty nice. The other filters are also critical in opening up the spatial qualities while taking away some of the high frequency harshness. Is the distortion audible? I don't have the reliably way to determine that subjectively. I can tell you that the highs really stand out. Is this harmonic distortion? My Dan Clark E3 daily headphone had much more tamed high frequencies. This could be due to lack of distortion, better frequency response, or both.

Power handling was excellent and I could get the headphones quite loud with my RME ADI-2 Pro at quite attenuated volume positions. Cranking up the levels momentarily, didn't result in any clipping or odd behavior. I think this is due to good low frequency distortion measurements.

Spatial qualities were quite good. I would give them B+.

Conclusions
Out of the box, the Nano is not to my liking as someone who wants to hear and feel low frequencies. These large drivers have incredibly ability to deliver on that but they keep getting released with flat bass response. Combine this with some uneven high frequency response and you have the makings of something I would not buy. A bit of EQ nicely transformed the sound, creating impressively fidelity across my list of reference tracks.

Per above, I can't recommend the Hifiman Ananda Nano as is. With EQ, it becomes a good headphone, albeit with potentially some impact from high distortion/resonances in high frequencies.

------------
As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.

Any donations are much appreciated using: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-support-audio-science-review.8150/

finally made an account for this lol, but wow look another Hifiman flagship that makes me want to keep my HE400se's

but seriously has Hifiman dropped a headphone that actually has better low-distortion specs than the HE400se? A teensy bit of bass boost from my old Fiio Q1 helps push the lowend back into harman, and I replaced the grills for a more spacious honeycomb pattern and a thinner backing material (just used some thin tool fabric) so the soundstage is nice and open as well.

I've been doing mixing work on them for a couple years now and I haven't found another pair of Hifimans to upgrade from either due to massive diminishing returns in cost OR they're literally worse than the HE400se in areas I can't sacrifice in a mixing environment (these distortion specs are wild lmfao).

 

[Blorg]

finally made an account for this lol, but wow look another Hifiman flagship that makes me want to keep my HE400se's

These sound a lot better than the HE400SE (which does sound great for the price). Much better soundstage in particular, better bass, closer to Harman out of the box, sounds much more natural and "effortless". I EQ the HE400SE to Harman, this is still better out of the box. I have had both of them at the same time, to compare, HE400SE is not in the same ballpark, sorry.

 

[thescarfydoc]

These sound a lot better than the HE400SE (which does sound great for the price). Much better soundstage in particular, better bass, closer to Harman out of the box, sounds much more natural and "effortless". I EQ the HE400SE to Harman, this is still better out of the box. I have had both of them at the same time, to compare, HE400SE is not in the same ballpark, sorry.

oh i'm sure it sounds better! but I was just talking raw distortion specs and diminishing returns.

would the Nanos sound better than my HE400se cans? most certainly.

would they be more useful to me, or even worth the ~700 upgrade?

... maybe??? but I'm very hesitant to put my money where my mouth is, especially since the HE400se do their job perfectly well for so much less.

I care a lot about distortion in my monitoring set-ups and chose the HE400se specifically for how clean the output is when compared to other cans, and while people say the other Hifiman are massive upgrades I have yet to find something that will replace these for me in a working environment.

should've clarified though that i'm approaching this exclusively from a production/mixing standpoint and less so audiophile upgrade advice.

 

[The-Pupil]

Did anyone order refurbished Ananda Nanos from Hifiman? Do they check for channel imbalance before repacking the returns with new earpads? If they do listen to them briefly to spot channel imbalance then it seems one should order refurbished headphones from Hifiman.

I have ordered one. Not sure when it will arrive, but I will let you know. I can only go by ear as I have no measuring equipment.

 

[Blorg]

would they be more useful to me, or even worth the ~700 upgrade?

It's $419 now, $399 "open box" (which often just means new with Hifiman) or $369 refurbished.

ANANDA NANO

<p><img src="https://hifiman.com/attachments/image/20230908/20230908130255_25265.jpg" alt="" /></p>

store.hifiman.com

ANANDA NANO (open-box)

<p style="margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: left; color: #2c2c2c; text-transform: none; text-indent: 0px; letter-spacing: normal; font-family: 'Myriad Pro', 'DejaVu Sans Condensed', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px; font-style

store.hifiman.com

ANANDA NANO (refurbished)

<p style="margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: left; color: #2c2c2c; text-transform: none; text-indent: 0px; letter-spacing: normal; font-family: 'Myriad Pro', 'DejaVu Sans Condensed', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px; font-style

store.hifiman.com

 

[david86bcn]

Sorry but I decided to register because it can't be that in all the reviews I've read of the ananda nano they rate them as excellent headphones, and here you say they are so horrible. Are all the reviewers wrong? I doubt it...

Soundnews 86/100 "Our favorite $500 headphones"
Headfonics 8.8/10 "Superior to previous versions. Perhaps one of the best this year"
Earphonia 9.1/10 "You're not just listening to music, you're traveling through the very cosmos of sound, discovering new auditory galaxies and sonic stars. It's a journey into the future of audio, and the future sounds magnificent."
Head-fi 4.6/5 users reviews
Headfonia "delivers an exceptional audio experience that's hard to match in its price range. These headphones are a worthwhile investment for any audiophile looking for a high-quality, reliable headphone with impressive performance."
Majorhifi "Gold" "The Ananda have never sounded better than they do with the Nano, with their immersive soundstage, rewarding bass, and flavorful highs."
Bloomaudio "The Ananda Nano takes these core aspects of the Ananda sound and fine-tunes them for true sonic excellence that works with almost any source so you can enjoy them virtually anywhere."
Audiophile Heaven "The Ananda nano is simply insane, outperforming the Ananda and Ananda Stealth in detail, resolution, clarity, and overall sonic accuracy. You can experience flagship sounds for literally the best price I've seen for headphones with such revealing and detailed sound to date."
Headphonedungeon "that smoothness keeps the sound refined and cohesive, effectively balancing liveliness with easy listening fluidity. And when combined with what is probably the most multi-dimensional soundstage you can get at this price point, the Nano creates an incredibly engaging and satisfying listening experience. It would certainly be my first reference planar magnetic headphone for under $800."
Mimic Audio "It's a fun and engaging experience and offers great technical performance at a low price. The female vocals and bass were what I liked most about the nano"
Audio46 "The HiFiMAN Ananda Nano is one of the most impressive sub-$1000 over-ear headphones to hit the market in recent years. It offers more speed and excitement than previous versions of the Ananda at a curiously more affordable price."

Dynamic audio "the new king of the mid-range"
Overall audio "super super round, hard to find a rival for its price"
The headphone show "is very fast and detailed. it's a beast in vocal clarity, detail and texture"
Joshua valor "bass response, detailed sound wide sound field."
The headphone experience William murdock "exceptional headphones for the price, I have not heard anything better for less than $500, exceptional detail and clarity, good, solid, tight, controlled, good extension to the sub base, dynamic, wide soundstage"
Reviews By WaveTheory "you will not get other headphones for less than $600 that beat these in resolution, spatial presentation, one of the most dynamic and impactful, very good tonality and tonal balance"
Paul third "super fast, super clean, details like I have never heard in other headphones"
The audio stuff "a lot of clarity in voices, instruments, very detailed highs, best soundstage in its class"

 

[The-Pupil]

I received my 'Refurbished' Nano. And it had 2 small blemishes on the upper part of the cup. I'll touch it up with a grey marker.

Sound is great. Still have to get used to it. I was coming from a warm Senheisser HD598. I am using it with a Schiit Magni 2. No imbalance as far as i can hear.
Happy with the purchase, just need to find the time to listen. #kids

 

[Ste_S]

Sorry but I decided to register because it can't be that in all the reviews I've read of the ananda nano they rate them as excellent headphones, and here you say they are so horrible. Are all the reviewers wrong? I doubt it...

Soundnews 86/100 "Our favorite $500 headphones"
Headfonics 8.8/10 "Superior to previous versions. Perhaps one of the best this year"
Earphonia 9.1/10 "You're not just listening to music, you're traveling through the very cosmos of sound, discovering new auditory galaxies and sonic stars. It's a journey into the future of audio, and the future sounds magnificent."
Head-fi 4.6/5 users reviews
Headfonia "delivers an exceptional audio experience that's hard to match in its price range. These headphones are a worthwhile investment for any audiophile looking for a high-quality, reliable headphone with impressive performance."
Majorhifi Gold "The Ananda have never sounded better than they do with the Nano, with their immersive soundstage, rewarding bass, and flavorful highs."
Bloomaudio "The Ananda Nano takes these core aspects of the Ananda sound and fine-tunes them for true sonic excellence that works with almost any source so you can enjoy them virtually anywhere."
Audiophile Heaven "The Ananda nano is simply insane, outperforming the Ananda and Ananda Stealth in detail, resolution, clarity, and overall sonic accuracy. You can experience flagship sounds for literally the best price I've seen for headphones with such revealing and detailed sound to date."
Headphonedungeon "that smoothness keeps the sound refined and cohesive, effectively balancing liveliness with easy listening fluidity. And when combined with what is probably the most multi-dimensional soundstage you can get at this price point, the Nano creates an incredibly engaging and satisfying listening experience. It would certainly be my first reference planar magnetic headphone for under $800."
Mimic Audio "It's a fun and engaging experience and offers great technical performance at a low price. The female vocals and bass were what I liked most about the nano"
Audio46 "The HiFiMAN Ananda Nano is one of the most impressive sub-$1000 over-ear headphones to hit the market in recent years. It offers more speed and excitement than previous versions of the Ananda at a curiously more affordable price."

Dynamic audio "the new king of the mid-range"
Overall audio "super super round, hard to find a rival for its price"
The headphone show "is very fast and detailed. it's a beast in vocal clarity, detail and texture"
Joshua valor "bass response, detailed sound wide sound field."
The headphone experience William murdock "exceptional headphones for the price, I have not heard anything better for less than $500, exceptional detail and clarity, good, solid, tight, controlled, good extension to the sub base, dynamic, wide soundstage"
Reviews By WaveTheory "you will not get other headphones for less than $600 that beat these in resolution, spatial presentation, one of the most dynamic and impactful, very good tonality and tonal balance"
Paul third "super fast, super clean, details like I have never heard in other headphones"
The audio stuff "a lot of clarity in voices, instruments, very detailed highs, best soundstage in its class"

Shill-sense is tingling.

 

[scolfaro]

I mean if you use sharp enough (High Q) filters then sure you can EQ that up, assuming it's still minimal phase there, but it would be generally poor EQ practice to use such sharp & large EQ filters and particularly high up there in the treble because you couldn't necessarily guarantee that your unit of headphone on your own head would have the dip in exactly the same place (due to unit to unit variation & anatomical differences) - therefore if you were to EQ up that dip totally to the target you may end up with a peak there in reality whilst having a dip still right next to it for instance. And there's the idea that High Q boost filters are more likely to create ringing, although it's not something I've tested in practice. It doesn't seem like the ideal frequency response to EQ to Harman, but I've seen worse.

My approach (and that has served me well so far), is if I can't get it to where I want to with 3 bands or less (bells or shelves), no more than 5-6db of gain, I'll look elsewhere. Hexa, Sundara, Audeze LCD-2c are all either spot on Harman or in its general new-meta direction with those constraints. 7Hz Zero 2 seems to be born perfect as far as tuning goes, and a bunch of other headphones like AT-R70x or Beyer 880, that could get close but not quite, I ended up selling. This Ananda one here looks really promising, except it does seem to get complicated up there for such minimalistic EQing. So for me it's a pass...

Whenever I read abou people using 31-band graphic EQs to nudge headphone response curves around I just shudder. If they can't hear how everything can happen with that (and ringing is just one very easily audible part), like phase-shifts and general narrowing of the stereo image and a whole lot of other problems, from transient smearing onwards, I just get put into audio-defensive stance, and that tends to make their opinions irrelevant.

 

[thescarfydoc]

Sorry but I decided to register because it can't be that in all the reviews I've read of the ananda nano they rate them as excellent headphones, and here you say they are so horrible. Are all the reviewers wrong? I doubt it...

Soundnews 86/100 "Our favorite $500 headphones"
Headfonics 8.8/10 "Superior to previous versions. Perhaps one of the best this year"
Earphonia 9.1/10 "You're not just listening to music, you're traveling through the very cosmos of sound, discovering new auditory galaxies and sonic stars. It's a journey into the future of audio, and the future sounds magnificent."
Head-fi 4.6/5 users reviews
Headfonia "delivers an exceptional audio experience that's hard to match in its price range. These headphones are a worthwhile investment for any audiophile looking for a high-quality, reliable headphone with impressive performance."
Majorhifi "Gold" "The Ananda have never sounded better than they do with the Nano, with their immersive soundstage, rewarding bass, and flavorful highs."
Bloomaudio "The Ananda Nano takes these core aspects of the Ananda sound and fine-tunes them for true sonic excellence that works with almost any source so you can enjoy them virtually anywhere."
Audiophile Heaven "The Ananda nano is simply insane, outperforming the Ananda and Ananda Stealth in detail, resolution, clarity, and overall sonic accuracy. You can experience flagship sounds for literally the best price I've seen for headphones with such revealing and detailed sound to date."
Headphonedungeon "that smoothness keeps the sound refined and cohesive, effectively balancing liveliness with easy listening fluidity. And when combined with what is probably the most multi-dimensional soundstage you can get at this price point, the Nano creates an incredibly engaging and satisfying listening experience. It would certainly be my first reference planar magnetic headphone for under $800."
Mimic Audio "It's a fun and engaging experience and offers great technical performance at a low price. The female vocals and bass were what I liked most about the nano"
Audio46 "The HiFiMAN Ananda Nano is one of the most impressive sub-$1000 over-ear headphones to hit the market in recent years. It offers more speed and excitement than previous versions of the Ananda at a curiously more affordable price."

Dynamic audio "the new king of the mid-range"
Overall audio "super super round, hard to find a rival for its price"
The headphone show "is very fast and detailed. it's a beast in vocal clarity, detail and texture"
Joshua valor "bass response, detailed sound wide sound field."
The headphone experience William murdock "exceptional headphones for the price, I have not heard anything better for less than $500, exceptional detail and clarity, good, solid, tight, controlled, good extension to the sub base, dynamic, wide soundstage"
Reviews By WaveTheory "you will not get other headphones for less than $600 that beat these in resolution, spatial presentation, one of the most dynamic and impactful, very good tonality and tonal balance"
Paul third "super fast, super clean, details like I have never heard in other headphones"
The audio stuff "a lot of clarity in voices, instruments, very detailed highs, best soundstage in its class"

>"I've been doing mixing work on them for a couple years now and I haven't found another pair of Hifimans to upgrade from either due to massive diminishing returns in cost OR they're literally worse than the HE400se in areas I can't sacrifice in a mixing environment (these distortion specs are wild lmfao)."

... As I said prior, I just don't think they're worth spending money on while my current pair of cans works well. I'm not approaching from an audiophile's perspective, but from an audio tech's perspective. I want low distortion specs on my monitoring set up, from the DAC to the Amp to the Headphones.

Mixing is more about consistency and reliability than having the "best sounding" set up possible, so I'm prioritizing qualities that I care about to get a set up with low distortion specs from the computer to my ears while spending as little as is reasonable. This is entirely for the sake of workflow and having a go-to monitoring rig that I'm extremely familiar with across a broad spread of genres, exclusively for mixing purposes.

I'm sure the reviewers are right, a $700 pair of headphones better sound damn good.