Bowers & Wilkins unveils flagship PX7 wireless headphones

An upgrade on the company's already-stellar PX cans.

After filling out its wireless Formation lineup, Bowers & Wilkins is turning its attention back to headphones. The British manufacturer -- best known for its decadent home speakers -- unveiled four options today including a successor to the PX, its much-loved and most premium wireless headphones, and two sets of neckbuds focused on noise cancelling and high-end sound respectively. None of them are cheap (no surprise there), but the company hopes that its signature quality, combined with a new brand motto called "emotion, amplified," can expand its marketshare and pull customers away from competitors such as Bose, Sennheiser and Sony.

But what exactly has changed? You won't find any touch controls on these headphones, or a voice assistant (yet) that can control your tunes and retrieve useful information. Instead, Bowers & Wilkins is pushing wireless audio standards. All four should be the first headphones to ship with Qualcomm's aptX Adaptive, a Bluetooth codec that optimizes audio quality and latency depending on the content being played and the RF environment surrounding your device. Bowers & Wilkins put a similar focus on its Formation line earlier this year, pushing multi-room streaming and imperceptible speaker synchronization over flashy voice controls.

PX7

Leading the headphone charge for Bowers & Wilkins is the PX7. These cans effectively replace the PX, though the company will sell the older model for a little while longer. They have a sleek over-ear design and deliver "absolute sound superiority," the company claims, through 43mm drivers.

I slipped on the wireless headphones and listened to a few tunes stored on an employee's demo phone, including "You Should See Me in a Crown" by Billie Eilish, "Death Row" by Chris Stapleton and "Ohio" by Neil Young. All of the tracks sounded amazing, unsurprisingly. The PX7s are considerably lighter than the PX thanks to an all-new design, which includes carbon fiber composite arms. The headphones should also last longer, too -- 25 hours, What Hi-Fi? reports, up from the PX's already-decent 22 hours.

The PX7 will set you back $399.99/£349.99/€399.99, which is identical to the current PX pricing in the US. (They're slightly more expensive than the PX in the UK, though -- blame Brexit and the nation's weak pound, I guess.)

Gallery: Bowers & Wilkins PX7