Ahead of the NFL season kickoff, Bose invited us to a noise-canceling test on Thursday that got us pretty pumped. The longtime producer of speakers and headphones doesn't enjoy the best reputation among audiophiles, but the company does pride itself on solid noise-canceling tech, and it had just announced a four-year partnership with the NFL to equip every team's head and assistant coaches with a new fleet of game-ready headsets.

Since the Seattle Seahawks won the last Super Bowl, that meant the event was taking place at Centurylink Field, perhaps the ultimate test site for all things noise. After all, this stadium is notorious for record- and eardrum-shattering crowd noise, and the Seahawks' "12th Man" army of fans has topped 135 decibels on more than a few occasions.

Unfortunately, Bose didn't invite 67,000 of its closest friends to fill Centurylink's seats. Instead, I walked past a mostly empty football field to a small testing room. Against the wall rested eight headsets, uncreatively named Bose NFL Headsets. A few enormous speaker and subwoofer rigs hid beneath floor-level banners.

A Bose technician flipped a switch. The roar of typical stadium noise, including a thousands-strong crowd and between-play rock music, filled the entire room and made it impossible to hear my own voice without shouting. I was given a headset, and once its puffy ear cushions enveloped my ears, the noise vanished in an instant. The roar of the crowd was still apparent but heavily diminished, as if shouted through layers of foam, and thudding bass was only apparent by how it felt through my bones; it didn't even register in my ears.

Aviation-grade, sideline-ready

As it turns out, the NFL's partnership with Bose began "two years ago," according to Bose Vice President Sean Garrett, meaning their conversations began while Motorola's logos still adorned NFL coaches' headsets. Motorola's arrangement ended in 2013, at which point Bose began developing a custom solution for the NFL based on the technology powering its aviation-grade noise-canceling headsets.

"[The NFL] knew our history helping the military and pilots communicate more clearly in mission critical situations," Garrett said at the Centurylink event. "They thought, hey, maybe this noise-canceling tech can help sideline communication."









The result is a pretty nondescript headset, at least in looks, with cushy foam pads and a small belt-loop box that accepts two AA batteries. Those batteries keep the Bose NFL Headset operating for "days," according to Bose staffers, and while the headset will still operate without power, it won't drown out thousands of screaming fans at that point.

Though Bose didn't confirm technical noise-canceling details, the set compared favorably to Bose's A20 Aviation Headset, a years-old, $1,000-plus offering that includes multiple microphones per ear, both on the inside and outside, to measure and counter ambient noise. The microphone was ridiculously sensitive as well, allowing those connected on the same channel to speak back and forth at a near-whisper; I had to pull the mic back to practice yelling, as the set won't automatically adjust mic sensitivity when coaches break into a screaming panic.

A new QuietComfort offering to match

Seahawks coach Pete Carroll made a brief cameo during Bose's presentation, and that brevity probably worked in Bose's favor. "I'm a one-eared kind of guy," Carroll said about his headphone preferences. "I'm not one of those [coaches] who is trying to shut out the sound."

The company did use Carroll's appearance to segue into another product introduction: the QuietComfort 25, a $300 pair of wired cans that debuted Thursday and officially replaced all other noise-canceling, around-ear options at Bose's site. "The only headphones I've ever owned are Bose," Carroll boasted somewhat incredulously. The only thing more unbelievable was his "personal playlist," to which a QC25 headset was connected for testing purposes. Macklemore and Ryan Lewis leading off a long hip-hop tracklist, Pete? Doubt it.

Thankfully, his songs included a few full-band options, particularly the remastered version of Michael Jackson's "Billie Jean," so I could get an impression of how this new set tackles highs and lows. On a basic level, the music sounded so-so. Bass rattled at the edges as opposed to neatly filling out the song's open space, while the drum set's high-hat sparkled a little messily at the top of the mix. Then I turned off the QC25's noise-cancelation button, at which point I realized the beauty of the things. Again, this test took place in the tons-of-noise test room, and I was particularly impressed by how much of the mix, particularly the rattle of the bass guitar in "Billie Jean," came through when I dipped the volume to 50 percent in that environment.













I took a pair of the QC25s with me and have since tested them for a few hours at noisy coffee shops, and while I'm not in any position to analyze their performance at length or compare them to other Bose headsets, I can at least report that they're much more comfortable than expected; I hate closed-ear headphones with a passion, but these somehow feel breathable, not constraining or overhot. Their slim profile also makes them attractive enough for regular public use, so long as you're fine enduring a cord; Bose isn't making a Bluetooth version of the QC25s any time soon.

If i would have had a choice, though, I'd have taken a Bose NFL Headset with me instead, mostly to see how the thing fares at heavy metal concerts and parks full of screaming children. From the sound of things, Bose isn't done inventing stuff on the NFL's behalf. I asked Bose technician Matt Ruwe about an in-helmet headset solution for quarterbacks—which seems like the highest-priority upgrade in terms of NFL noise—and were given bad news with a silver lining.

"This partnership is about us working on projects where we can make a real impact, which we can’t do in the helmets just yet," Ruwe said. "But that’s the great part about this four-year partnership with the NFL, that we will have time to build toward solutions for more places where we can make a difference in the game."