I remember the early days when barely anyone has even heard of the brand “Moondrop”. It was by pure accident that I stumbled upon measurements of the original Blessing on the Ear-Fi Blog, at which point my interest was piqued enough to start asking around for sample units to review.

It’s funny in retrospect, how this almost-underground upstart company managed to hit the Harman in-ear target better than Harman could. And so established their reputation as the “Target Hitter”, tuning their IEMs to Harman (and Diffuse Field in the case of the Spaceship).

I don’t think anyone, myself included, would’ve expected that Moondrop would become one of the greatest chifi powerhouses of the new generation, churning out product after product that received their own share of critical acclaim and mainstream hype. Their meteoric rise no doubt contributed to many other chifi companies’ consideration of Western academic curves as viable targets, which may be why we’ve been seeing a renaissance of chifi IEMs attempting to emulate Harman (to varying degrees of success).

Their current star-studded cast include the Spaceship, the KXXS and more recently, the Starfield and the upcoming Blessing 2. The S8 is Moondrop’s surprise update to the A8, an IEM that has long since been their flagship though lingers in the shadow of its more popular, far cheaper siblings.

Let’s see if Moondrop’s flagship deserves a spot in the limelight, for once.

Product page: Moondrop S8, Moondrop A8

MSRP: $700

Driver configuration: 8BA