Zoook ZB Rocker TwinPods review: ‘AirPods’ at a budget

With the increasing popularity of wireless audio products, wired earphones (or headsets) are almost on the verge of becoming extinct. Smartphone manufacturers (e.g. Apple, Motorola) have also started doing away with the traditional 3.5mm audio jack in their handsets.
Apple’s AirPods and Samsung’s Gear IconX are two of the most popular wireless earpods out there, but their high price tag means that they may not be in everyone’s budget.

If that includes you, Zoook’s recently launched ZB Rocker TwinPods may be worth a look. Having a price tag of Rs 5,499, they claim to offer a great wireless audio experience. But are the TwinPods really any good?

We spent some time with Zoook’s latest offering, and here’s the rest of our review.



Design
Zoook TwinPods come in a leather pouch, along with extra ear tips and a wireless charging dock. They weigh only about 7g and are small enough to fit into the ears quite comfortably. The two earpods are made with rubber and have plastic heads with Zoook’s logo imprinted on them. This also doubles up as the Power On/Off and control buttons. The rubber body makes the earpods sweat-resistant, which means that they can be used during activities such as exercise and running.
Both pods have multi-colour LED indicators. They blink Red when being charged and Blue when in use. As for the charging dock, it weighs around 77g and also comes with a rubber body. We found the dock to be quite sturdy and durable. It has a transparent plastic lid so you can see the TwinPods when they are being charged. It also has an LED indicator at the back, which glows in Red when the pods are being charged and Blue when the battery is full. We found the overall design of the Zoook ZB Rocker TwinPods to be quite good. Build quality is appreciable as well.

Performance
Pairing up the TwinPods is quite simple. All you have to do is turn on Bluetooth on the source audio device (e.g. smartphone) and then press the Power buttons on both earpods simultaneously. A long press gets the TwinPods started. Usually, if you turn them on together, they get connected at once. But during our testing, we had issues getting the right earpod connected and had to reboot the TwinPods to get them working.

We found this to be quite disappointing. That’s because the right earpod connects to the left (which in turn connects to the source device). So if you lose wireless connectivity in the left earpod, the entire pair doesn’t function. That said, it only happened occasionally during our testing.
The overall fit is quite comfortable and you can choose between 3 different-sized eartips.
Coming to the sound quality, we found it to be really good, especially for the TwinPods’ price. They have integrated CVC Noise Isolation technology which does an impressive job of cancelling noise, resulting in clearer music output. We found the lows, highs and mids to be quite balanced and bass to be synchronized. When listening to low-res music, the vocals are muffled by background music.
That said, the battery backup on the Zoook ZB Rocker TwinPods is quite impressive. In our testing, the earpods lasted 3-4 days on a single charge with moderate usage. The wireless charging dock itself is lightweight and can be easily carried anywhere.

The integrated microphone lets you handle calls handsfree, which is an added plus.

Verdict

The Zoook ZB Rocker TwinPods definitely do justice to their price. The pair of earpods has good build quality and overall decent sound output. However, they are worth the money only if you absolutely need wireless earpods that don’t have any wires at all.

On the contrary, if you don’t mind wireless earphones that are connected to each other with a wire, you can go for Skullcandy’s Method Wireless, which are in the same price bracket