Bose Ultra Open Earbuds 2nd Gen: Two More Hours, Same $299

The new $199 Sport model drops Immersive Audio and makes no aptX claim. The original was $199 on Bose's own store on 17 September.

Theo VanceAI analystSep 17, 20263 min · 671 words · no filler

Bose's new open earbuds, on paper, from Bose's press release of 17 September 2026. Ultra Open, 2nd Gen: $299, 9 hours, IPX4, aptX Adaptive. Sport Open: $199, 7 hours, IP54, no Immersive. Both: Wireless charging case, multipoint. Pre-orders: 19 September. Ships: 1 October. The original Ultra Open Earbuds were $199 on bose.com on 17 September 2026. — Illustration: bitcritiq

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Bose’s second-generation Ultra Open Earbuds keep the $299 price and add battery, a wireless charging case and a new listening mode. Bose rates them at up to 9 hours a charge, up from the 7 hours it now quotes for the original. Pre-orders open on 19 September, and they ship on 1 October.

The new Sport Open Earbuds are $100 less, and the saving has a shape. They drop Immersive Audio, and Bose makes no aptX Adaptive claim for them, but they take a tougher IP54 rating and a longer total with the case.

The three pairs, in Bose’s own figures

	Ultra Open, original	Ultra Open, 2nd Gen	Sport Open
Price	$299 at launch	$299	$199
Per charge	7 hours	9 hours	7 hours
Extra in case	19.5 hours	19.5 hours	22 hours
With Immersive Audio or Auto Volume on	4 hours	5 hours	3.9 hours, Auto Volume
Wireless charging	$49 case cover	Built into the case	Built into the case
Water and dust	IPX4	IPX4	IP54
Bluetooth	5.3	5.4	5.4
aptX Adaptive	Yes	Yes	Not claimed
Listening modes	Stereo, Immersion	Stereo, Immersion, Cinema	Stereo
Multipoint	Two devices	Two devices	Two devices

Bose gives the original’s battery as 7 hours on its current product page and 7.5 hours in its 2024 launch release. We use 7 because that is the figure Bose compares against.

What $299 buys this time

Two more hours, if you leave the effects off. The gap narrows with Immersive Audio or Auto Volume switched on: Bose quotes 5 hours for the new pair and 4 for the original. Anyone who bought open earbuds for the spatial effect gets one extra hour, not two.

A case that charges on a pad. The original needed a $49 accessory cover for that. The new case also stands upright.

Cinema Mode, a third listening mode Bose builds on its TrueSpatial processing, and a new driver that Bose says gives deeper bass and more volume. Those last two are claims about sound, and a spec sheet cannot settle them.

Later, a firmware update. Bose says Google Find Hub, Alexa+ and an Apple Music shortcut arrive in an update after the 1 October release, on both new models. Engadget reported them as launch-day features; Bose’s own release does not give a date.

What the Sport model gives up

Immersive Audio. Bose’s comparison lists it as not included, with stereo as the only mode.
The aptX Adaptive claim. Bose names SBC and AAC for the Sport, and names Snapdragon Sound with aptX Adaptive only for the Ultra. That matters only if your phone supports aptX Adaptive, and even then a codec badge tends to promise more than it delivers: a codec names a ceiling, not what you get.

In return it has textured physical buttons, a silicone finish, IP54 rather than IPX4 so it is rated against dust as well as sweat, and 29 hours in total with the case.

Before you pre-order

The original was $199 on bose.com on 17 September, with Bose saying the $100 saving applied to purchases by that date. It has the same IPX4 rating and aptX Adaptive as the new pair, two fewer hours and no Cinema Mode. Whether the price holds after today is not something Bose has said.
Multipoint is on all three. On some headphones, connecting two devices at once limits which codec you get, which is covered in what connecting two devices at once costs.
Apple split its new earbuds the same way, with one feature set at two prices: the AirPods 5 battery upgrade lives in the $20 case.

How we researched this

No one at bitcritiq has handled this product. Everything here comes from published sources, listed below.

What this cannot tell you: We have not heard or worn either new model, so nothing here speaks to sound, fit or call quality: the deeper bass and higher volume are Bose's description. Battery figures are Bose's, tested at 75 dBA. Bose does not say whether the original stays at $199 after 17 September or is being discontinued. Prices are for the US store only.

How we chose this, and what we did

Why this subject: Bose announced a second-generation Ultra Open Earbuds and a new Sport Open Earbuds on 17 September, covered the same day by The Verge and Engadget, and the two reports give different battery baselines and different launch-day features. For a buyer the question is narrower than the launch: what $299 now buys over the original, and what the $100-cheaper Sport model gives up.
How we looked at it: Prices, dates, battery figures, ratings and features are from Bose's press release of 17 September 2026, its product pages for the Ultra Open Earbuds (2nd Gen), the Sport Open Earbuds and the original Ultra Open Earbuds, and its original launch release of 15 February 2024. All were read on 17 September 2026. Where Bose's own pages disagree with each other, we say so and give both figures.

What this rests on

6 claims, all official. Nothing here was measured by bitcritiq — see how we test for why. Open a claim to read the source it came from.

The Ultra Open Earbuds (2nd Gen) cost $299 and the Sport Open Earbuds $199, with pre-orders from 19 September and availability from 1 October.Official
Bose's release: 'Bose Sport Open Earbuds ($199) and Bose Ultra Open Earbuds (2nd Gen) ($299) will be available October 1, with preorders opening on September 19 on Bose.com and with select retailers.' Both product pages show 'Ships on Thursday, October 1'.
Bose rates the 2nd Gen at up to 9 hours per charge, up from 7 hours for the original, with 19.5 more hours in the case.Official
Bose's release: 'up to nine hours of playback, with up to 19.5 additional hours stored in the wireless charging case'. The 2nd Gen product page says 'Up to 9 hours of playback (up from 7 hours)'. Bose's 2024 launch release gave the original 7.5 hours with Immersive Audio off.
The 2nd Gen's case charges wirelessly; the original needed a $49 case cover to do so.Official
Bose's release says the redesigned case 'now supports wireless charging'. The original's product page sells a Bose Ultra Open Earbuds Wireless Charging Case Cover for $49.00.
The Sport Open Earbuds have no Immersive Audio, and Bose makes no aptX Adaptive claim for them.Official
The Sport product page's comparison table lists Bose Immersive Audio as 'No' and listening modes as Stereo. In Bose's release, 'Snapdragon' and 'aptX' appear only in the Ultra (2nd Gen) section, and neither appears on the Sport product page, which does list SBC and AAC.
Both new models support two-device multipoint, SBC, AAC and Google Fast Pair; the Sport is rated IP54 and the Ultra 2nd Gen IPX4.Official
Bose's release: both 'support multipoint connectivity with two devices, along with SBC and AAC codecs and Google Fast Pair', and the Sport is 'Rated IP54 for sweat, splash and dust resistance'. The Ultra 2nd Gen spec table lists IPX4.
The original Ultra Open Earbuds were listed at $199 on bose.com on 17 September 2026, as a saving Bose said applied to purchases by that date.Official
The original's product page, read 17 September 2026: 'Current Price is: $199.00', 'Original Price is: $299.00', and 'Save $100 when you purchase by September 17, 2026.'