After making their US debut at CES 2020 earlier this week, LG’s new self-cleaning true wireless earbuds – the LG Tone Free – are finally on sale in America for $200 (around £153, AU$289).
If you want to be first in line to get a pair, you’ll need to purchase them directly from LG. But if you can wait another day, you’ll be able to buy them from other retailers.
So what’s the deal with self-cleaning? The LG Tone Free uses UV light inside the headphone’s case to sanitize the earbuds in between use, killing bacteria and germs – though just how good of a job it does isn’t totally clear.
That said, even if you think the germ-killing feature is a bit gimmick-y, they’re a decent set of ‘buds in terms of performance: they were built in partnership with Meridian Audio and use a composite diaphragm in the speaker unit that, according to LG at least, produces clarity in high, mid and low ranges.
Keeping it clean
According to specs listed on the LG Tone Free’s product page, you should be able to squeeze about six hours of battery life out of the earbuds between charges and the case itself provides another 15 hours of battery life – which is impressive considering that germ-killing UV LED light inside the case stays turned on when the earbuds are charging.
Neither the product page nor LG itself has said anything about turning the UV LED light off to get a boost in the case’s battery life – but that’s something we’ll try out when we get the headphones in for review later this month.
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