Razer Barracuda Pro Wireless Gaming Headset

Razer Barracuda Pro is quite unique in the gaming world as it is a product targeted for gamers who want to have a versatile wireless headset that they can use for both gaming and general listening. An all-rounder.The headset has a sleek design akin to premium pairs by major audio brands. No flashy gaming LED lights, which is a good thing for a versatile headset. They are a bit heavy, however the quality of material is nice and most importantly they are still comfortable to use even in long gaming session. Battery hours is fantastic. You can use the headset for days without needing them to charge. We can’t charge the headset while using them at the same time but that’s not a problem because they are rated at 40 hours of battery use to make them survive even the ... MoreRazer Barracuda Pro is quite unique in the gaming world as it is a product targeted for gamers who want to have a versatile wireless headset that they can use for both gaming and general listening. An all-rounder.The headset has a sleek design akin to premium pairs by major audio brands. No flashy gaming LED lights, which is a good thing for a versatile headset. They are a bit heavy, however the quality of material is nice and most importantly they are still comfortable to use even in long gaming session. Battery hours is fantastic. You can use the headset for days without needing them to charge. We can’t charge the headset while using them at the same time but that’s not a problem because they are rated at 40 hours of battery use to make them survive even the longest gaming session.In terms of features, the pair offer almost everything you can find in a premium headset such as ANC, USB-C, and they offer wireless connectivity through proprietary 2.4Ghz wireless technology and Bluetooth. The option to connect the headset through 2.4Ghz wireless tech is a big deal because you can use your PC’s Bluetooth connectivity for other peripherals such as game pad and phone without experiencing any degradation of audio quality while playing games. The headset also has built-in THX spatial audio encoding meaning this headset is ready for spatial audio gaming.The sound quality is excellent so the 50mm driver as expected does not disappoint. The headset produce balanced sound profile that is leaning towards studio headset, which may or may not work for you. If your favorite genre is EDM, this pair may sound a bit lacking in the bass department. Other types of music should sound nice and movies produce clear dialogues. The pair can compete in the sound department with other headsets offered from most premium brands, which makes this headset very appealing for general purpose. In the past, you might want to have separate headsets for gaming and general listening. This headset can do them all. The THX Achromatic Audio Amplifier seems to be doing good job in producing the gaming sound profile. So, you’d be getting the best of two worlds: gaming and general listening.How well this headset performs for gaming would however depend largely on what type of gamer you are. If you play mainly AAA games and don’t use in game voice chat much, this headset will be great for you. There’s no detachable boom mic. While the mic is not bad but surely, it’s not their forte.So why five stars? It’s clear from the beginning that this is a product intended to be a versatile headset for gamers. Many headsets that I own do not have a boom mic and the mic sound quality is what to be expected for that kind of headset. So, if you’re a gamer who wants to have versatile wireless headset that you want to use for long gaming sessions and general listening, this is a great pair for you. But if you’re a streamer or a gamer who uses in game voice chat a lot, you may want to consider other options.

The Razer Barracuda Pro is more like a premium general headset vs a traditional gaming headset. There are no bright lights, no boom mic, and no funky color schemes. You can almost say it’s a gaming headset for “adults”, but it feels like the Razer design team was shooting for even more. The Barracuda Pro is an Active Noise Canceling headset, which is somewhat rare for gaming, but definitely has a place. It does a fair job of softening the sound of people talking around me, however it doesn’t completely eliminate them. To be fair, I’ve tested a lot of high end ANC headsets and none of them cut out 100% of the noise, but Barracuda Pro still lets more sound leak through than others. Not a big deal in my book, because I’ve never felt the need for noise reduction in my ... MoreThe Razer Barracuda Pro is more like a premium general headset vs a traditional gaming headset. There are no bright lights, no boom mic, and no funky color schemes. You can almost say it’s a gaming headset for “adults”, but it feels like the Razer design team was shooting for even more. The Barracuda Pro is an Active Noise Canceling headset, which is somewhat rare for gaming, but definitely has a place. It does a fair job of softening the sound of people talking around me, however it doesn’t completely eliminate them. To be fair, I’ve tested a lot of high end ANC headsets and none of them cut out 100% of the noise, but Barracuda Pro still lets more sound leak through than others. Not a big deal in my book, because I’ve never felt the need for noise reduction in my gaming headsets, however it does do a fantastic job of cutting out fan noise. I can actually turn on the Turbo mode in my gaming rigs and I don’t hear the fans at all, which is a triumph, because they’re so loud I rarely use Turbo mode. But now I can!Aside from ANC, the Barracuda pro features a Smartswitch (to quickly change between wireless dongle and bluetooth sources), THX achromatic amplifiers, noise canceling microphones, and is compatible with PC, Playstation, Nintendo Switch, and Android devices. It’s designed to connect to 2 devices at once (usb and bluetooth), with the bluetooth connection ideally suited for the phone. What’s nice about this is that I can also use the Barracuda Pro as a regular set of ANC headphones when I’m out and about, and then plug in the USB dongle to my PC for virtual surround gaming. It works fairly smoothly, however there were a couple times that it was connected to my phone and playing audio, but wouldn’t connect to the Android app for some reason.Soundwise, it does a good job with games and movies, but I find it a bit flat for music. I can’t really put my finger on it, but it reminds me of how high end reference home theater speakers generally don’t make great music speakers. There’s a certain punch I like for music, and while the Barracuda Pro has decent low bass extension, there’s something in-between that’s missing. Maybe I need to play with the EQ more, or try a different spatial audio setting. For games and movies though, it plays loud and clean, while offering an excellent soundstage. I could clearly hear audio details that I was previously unaware of in games, and it actually helped me get a lot further in Hades than before.In terms of fit and finish, the ear cushions are incredibly comfortable and soft. They surprisingly don’t make my ears warm and are legitimately comfortable to wear for hours of play. The materials are all plastic and leather, but it feels sturdy and tightly put together. I worry that the band is all plastic, but only time will tell how it’ll hold up. For now though, it’s been solid and I appreciate how the cans can pivot and swivel for the best fit.Overall, the Razer Barracuda Pro is a solid ANC gaming headset that’s versatile enough for all-purpose use. The battery life is great, they can be comfortably worn for hours, and do an excellent job with games and movies. It responds very well to spatial audio effects in Windows (Atmos vs THX vs DTS), and is a good choice for someone who wants one ANC headset that can do it all.

INTRO:I’m a gamer (on all modern platforms), but also an audiophile and headphone enthusiast. For me, audio is critically important to any gaming experience, but there’s often a desire for conveniences like 2.4GHz Wireless, Bluetooth, or Active Noise Cancellation. The Razer Barracuda Pro sets out to be your cross-platform (minus Xbox) gaming headset as well as your travel companion. And to my surprise, overall, I think it achieves a fair bit of that but not without compromise.UNBOXING:The box was easy to open, and inside you’ll find a nice carrying case. It’s relatively rigid as to keep the headset protected, but that does mean that it won’t flex a whole lot in your bag. It is among the largest cases I’ve had for portable headphones like this, but I don’t ... MoreINTRO:I’m a gamer (on all modern platforms), but also an audiophile and headphone enthusiast. For me, audio is critically important to any gaming experience, but there’s often a desire for conveniences like 2.4GHz Wireless, Bluetooth, or Active Noise Cancellation. The Razer Barracuda Pro sets out to be your cross-platform (minus Xbox) gaming headset as well as your travel companion. And to my surprise, overall, I think it achieves a fair bit of that but not without compromise.UNBOXING:The box was easy to open, and inside you’ll find a nice carrying case. It’s relatively rigid as to keep the headset protected, but that does mean that it won’t flex a whole lot in your bag. It is among the largest cases I’ve had for portable headphones like this, but I don’t think it’s unreasonable either.Inside the zipper case is the Barracuda Pro and a nice compartment with charging/data cables and 2.4GHz adapter. The wireless adapter uses USB-C male for versatile connectivity. The cables include a USB-A male to USB-C female cable for adapting and extending, as well as a USB-A to USB-C for charging the Barracuda Pro directly.BUILD:The build is decent on the Barracuda Pro. The build is plastic, but doesn’t feel like rubbish. However, as I displace the earcups away from each other to put the headset on my head, I do hear some light plastic creaking noises.I also really like how the design is not as gamery as other Razer products. The logo is quite stealthy, and people would probably not notice that I was wearing a “gaming headset” unless they looked hard enough.COMFORT:I’ve been using the Barracuda Pro at home and at work to really put them through their paces. And I’m honestly pretty happy with how comfortable the Barracuda Pro is. While it does weigh in a bit heavier than some other headphones that I regularly use, I find that the clamping force is ample for my normal size head to get a good seal for isolation, and the headband doesn’t create any pressure points that cause me discomfort.I have worn the Barracuda Pro for hours at a time, which I honestly didn’t expect I’d be able to do. I’ve used the most hyped up 2022 ANC headphones, and for my head, the Barracuda Pro’s ear pads and headband are surprisingly more comfortable. Not only that, but the Barracuda Pro has deeper pads which means your ears are less prone to touching the fabric that covers the speaker drivers. This aspect of comfort is honestly pretty noteworthy because I would actually consider taking these onto a flight.SETUP & FIRMWARE UPDATE:Setting up the Razer Barracuda Pro is pretty simple. Plug the USB-C dongle into your device, and hold the multifunction power button on the left earcup of the headset to power it on. If you hold it for longer while it powers on, you will enter pairing mode for the 2.4GHz HyperSpeed Wireless.On a Windows machine, I was prompted to install Razer Synapse—which I reluctantly did. I ended up finding that there was a firmware update for the Barracuda Pro and its dongle which I did perform.Prior to this firmware update, my unit exhibited a strange microphone feedback loop which caused the headphones to make a continuous high pitch sine wave noise while ANC was enabled with the headphones off your head. I’m amazed they shipped it like this as it’s definitely unacceptable behavior for a headphone these days. So it’s really important to stress that you should UPDATE THE FIRMWARE.I also encountered a strange bug (at least in Windows 11) where over 2.4GHz, having the sound panel open makes the Barracuda Pro sound incredibly tinny and removes all the bass. The moment you close the sound panel, this problem goes away. PLEASE FIX THIS RAZER.FEATURES:On the headset, you have a pretty minimalistic control scheme, which I can appreciate.On the left earcup, you have the microphone mute switch, a volume wheel, a multifunction button, and the USB-C charging port. The multifunction button can be held to power on/off the headset, pressed 1x to play/pause, pressed 2x quickly to skip forward a track, and pressed 3x quickly to go back to the previous track.One unfortunate aspect of this headset is that because there is no boom microphone, you won’t have any LED indicator showing you when your microphone is muted. Unfortunately this means you might end up talking and not realize that your microphone is muted.And while the Razer Synapse software does allow you to enable sidetone monitoring, it is software based rather than hardware based—so it appears to only work on Windows, but even worse is that the latency is too high for me to recommend it. You will likely end up stuttering if you use this. If you absolutely need to hear yourself, I would recommend the Ambient mode over the Razer Synapse sidetone monitoring since that is hardware based and won’t have any perceptible latency. But you’ll lose out on ANC as a result.On the right earcup, you have a single button that when pressed toggles between ANC on, ANC off, and Ambient mode. When you press the button 2x quickly, this will toggle between 2.4GHz HyperSpeed wireless and Bluetooth. And when you hold it for several seconds, it will enter Bluetooth pairing mode.Unlike some other headsets, you cannot use Bluetooth and 2.4GHz simultaneously. So you won’t be able to chat on Discord on your smartphone over Bluetooth while playing on PlayStation or Switch via 2.4GHz. And there’s no wired listening option on the Barracuda Pro, as there appears to be no data over USB-C and there’s no 3.5mm jack for traditional analog use.SOFTWARE:The Razer Synapse software experience is probably the worst part about the Barracuda Pro. Once you perform your firmware update, Synapse is largely optional. You get some basic EQ capabilities and control over the ANC strength and can switch between ANC on, ANC off, and Ambient modes. You can also enable/disable THX Spatial Audio, but this requires you to change your output device in Windows to a virtual THX Audio device.You also get some microphone EQ, noise reduction and voice clarity options, but I honestly felt as though none of them were particularly great. The volume normalization helped make the microphone louder, but voice clarity seemed to mostly just cut bass out of your voice which can really suck the life out of your voice, so I would keep that setting to a minimum.Once paired over Bluetooth, the mobile app allowed basic controls like how long it can remain idle before turning off, a 10-band EQ, ANC strength, microphone noise cancellation, a low latency mode, do-not-disturb settings to prevent calls from interrupting a mobile gaming session, and the ability to switch which Bluetooth device it is connected to. Overall, a basic software experience here, but honestly favorable over the experience that is Razer Synapse.SOUND:I think the Barracuda Pro’s stock sound signature is “balanced, and it’s my favorite way of listening. The Barracuda Pro isn’t overly bass heavy like a bunch of cheap gaming headsets, but it definitely has bass and can pack a punch. It does a decent job at presenting midrange and treble detail without presenting any sharp sibilance and also without being overly relaxed or veiled. It is honestly a surprise to me how much I actually think Razer is onto something with this stock sound. It is quite competent for music compared to many other headsets I’ve tried.And while I’m not a hardcore competitive gamer, I do personally find that playing a variety of games on the Barracuda Pro to be quite enjoyable. As someone who normally plays games and music on high-end headphones, I find that the Barracuda Pro doesn’t make me grimace. It lets me listen without constantly criticizing my listening experience. And it’s worth mentioning that there’s a reasonably wide soundstage, so whether it’s music, cinematics or game sound effects, they will be presented with good stereo separation.ANC & AMBIENT:In terms of Active Noise Cancellation, I’m pretty impressed with what Razer has implemented with the Barracuda Pro. I don’t personally feel a lot of pressure with the Barracuda Pr; having the ANC set to the maximum via Synapse or the mobile app is effective enough for my needs.The Ambient mode is also pretty good compared to some implementations I’ve heard from other companies. When I’m using it, I can hear myself quite well and don’t struggle to hear my environment.MIC:Because the Barracuda Pro doesn’t have a boom microphone, you’re getting very mediocre microphone quality, which is definitely a bummer. The most popular Bluetooth ANC headphones on the market have better microphone quality compared to the Barracuda Pro, which is disappointing. But at the same time, the Barracuda Pro also functions as a gaming headset and is typically more affordable than those popular ANC headphones.On both 2.4GHz and Bluetooth, I’d describe the sound as warm, muffled, and a bit distanced. It gets the job done, and I’ve heard much worse. But I’ve also heard much better from bluetooth headphones that came out 6 years ago.BATTERY:There’s honestly not much to say here other than it’s been fantastic. I’ve been using it through both 2.4GHz and Bluetooth. Razer claims 40 hours, and I’m definitely getting my 40 hours worth with ANC enabled. Very happy with the results here. You won’t have any issue getting through a week of use.CONCLUSION:Overall, I like the physical product, and I like the way it presents music and gaming audio. The noise cancellation is quite effective, but not industry-leading. The worst part about the Barracuda Pro is the fact that Razer Synapse is overly complex and buggy. And while the microphone is not great, it’s certainly serviceable and doesn’t sound like a distorted mess.My initial impression was not-so-great first impressions because of Razer Synapse and other firmware bugs. But each day I used it on a machine without Synapse, the more I am impressed by its versatility and performance.