In this video we’re breaking down the five best mp3 players in 2021. I’ve included options for every type of consumer. If you’re looking for an mp3 player for fitness or one that plays high-resolution audio to give you as close to the original sound as the artist intended, all of the product for you.
The fifth product on our list is the SanDisk Clip Sport Plus. This is our best mp3 player for fitness. If you’re looking for a simple mp3 player for your workouts the Clip Sport Plus is an inexpensive mp3 player that will run you about 50 dollars. It’s durable water resistant and stands up to tough workout conditions rain or shine, pair the SanDisk Clip Sport Plus mp3 player with your favorite Bluetooth wireless headsets for even more freedom in your workout
It has a plastic body with a 128 by 128 pixel screen up front with easy-to-use interface. The control buttons surround a large power select button and let you handle playing tracks, pausing, skipping tracks and all other functions related to playing songs and navigating files. A volume control is on the left side and a jack for the included wired headphones is on the right.
The Clip Sport Plus is very compact making it perfect for workouts or running and won’t weigh you down. It clips to your clothing or gear using a large spring-loaded clip on the back of the player and even though it’s small it puts out decent audio quality and has 16 gigabytes of internal storage letting you load up about 4 000 songs and also as a built-in FM tuner.
If you need more internal storage there’s a micro-SD slot that you can add a card to for additional storage. The Clip Sport Plus is compatible with most popular audio file formats including mp3, WMA, AUG VORBIS, FLAC and AAC. The player comes with an internal rechargeable battery that can last up to 20 hours on a single charge.
If you’re looking for a good mp3 player for your workouts the SanDisk Clip Sport Plus offers lightweight portability built-in FM radio and a clip-on design making it ideal for anyone with an active lifestyle.
The fourth product on our list is the Apple iPod Touch. This is still a great mp3 player. Apple brought out a new 32 gigabyte version of the iPod Touch with a bump in processor and performance that makes a great alternative to using your more expensive phone for workouts for all your gaming music and videos.
Retailing for around 200 the Apple iPod Touch still looks incredible sporting subtle design elements like the chamfered edges the ring around the camera and a great looking 4-inch retina display that all work toward presenting you with a highly polished product that looks and feels amazing. Along with the iPod everything you need to get started is included in the box including the EarPods, a lightning cable and an ac adapter.
Most of the changes to the touch are on the inside including a 64-bit a10 chip that’s capable of running pretty much anything on the app store. It also has support for group facetime and AR apps. On the back there’s an 8-megapixel camera with an f/2.4 aperture which takes solid pictures with crisp detail and videos recorded at 1080p at 30 frames per second also looks smooth and vibrant. It’s a really nice all-around device that’s capable of more than just playing music.
The iPod Touch can play mp3, AAC, AIFF, wave audible audiobook and apple lossless audio formats. And if you like the touch but feel that 32 gigabytes might fill up too fast, Apple also offers the touch in larger 128 and 256 gigabyte sizes at a higher price point.
This is a great device for keeping your music handy in the car at the office on trips or by your bedside without having to rely on your phone or use up your phone’s battery; it even makes a great workout companion. There’s a lot to like about the Apple iPod Touch which is still a great mp3 player and it has a lot to offer you with its versatility in addition to just music.
The third product on our list is the Sony NW-A55 Walkman A Series. This is a great all-rounder mp3 player. Sony has had to keep up in order to stay relevant amid competing products and one of their most recent offerings is the NW-A55 Walkman A Series that’s priced at around 220. It delivers an entertaining experience with detailed, natural sounding, high resolution audio.
It’s well designed and has a familiar design with the front dominated by the 3.1-inch TFT color touchscreen display that gives you a nice crisp pixel density of 300 PPI. The left side houses the micro-SD card slot which is protected by a color matched flap and a small rubber gasket that offers a reasonable amount of protection against dust but doesn’t qualify as water resistant in any way.
On the right side you’ll find all of the buttons that control power, volume, plan pause and skip buttons and finally a hold switch that locks out the controls apart from the power button and is useful if you’re involved in an activity and want to avoid unintentional button presses that might interrupt playback.
Built-in Bluetooth will let you use wireless headphones with the Walkman and while you’re enjoying your music there’s a lot of audio processing going on in the background. S master hx reduces distortion and noise across a wide range of frequencies for rich full-bodied sound while DSEE HX restores all your compressed music files and upscales compressed digital music files and brings them closer to the quality of hi-res audio. It’s compatible with various audio formats including mp3, WMA, FLAK, AAC, apple lossless and more.
You can even tune into live radio broadcasts with the built-in FM tuner and battery life will give you an incredible 45 hours of play time. The Sony NW-A55 Walkman A Series is a great all-rounder mp3 player with a lot going for it the design is appealing and the sound processing makes everything sound its best with the DSE HX adding more richness to the overall sound. If you’ve ever owned an analog Sony Walkman, you’ll love the digital version.
The second product is the FiiO M11. This is our best overall mp3 player under 500. If you’re looking for an mp3 player that has a feature set for audio files you’re going to really like the FiiO flagship M11 Pro. It’s an android high resolution lossless music player with APTX HD, LDAC HIFI Bluetooth making it one of the best overall mp3 players you can get for under 500.
The M11 has a squared off angular design with a vibrant 5.15-inch 720p IPS touchscreen display with excellent viewing angles in color that makes your album art pop. Throw in an exynos 7872 processor that drives a fast and responsive android OS along with two AKM digital to analog converters that decode your music and reduce distortion and you’ll have a digital audio player that looks and feels close to a modern smartphone.
The FiiO music app was designed for audio files with both a user interface that gives you easy access to your music and an exclusive decoding algorithm for the highest sound quality possible. The OS also delivers easy native support for streaming services including title and Spotify. You’ll also like the built-in support for 2.5 3.5- and 4.4-millimeter balanced headphone outputs that eliminate the need for adapters and battery life will give you up to 13 hours of play time.
You get three gigabytes of ram that ensures smooth multitasking while the 32 gigabytes of storage plus two micro-SD card slots that each support up to two terabyte cards means you can store thousands of music files. But if your music collection even exceeds the SD cards you can also play files directly from your pc using DLNA or airplay for IOS devices.
If you’re looking for one of the best mp3 players around, the FiiO M11 has an excellent display, great battery life, lots of storage options and optimized electronics that ensure great sound for an exceptional high quality audio listening experience.
The first product on our list is the Astell&Kern A&Norma SR25. This is our best mp3 player for hi-res audio. If you love listening to hi-res audio to appreciate all the fine details and don’t mind paying more for that bit perfect audio Astell&Kern A&Norma SR25 brings you mastering quality sound so you can hear natural and almost exact presence exactly as it was recorded.
Astell&Kern’s most affordable portable music player. The A&Norma SR25 features a unique design with a heavy focus on audio quality above all else that makes this one of the best mp3 players for high resolution audio. It’s got a unique design with a durable aluminum body and the canted 3.6-inch touchscreen compensates for the natural position of your hand, so it appears straight when holding it.
You get two headphone jacks on top, one three and a half millimeter unbalanced and one two and a half-balanced output. The volume thumbwheel is a nice touch making it more convenient than using volume rockers; the bottom of the unit has a USB type-c port and a micro-SD card slot for additional storage up to one terabyte on top of the 64-gigabyte internal storage.
The battery life is phenomenal at 21 hours with a stable power supply design and circuit optimizations giving you signature and k quality sound and a low noise floor. The SR25 supports native DSD 256 and 32-bit 384 kilohertz audio and boasts performance that surpasses most of its competitors with a high-performance CPU and fast memory speed along with an audio path suitable for high-speed signal processing. There’s also a performance mode that automatically optimizes the system according to the data size of the source being played so you don’t hear any breakups.
With the open app service, you can stream your favorite music from title, SoundCloud, pandora, cobuzz siriusxm, ds audio, Deezer and more. If you’re looking for a portable music player that’s packed with innovative tech specs and features including dual DAC all working to give you audio that’s as close to the original sound as the artist intended, then the A&Norma SR25 is your best option for hi-res audio.