The Best IEMs for Mixing — SonicScoop

This article on the best mixing IEMs is also available as a video and podcast episode.

Introduction: Can you mix in IEMs?

In Ear Monitors or “IEM”s are a mainstay of the live sound world and have been for years.

The extra small earphones that sit deep inside the ear canal help keep stage volumes low, while allowing musicians to hear themselves better, leading to better sounding concerts and less hearing loss among performers.

They’ve increasingly conquered the stage in recent decades, but do they also have a place in the studio and for mixing, mastering and recording applications?

Much to my surprise, I now believe that the answer to this question is a resounding YES.

…If you know which ones to buy.

The quality of IEMs has improved so much recently that some of the best among them are on par with high quality open back headphones in terms of performance and trustworthiness.

We already know that higher-end headphones have recently become a viable opportunity for mixing and even mastering applications, often outperforming speakers in the same price range in small studio settings by taking the all-important room out of the equation. So we’re increasingly seeing high level mixes done in headphones already.

But why use compace IEMs, when you can use full sized headphones instead?

Below are the potential pros. Read on, or scroll through to my top picks below from brands like 64 Audio, Alclair, Sennheiser, Beyerdynamic,

The Benefits of IEMs Over Traditional Headphones

1. Lack of Leakage

The biggest benefit that IEMs have over headphones is their incredible lack of bleed, in or out.

If you are mixing or monitoring in loud settings, or in situations where you don’t want to annoy or distract family members, coworkers or other bystanders, IEMs offer a clear advantage over open back headphones.

If you are recording a band in a one room studio, if you’re mixing a live show for an audience, or monitors for musicians, IEMs could be the ideal choice over open back headphones.

Sure, closed headphones can also reduce bleed, but good luck getting good results out of them for mixing… unless perhaps you are using some sophisticated software solutions like Slate VSX, Sonarworks, or Space Replicator. And even then, the transient response of closed back headphones can be lacking compared to high quality open backs or IEMs.

IEMs also offer benefits in tracking situations. In addition to having less bleed than open backs, they can have less bleed than closed backs, especially when used on a single ear.

Many singers like to take one earcup off on closed back headphones so they can better hear their voices and have more accurate pitch. But leaving one closed back ear cup dangling is a recipe for bleed.

On the other hand, most professional IEMs will have the option of easily fully disconnecting one earpiece, allowing single ear listening without bleed.

2. More Consistent Sound

If you wear headphones the same way every day, they can offer you very consistent performance. But if you change they way they sit on your head, whether by putting them on at a slightly different angle, or adding glasses or a hat to the equation, the sound of your headphones can potentially change from day to day.

A potential benefit with IEMs is that if you get a pair that fit very well, and push them all the way in every time, you should have the same exact sound every time, regardless of insertion angle or accessories.

3. Potential for Custom Fit

This leads us to advantage #3: IEMs can be made to fit your unique ears so the fit and seal is absolutely perfect every time. By meeting with an audiologist, you can have molds made of your ears, and many IEM brands can use these to make a custom fit pair just for you.

You can generally expect a custom fit pair to last you about 5-10 years before the fit ceases to be perfect due to continued growth of the ear canal over time—and at that point they just turn into a decent generic fit pair in many cases.

4. Lighter Weight

The best open back headphones for mixing and mastering applications an be HEAVY. The very best options are often planar magnetic models which have to use quite massive magnets to offer all the sonic benefits that headphones can deliver.

IEMs on the other hand, are designed to be as light and easy to wear as possible, generally lighter than even the lightest of dynamic driver headphones.

5. Potential sound quality benefits

There are several types of drivers available for IEMs, and two of the most intriguing are basically exclusive to IEMs at this point: Balanced Armature and xMEMS drivers, both of which offer excellent transient response—far better than traditional dynamic drivers—at a fraction of the weight of the kinds of Planar Magnetic designs available for full-sized headphones.

Types of IEMs

There are a few types of IEMs out there, which we’ve started to explore above:

Dynamic Driver IEMs

These are usually the lowest cost options available, and some of them can be surprisingly good for the price.  The technology is basically the same as what you’ll find in most conventional headphones and speakers, just scaled down.

Aside from the low cost, the benefits are in how easy it is to get good low frequency reproduction, though often at the cost of some detail in the highs and/or mids, as well as speed in the transient response.

However, companies have been doing a better and better job of making great affordable dynamic IEMs in recent years. For just $100, the Sennheiser E100 can match or outperform many full sized dynamic driver headphones around the same price. At $500 the new Beyerdynamic DT 70 offer a very linear frequency response with transient accuracy that again is as good or better than many full sized closed back headphones of a similar price.

Balanced Armature IEMs

These are the quintessential “IEM” style of driver. The benefits here lie in the fast transient response, excellent midrange and high frequency performance, and the tiny size that allows makers to put multiple drivers into a single pair of headphones.

The behavior here is totally different from dynamic drivers, and instead of using a cone and moving coil, they employ what is almost like a small lever that pivots back and forth on a fulcrum, often inside of a miniature tube.

By themselves, they struggle at reproducing lows, but when a maker stacks multiple tiny drivers into the same earpiece, they can create 2-way, 3-way and even 4-way in ear monitors, relying on the concepts you’ll find in the highest end multi-way speaker systems found in high end mixing and mastering rooms.

In these kinds of multi-driver arrays, balance armature IEMs can provide very good, very resonance free low end, and performance that dynamic drivers can only dream of.

My favorite picks here for studio use are from Alclair Audio and 64 Audio, both of which make absolutely wonderful IEMs at every price point you’ll find them in. I recommend Alclair for those who prefer a slightly darker, smoother, more neutral voicing, and 64 Audio for those who prefer a bit more detail and brightness.

The best of the Alclair IEMs are a bit more understated and smooth in voicing, and may encourage you to add a bit more welcome excitement to your mixes, while the 64 Audio are a bit more “stunning” in sound out of the box, with an even more “luxurious” sound, and offer incredible insights into the soundstage and upper frequencies.

Planar Magnetic IEMs

These are one of the less common types of IEMs, but should offer increased transient accuracy over dynamic drivers without the expense of a multi-driver balanced armature design.

When it comes to full sized headphones, planar magnetic drivers are just beginning to take the pro audio world by storm for their advantages in low frequency extension and transient response.

The problem in the IEM world however, is that to offer all the advantages of planar designs, the earpieces have to be quite wide, making them less suitable for stage performance, so there has been less innovation and variety in this type of driver so far.

64 Audio has a model that embraces this technology, called the solo, and Audeze, maker of some of the most famous full sized planar headphones, have recently discontinued their planar IEM line in anticipation of reworking its production for the future.

Electrostatic IEMs

Although there aren’t any purely electrostatic IEMs that I am aware of, at least one company, Alclair Audio, is starting to incorporate this technology into their higher end multi-driver designs, like the Electro 6.

Electrostatic technology is famous for being the driving force behind some of the most expensive high end full sized headphones ever made. They offer top tier high frequency response and stunning midrange, and they have real potential in some IEM deisgns.

xMEMS IEMs

I’m saving the most interesting for last on this list. “MEMS” is short for “micro-electromechanical systems”. In this context, we are talking about super-miniature machines— tiny micro-chip-like devices that are excellent at moving sound.

“xMEMS” refers to a specific brand and technology based on these principles, that focus around miniature reverse piezoelectric drivers.

You can think of these drivers as being tiny rigid little “flaps” with an air gap between them that vibrate rapidly back and forth, almost like a pair of shutters inside a window.

While this driver type exhibits slightly more THD than others, it is still well below the point of diminishing returns, where it really doesn’t matter.

The huge advantage here is not only in its stellar transient response and the extremely tight production tolerances around frequency response… They also smoke any other type of driver when it comes to phase alignment across frequencies.

This is an under explored and under-recognized facet of audio fidelity that has driven the embrace of DSP-powered studio monitors in recent years, and is a concept that deserves an article all of its own.

Suffice it to say that improved phase coherence offers significant benefits in stereo imaging, among other factors.

A very small number of companies making pro-audio suitable products, like Singularity Audio and Noble Audio are making products that use this technology. While still maturing at this time, this field is very promising.

Which to choose?

So which ones to choose?

I’m here to help. In case you don’t know me, I’m Justin Colletti, and I’m a platinum mastering engineer who just happens to have heard most of the IEMs on the pro market today, and plans to hear them all over time! I’ll give you some of my recommendations and tasting notes to help you find the monitors that will best suit your needs.

Rather than focus on specific models I’ll be focusing in on IEM brands to give you a sense for how them compare, and where each excels.

I’ve broken them up into 5 categories:

The Categories

1. The Best Money Can Buy — These are my top picks at any price point, and the IEMs that I’d most recommend for serious mixing, mastering and studio applications. My top picks are from the high end of Alclair Audio and 64 Audio.

2. Most Innovative — I had to include some xMEMS IEMs here because of how intriguing and beneficial this technology is. My pick here is from Singularity Audio. While I don’t think the voicing is yet on par with Alclair and 64 Audio, this can be addressed with EQ, and there are some ways in which the xMEMS drivers outperform at a fraction of the price.

3. Best Dynamic Drivers — I couldn’t make this list without including lower cost dynamic driver headphones. My picks here are the Sennheiser 100 at the lower end and the Beyerdynamic DT 70 at the higher end.

4. Best Super Compact IEMs — For those who are looking for IEMs for studio and stage use, I wanted to include entries that are extra compact and lightweight, even if they aren’t my top picks for mixing applications. Here I was especially impressed by the Westone MACH series of IEMs which were almost on par with my favorites from Alclair and 64 Audio, at a lower cost and with a much smaller and lighter profile.

Brands Not Included

Please note that this list is not quite as comprehensive of a list as my headphone and speaker roundups to date, as it is represents my own first foray deep into the world of IEMs over this past year.

I do not yet have as wide of a multi-decade experience to draw on with IEM brands as I do with speaker and conventional headphone brands. But I believe that I am one of the few studio oriented engineers who has heard and compared nearly as many IEMs as I have this past year!

Not available for audition due to lack of response or availability from the brands include options from JH Audio, Sony, Noble Audio, Sensaphonics, Jomo, Softears, and HiFiGo.

Alclair Audio (Winner: Best Money Can Buy — Smooth/Neutral Voicing)

The Alclair Audio IEMs I tried in my tests were my personal favorites. The only ones that came close were those made by 64 Audio, and some listeners may prefer either brand, depending on their tastes.

In a word, studio focused in-ears from Alclair are smooth. They have some of the best low end of any balanced armature IEMs out there, and the mids and highs were wonderfully detailed without being excessively bright.

These are remarkably resonance-free IEMs with fantastic balance, and the kind of frequency response that is most likely to lead you in the right direction in the mix.

The Studio 4 ($999) and Electro Six ($1799) IEMs from Alclair sounded closer to my trusty full sized Audeze MM-500 headphones than any of the other IEMs I tried, making them a natural personal choice for me. Very close to them in quality were the RSM Quad Driver ($749).

While the Electro Six offer a nice addition of an electrostatic tweeter, which is unusual in IEMs, the best value here is probably the Studio 4, which were basically on par with my $1700 open back planar magnetic headphones for just $999.

Alclair also offer much less expensive IEMs, all the way down to $149 for their single driver generic fit IEMs, and super high end models as high as $2499. The models I’ve discussed here are their best options for flat, critical listening in ears for mixing, mastering and producing situations, but they also offer other models designed for live performance, and for specific instrument types.

The only caveat here is that most of the Alclair line is custom fit only, meaning you’ll want to make a quick trip to your local audiologist for any of my top picks from them to be an option for you.

Some listeners who prefer brighter sounding monitors may prefer other brands, but be warned: If you like bright sounds, brighter monitors will lead you toward making darker sounding mixes.

The Alclairs, with their flat midrange and thoroughly unhyped high-end will lead most mixers in the right direction, as most mixers tend to end up with mixes that are slightly darker than they want their final mixes to sound. I’d only steer you away from this brand if you already tend to mix excessively bright and need help reeling that in.

64 Audio (Winner: Best Money Can Buy—Bright/Detailed Voicing)

 

My other top pick for IEMs is easily 64 Audio. These in-ears sound shockingly good.

Along with the top of the line in-ears from from Alclair, 64 Audio easily offers some of the best overall balance that I’ve heard from any IEMs on the market.

I just can’t say enough nice things about them. The 64 Audio IEMs I’ve tried are absolutely dazzling, but without sounding overhyped. They are incredibly detailed and clear without ever sounding harsh or excessively bright. The lows are deep while being free of any misleading resonances.

If it came down to pleasure listening, I’d probably even prefer the 64 Audios over the Alclairs. My only fear is that these IEMs sound so good, so clear, and so detailed that they might not force you to works as hard to make your mix sound great as the Alclairs might. But for those who prefer a little bit more detail in your monitoring, the 64 Audio line is a perfect pick, and may be better suited to leading you in the right direction.

For my own personal tastes, I almost wish the 64 Audio profile had just slightly more lift in the low end, and slightly more softness in the top for mixing purposes. But this is easily solved with subtle corrective EQ, and earphones are such a personal choice, so my own personal tastes may differ substantially from yours!

The other thing I love about this brand is their attention to detail in other areas, including physical product design. Everything about 64 audio screams “luxury”, even at their lower price points.

The fit, the feel, the machining—everything here is just beautiful. And their unboxing is a real experience, not just in the feeling you get from opening them, but also in how simple and easy they make finding exactly the right fit from their generic fit models.

I auditioned the U12t  ($1999) which incorporates a proprietary tubeless balanced armature driver (called “tia”), and the hybrid U4s ($1049), which combines a low frequency dynamic driver with standard and “tia” balanced armature drivers.

64 Audio makes IEMs from $349 up to $3000 with excellent options at every price point, including dynamic, BA and planar magnetic models. All of them are voiced more or less toward a unifying frequency curve for the whole brand, so if you like one model, you’re likely to love others as well.

Unlike Alclair, 64 Audio offers many generic fit models, even at their highest end, and I had a remarkably easy time getting them to fit me comfortably.

I can’t recommend them enough, and its no wonder that so many top artists and their crews have been choosing these as their personal in-ears.

Westone (Winner: Best Super Compact IEMs)

While I didn’t like Westone quite as much as potentially super-premium brands like Alclair and 64 Audio, they still win out in at least two regards:

They sound almost as good as the very top brands for a fraction of the price, and they are super compact and lightweight compared to just about everything else on the market. If you don’t want to feel your IEMs hardly at all, this could be the line for you!

The Westone Mach 80 were almost as nice in sound as Alclair and 64 Audio for the substantially lower price of $1099.

The Mach 10 through Mach 30 run $139 through $349, and they have a bit of a sweet spot at the $799 price point with the Mach 50 where you get so close to having all the benefit of the Mach 80 for even less still.

For situations in which you want less weight and want your monitors to practically disappear, these are just remarkably light, small and comfortable. And if you want to save a bit over Alclair or 64 Audio, they are still neutral and detailed enough to be IEMs that you could learn to mix on.

 

The Paradox ($740) from Singularity audio is the only IEM on this list to be made with the burgeoning new xMEMS technology.

xMEMS drivers offer not only incredibly fast transient response, but also incredible phase alignment between frequencies.

In conventional drivers, different frequencies may leave the speaker diaphragm at different times, causing slightly different phase alignment between frequencies than is present in the original recorded signal.

While technically not a deviation from frequency response as it is conventionally measured, this does have an audible “smearing” effect that can rob monitors of detail and accuracy, especially when it comes to placing sounds in the left/right and front/back spectrums.

In xMEMS drivers, this phase smearing is minimized. While this comes at the cost of some small increase in THD, it’s not enough to be over our threshold of hearing for THD, so it’s a bit of a non-issue.

I was impressed by these IEMs, especially in the mids and highs. And they had more low end than I anticipated!

The Paradox are voiced with a curve that is meant to suit everyone from general pleasure listeners and hi-fi enthusiasts to audio professionals, and the one critique I can offer is that they might benefit from a model or a voicing option even more specifically crafted for professional users.

While the mids and highs are in a great spot, for the purposes of mixing/mastering, I felt there were slight “hot spots” and “weak spots” in the bass that can be smoothed out with minor corrective EQ to make these perfect.

I’d have to measure them to be sure where they are, but they seem to have a slight ramping up of frequencies in the lower/mid bass, coupled with a slight reduction in the upper bass, that made certain bass registers jump out a tiny bit more than others, and disconnected the experience of the lows from the mids and highs.

Fortunately, this appeared to be from voicing choices rather than actual resonances, meaning that simple EQ can likely fix this mild complaint. With slight EQ applied, these could potentially compete with the best IEMs I’ve heard, from brands like Alclair and 64 Audio, at half the cost.

Because of the nature of xMEMS drivers, they need a special amp, but this is included in the cable of the Paradox itself. Since it has a DSP chip built into this interface/cable/amp combo, it’s plausible that a firmware update or cable swap out could allow a different voicing for these IEMs in the future, without having to apply any computer-based EQ correction.

Sennheiser E100 (Winner: Best Super Budget IEM)

I reserve the right to replace this pick with other IEMs in the future, but for now, I was surprised by just how much I liked the Sennheiser E100 Pro. For just $100 they offered a great fit and solid frequency response that I didn’t think was possible at this price point.

While a bit lacking in depth of lows, the lows that were there were surprisingly trustworthy, and they had a fairly neutral feel that one could certainly learn.

I found them exceptionally easy to fit into my ears and get a good seal with, and could be a useful intro to the world of IEMs.

While they lacked some of the fullness in lows and lower mids that could make them a better mixing tool, they are considerably more neutral than the average closed back full sized headphones at the same price!

I’m not sure these could replace good open back mixing headphones, but they could certainly replace good closed back tracking and production headphones.

Beyerdynamic DT 70 (Winner: Best New Dynamic Driver IEMs)

They Beyerdynamic DT 70 are some of the flattest and most neutral dynamic driver headphones I’ve found—almost to a fault.

These are not flattering sounding IEMs at all—by design—and don’t quite have the signature EQ curve you might have come to expect from Beyerdynamic’s full size headphones.

The benefit is that they go deep, and they don’t sugarcoat the midrange in the least. Boxy low mids will sound boxy, aggressive center mids will sound aggressive and harsh upper mids will sound harsh. But this is a feature, not a bug.

These are IEMs that were designed for critical listening and making good choices about what to do in the mix, without being misled. If your mixes often come out a bit too dark, woolly, muddy and murky, as many of ours do, these IEMs can help fix all of that.

While not as free of resonances as comparably priced full sized open back headphones, they do go deeper, with far less bleed, and will outperform many closed back headphones in this price bracket for sheer neutrality of sound.

The only problem for these IEMs is that at the price bracket of $500, one could start to look at very nice multidriver balanced armature IEMs that could be more resonance free.

Honorable Mentions: JH Audio, Ultimate Ears, Etymotic, Noble Audio and Others

There are some IEMs that I couldn’t fit squarely into a slot above for one reason or another.

JH Audio is a brand that is often discussed in the same breath with 64 Audio and Alclair. Unfortunately, they did not have samples available or audition and seem to have much less ability to keep sample stock on hand.

They are another brand that is often preferred by many high end touring musicians, and their offerings run from $500 – $3000, mostly focused on multi-driver balanced armature designs.

To their credit, Platinum mastering engineer Glenn Schick briefly used JH IEMs as his exclusive reference for high level mastering applications before switching to full sized Audeze open back headphones.

Ultimate Ears is another brand that is famous among musicians and I enjoyed listening to their RR+ Pro, which are their latest model designed for critical listening. At $1000, they are very good IEMs.

But although they are advertised as being “zero hype” in-ears, I found them to be a bit more hyped in sound relative to the other even more neutral IEMs I selected among my top choices.

These may be the least hyped UE in-ears, but they still have a little bit of extra “excitement” compared to my top picks.

This is potentially a benefit if you prefer making production and mix choices on monitors that have just a little more “wow” factor to keep you form going overboard in the mix.

Because they didn’t have quite the neutrality of my top picks, or the compactness of my secondary pick in this category, I could find a natural slot for them to emerge as the clear winner compared to others. But they are still very capable in ears.

Noble Audio have an IEM out now called the XM-1 that uses xMEMS technology at just $600, which is very promising, but these were sold out and unavailable for review.

Etymotic is another famous brand with a famous form factor. They are reasonably neutral in the mids and highs, and very lightweight with excellent rejection of outside sound.

I didn’t find them as useful for mixing/mastering applications or as comfortable as my other top picks, but some users love and swear by this line.

Summing it Up

In ear monitors have never been better than they are today!

At the higher end they are competitive with some of the best open back headphones on the market, which means they are competitive with speaker and room monitoring systems that cost many times more.

At lower and middle price points, they can often perform comparably or better than similarly priced closed back headphones for neutrality and lack of resonance.

IEMs aren’t for everyone, but if they are for you, these are some of the best choices.

Prefer full sized headphone mixes?

In recent roundups, we’ve covered the best open back headphones for mixing and mastering at any price, and the best headphones for mixing under $400.

I hope you’ve found this roundup and buyer’s guide useful, and I hope to see you in the next one!

Justin Colletti is a platinum certified mastering engineer, a mix coach and author of the Breakthroughs series of mixing courses. He runs SonicScoop.

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