Odi Productions
In this article, I’m going to share my HONEST SHOKZ OpenDots 2 review for those who are wondering whether they are WORTH IT. I’ll be scoring the SHOKZ OpenDots 2 open ear clip on earbuds on comfort, fit stability, features, battery life, microphone quality, sound quality, and value.
I’m going to do my best to share whether these earbuds are worth it, and ideally who these earbuds are for. I bought these earbuds with my own money, and was NOT sponsored, paid, or received a free copy for review. All thoughts are my own.
I’ll be sharing my critical opinion with 10 years of experience as a professional music producer, audio engineer, and tech journalist. I also run the RecordingNow YouTube channel with over 30,000+ subscribers and over 8 million views.
Let’s dive right in!
SHOKZ OpenDots 2 Earbuds Review in Short
The SHOKZ OpenDots 2 is one of the best overall open-ear clip-on earbud products in the market today. It’s very comfortable to wear, has great sound quality, IP57 water resistance, above average battery life, and good mic quality. Although they’re mainly known for their bone conduction headphones, I actually prefer listening to these for music.
Pros and Cons
- Lightweight comfort
- IP57 dust and water resistance
- Best-in-class sound quality
- 40-hour battery life
- Clamping force is noticeable over time
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Comfort + Fit Stability
The SHOKZ OpenDots 2 is an open ear, clip on earbud that has very good comfort, especially compared to traditional in-ear earbuds.
Unlike traditional earbuds, these have a “C ring” design that wraps around the ear and sits right outside the ear canal.
Weighing in at just 6.4 grams per earbud, the OpenDots 2 is very lightweight and comfortable.
The OpenDots 2 has a solid mix between comfort and stability, with a clamping force that is firm enough to stay put even, but not too strong.
Over longer periods of time, like over 1-2 hours, you do slightly feel the clamping force of the earbuds on your ears.
Now, the clip-on design is more stable than an open-ear design like the Soundcore AeroFit 2, which isn’t as secure during more vigorous movements or head-tilting like laying on a bench.
Comfort + Fit Stability Score: 9.0 out of 10
Features, IP Rating, Battery Life, and Mic Quality
Features
The SHOKZ OpenDots 2 was originally released in June 2026, so it has many modern wireless earbud features:
- IP57 dust and water resistance rating (dust, sweat, rain, and temporary immersion in water up to 1 meter deep for 30 mins)
- Built-in microphones for taking calls
- Bluetooth 6.1
- Multi-point connection
- Physical button controls
- Custom EQ
- Qi wireless charging case
- Native apps for both iOS and Android
Buttons and Controls
The SHOKZ OpenDots 2 has a physical “pinch sensor” control on each earbud.
While I think this is superior to pure touch controls due to less accidental touches, it is a little bit sensitive compared to other physical buttons and pinch sensors.
Sometimes I accidentally pinch it when trying to re-adjust the earbud in place.
This button controls various functions like play/pause, skip forward, skip backward, and volume control.
Overall, I would say the controls are not bad, but could be slightly improved.
IP Rating (Dust and Water Resistance)
The SHOKZ OpenDots 2 is IP57-rated for dust and water resistance, which is near best-in-class for the open ear category.
This translates to dust, sweat, rain, and temporary immersion in water up to 1 meter deep for 30 minutes.
IP57 is a noticeable step up from the typical “IPX4”, which has no dust resistance and is less water-resistant since the lower “4” only goes up to sweat and light splashes of water.
Because of this, the OpenDots 2 is built for pretty much any workout or outdoor conditions, aside from swimming.
Battery Life
- On a single charge: 10 hours
- With charging case: 40 hours total
- Fast Charge: 5 minutes = 2 hours of playback
This battery life is well above average across the class that tends to be around 7 hours on a single charge and typically 30 hours with the charging case.
Microphone Quality
The SHOKZ OpenDots 2 has a fairly advanced microphone architecture consisting of a 4 MEMS microphone-array combined with 2 bone conduction sensors.
This hardware setup is similar to the best-in-class Anker Soundcore AeroClip 2, which has “Guinness World Record Call Quality”.
Due to this, the OpenDots 2 has above average mic quality for the open-ear segment.
But compared head-to-head with the AeroClip 2, it’s less impressive in noisy real-world environments and against windy conditions.
In a quiet room, they’re much closer in mic quality and the OpenDots 2 does have a nicely-detailed and natural sound.
Overall, the OpenDots 2 is one of the better options for mic quality in the open-ear segment.
Features, IP Rating, Battery Life, and Mic Quality Score: 9.5 out of 10
Sound Quality
The SHOKZ OpenDots 2 features a unique “Proprietary Bassphereâ„¢ 2.0 dual-driver array” with two 11.8mm dynamic drivers per earbud.
From a physical perspective, open-ear clip-on earbuds are at a disadvantage compared to traditional in-ear earbuds that have the benefit of the physical seal.
But due to this unique dual-driver design, I actually found the OpenDots 2 to have one of the best bass responses for an open-ear product in general.
The OpenDots 2 has a V-shaped consumer-friendly sound signature, heavily emphasizing the bass and treble.
While I typically prefer more balanced tonality as an audiophile for the traditional in-ear earbuds, I actually think the V-shaped frequency response makes more sense as a workout earbud.
For starters, the sound is more “energetic”, “exciting”, and generally more “fun” to listen to.
Next, the forward treble cuts through noisy environments and allows the vocals to be more detailed when competing with many low to mid frequencies in the real world.
The SHOKZ brand isn’t as well-known in the audiophile world, as they’re known for bone conduction headphones, but I was “shocked” at the pretty impressive sound quality.
I tested a similarly-priced flagship clip-on earbud, the Soundcore AeroClip 2, which I thought sounded pretty good.
But to my surprise, I found myself slightly preferring the OpenDots 2 for pure music-listening, especially for bass-heavy music.
The one drawback to this sound signature is that dialogue-based media like podcasts and YouTube videos are not quite as natural-sounding or detailed. For a more mid-range sound, I did slightly prefer the AeroClip 2.
Overall, the OpenDots 2 is one of the best clip-on earbuds I’ve tested for sound quality so far, and is one of my personal favorites in the open-ear category as a whole.
Sound Quality Score: 8.1 out of 10
Value
The SHOKZ OpenDots 2 retails for $199.95 USD, and has gone on sale historically to as low as $159.95 USD.
The SHOKZ OpenDots 2 is a legit flagship clip-on earbud, and meant to compete with the likes of the $300 Bose Ultra Open Earbuds.
Even though the price is a bit steep, I actually think the OpenDots 2 is an excellent value, especially if you can get it for any type of discount closer to $160.
It is a feature-rich, great-sounding, and very capable product that I truly enjoy using, and would happily pay the full $200 retail price.
A slightly better value might be the Soundcore AeroClip 2 which has a full retail just under $170, but they can be close to the same price if the OpenDots 2 is on sale.
Value Score: 9.0 out of 10
Overall Scoring Breakdown
Comfort + Fit Stability (30% of score): 9.0 / 10
Features + IP Rating + Battery Life + Mic Quality (30% of score): 9.5 / 10
Sound Quality (30% of score): 8.1 / 10
Value (10% of score): 9.0 / 10
Total: 8.88 out of 10
Is the SHOKZ OpenDots 2 Worth it?
I was a little skeptical of how SHOKZ would perform for $200 clip-on earbuds, since they’re mainly known for bone conduction headphones, but they exceeded my expectations by a good margin.
The sound quality is one of the best I’ve heard in the open-ear category in general, and I may even prefer listening to the OpenDots 2 over their signature bone conduction headphones.
Aside from sound quality, it performed above-average for battery life, mic quality, features, comfort, and stability.
Two worthy flagship contenders to the OpenDots 2 would be the Bose Ultra Open Earbuds 2nd Gen, and Anker Soundcore AeroClip 2.
Some very strong alternatives in this class of wireless earbuds are:
- Soundcore AeroClip 2
- Soundcore AeroClip
- Soundcore C50i
- Soundcore AeroFit 2
- Nothing Ear (Open)
- Soundcore Liberty 5 Pro
- AirPods 5
- Soundcore P31i
- CMF Buds Pro 2
- Soundcore Liberty 5
- Soundcore P20i
- Beats Studio Buds Plus
- EarFun Air Pro 4 Plus
- Samsung Galaxy Buds 4 Pro
- AirPods Pro 3
- Google Pixel Buds Pro 2
- Nothing Ear 3
Order HERE for the LOWEST PRICE AVAILABLE (Do NOT pay retail):
Disclosure: These affiliate links may provide a discount and in return, give us a commission in order to keep this website 100% independent to ensure honest unfiltered reviews 🙂
How We Tested and Our Methodology
RecordingNOW.com is a 100% independent publisher with over 10 years of experience testing and reviewing consumer electronics and headphones.
We currently purchase the products we test with our own money, and are not paid by any company or manufacturer to influence our opinions or decisions.
After purchasing the product, we conduct up to hundreds of hours of detailed hands-on testing in a controlled, acoustically-treated environment.
ODi Productions is our resident expert and author of this article, with 10 years of experience as a professional music producer, tech journalist, and audiophile.
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