High-impedance headphones are usually considered to have an impedance of 100Ω or higher. In general, they will provide superior audio quality compared to low-impedance headphones and therefore are coveted among audio enthusiasts and professionals. High-impedance devices will have thinner voice coils surrounding the driver, making more snug windings, resulting in a stronger electromagnetic field and reduced audio distortion.
While higher impedance doesn’t necessarily mean better audio quality, it has some merit.
Beyerdynamic and Sennheiser are two prominent brands that provide most of the high-impedance headphones these days. Also, Beyerdynamic is the only company that offers the same model of headphones with different impedance options.
Beyerdynamic provides three headphones with the highest impedance among consumer-grade headphones of 600Ω: Beyerdynamic T1 2nd Gen, Beyerdynamic DT 990 Edition 600 and Beyerdynamic DT 880 Premium.
Audio-Technica, another renowned name in the headphones niche, offers high-impedance headphones of their own: Audio-Technica ATH-R70x with impedance as high as 470Ω.
On the other hand, Sennheiser offers various headphones with an impedance of 300Ω: Sennheiser HD 820, Sennheiser HD 800 S, Sennheiser HD 650, Sennheiser HD 600.
AKG used to produce AKG K240 headphones with 600Ω impedance, but these have got discontinued long since and a 55Ω version is now sold instead. You might find a vintage AKG K240 with 600Ω impedance used on eBay.
Headphones with high impedance:
High-impedance headphones require an appropriate headphone amplifier to drive them. Most headphones have low impedance and can be driven by an integrated amplifier within your computer’s motherboard or a phone. However, the headphones mentioned in this list will require a dedicated amplifier to run them. You might be using DAC (Digital audio converter), audio interface or a high-quality dedicated sound card to drive your high-end headphones.
It’s worth noting that your high-impedance headphones will work without a dedicated amplifier; however, they will probably be too quiet for your liking even at the maximum volume and you’re very likely to notice distortion and lower audio quality. Both of these ruin the purpose of using high-impedance headphones in the first place.
Regardless of the higher quality audio provided by high-impedance headphones most consumers don’t own a DAC or audio interface to run them. Therefore, headphones will often have low impedance, making them pairable with any electronic device and more accessible to general users. High-impedance headphones are primarily used in studios for audio editing or home setups by enthusiast users.
Low-impedance headphones have become significantly more popular with the influx of portable devices such as MP3 players, smartphones and laptops. These devices can’t drive high-impedance headphones to their full potential, however, are perfectly capable of handling low-impedance headphones up to the 64Ω range. The 60-100Ω is more of a grey area and you’ll find varying opinions on whether you need an amplifier in this range.
My experience say high impedance unit driver sounds better. Despite dedicated amplifier. To answer at question : high impedance driver sounds best ? YES.
Susvara 70 ohm is best headphones i heared in sounding. After adx5000. But price is unbelievable.
Driver need to be angled in headphone and the more is open less distortion.
Beryllium can reach much detail with out high price.
High end headphones are mostly all uglys heavy and inconfortable.
Mid and high Gaming headphones are cheap and amazingly confortable and nice with the same size of driver unit. U can switch best unit driver bought on Ali Express or on broken high end headphones on used market and mount it gaming headphones with your cable well connected to your own player.
Idk why meze keep sell it’s ugly headphones for 800$ France. While it’s 40mm unit driver. The most communs size in mostly all world headphones.
For me the cable is the most important. The cable touch yourself permanently. He have to lightweight and friendly skin and the conductors in the cable have to be in 1 cable , not 8 or 16 !!!
The diy exist because capitalism make stupid people with commercials. High quality sound and confort from mounting good driver unit on a lightweight confortable headphones.