Thank you Turtle Beach for sending us this headset to review!

Turtle Beach has not used the Atlas name for several years. Some say it's reserved for some of the best sounding headsets in their history. I can't say that with confidence on past models, as I haven't heard them. What I can say is this Turtle Beach Atlas Air is one of the most comfortable and best-sounding gaming headsets I've ever heard, rivaled by only a select few. In fact, when powered via a 3.5mm cable, it nearly competes with some of my best audiophile gear. If your environment supports open-back cans, then you're in for a real treat.

Those who know me well know I certainly qualify for the label 'audiophile', but I am on a budget - as are most of you. I have accumulated a pretty good stack, with a decent DAC (digital analog converter), and an accompanying amp. It did take me many years, though. And so whenever I see something truly special, unexpectedly good, or an incredible value come across my desk, I just have to share it with you. This is one of those times.

There are several things about the Turtle Beach Atlas Air that make it special. But let's start with the most obvious one: this is an open back headset. What does that mean? Most gaming headsets and probably most headphones are what is often called closed back. Almost all speaker drivers radiate sound by moving back and forth, and as the listener, we primarily hear the forward wave, or the sound waves that radiate towards your ear from the front of the driver. In a closed back headphone, that back wave, which is inverted from the front wave (also called out of phase), is often sent back into the ear cup. Depending on the design, that back wave can be dampened out with various foams or other materials, or it can simply bounce off of the back of the ear cup and head right through the driver towards the ear. Sometimes, this sound reinforcement effect can work to your advantage, as you might get to hear a more thumpy bass, because those frequencies are doubled up. But it can also lead to smearing or a lack of focus across much of the frequency range. This can significantly reduce clarity, making closed-back headphone designs more difficult or expensive to get sound as clear as open back ones.

You see, open back designs normally just let the back wave escape out the back, or into the open. Since this back wave largely doesn't reflect to the listener, you instead hear mostly just the in-phase signal, making it much clearer and tighter. You also get some room sounds and general breathability, which is not always desirable, but can increase comfort by helping to keep your ears cool.

This open back design does mean that half of the generated audio energy is sent out into the room. However, when headphones are on your head, your ears are often less than an inch away from the driver. Whoever might be in the room with you might hear some of what you are, but it's going to be at a very low level. If you want to get an idea of what it's like, take your existing headphones and lay them on a table, with the ear cups facing each other but not sealed together. That's pretty much what it will sound like for the rest of the room. In my case, my wife and I both use open back headphones, and while we often game in the same room, what she is listening to is so quiet in comparison to my own stuff that it never bothers me at all. It's only noticeable if I'm not wearing headphones, or she is listening at very high levels. Usually the fan noise from our PCs largely drowns that stuff out.

Speaking of which, open backs let in sounds, too. So if your PC (this is primarily a PC headset, after all) has particularly loud fans, it could impact how things sound as some of that background noise could leak in. I didn't find this to be an issue in practice, but it's something to consider when choosing an open back headphone. For me, the benefits greatly outweigh the drawbacks, and almost all of my favorite pairs are open back headphones. But if you hope to bring this Atlas Air with you on a train or plane, I hope you will reconsider for the sake of those around you (and you'll hear them, too).

And you might be tempted to bring them with you because of how insanely comfortable these things are. They use all-fabric ear pads, on their new free-floating cup design, that mounts the cups to the headband with three sets of thick rubber bands. This allows the cups to naturally float and bend to whatever angle your head and ears need. The headband is made of a very light and flexible plastic, and while it doesn't look or feel premium, that doesn't matter the second it goes on your head. There is an adjustable elastic band that attaches to the sides via velcro, and is suspended in a cloth net of sorts. It's an unusual style, but it doesn't look bad or anything. And most importantly, it feels amazing. I have worn this headset for many hours at a time without serious discomfort. It's overall so light, and the pads are so plush, that it's actually one of the most comfortable pairs of headphones I've ever worn, headset or otherwise.

The good doesn't stop there, as the Atlas Air offers a lot more. In the box is the headset, a USB transmitter, a removable microphone and windscreen, a fabric USB-A to USB-C charging cable, a 3.5mm audio cable, and a carrying pouch. I really like that they include a carrying pouch; I think a hard case is even better, but a pouch is still great. There is also a little bag inside of the pouch so you can put the cables and perhaps transmitter inside of there. (I always put a velcro dot on my headsets and transmitters to make sure they stick together and are never lost.)

The wireless connectivity is likely expected to be used primarily by most listeners, and it works well, with great range. It supports 2.4GHz wireless and Bluetooth 5.2, and you switch between sources by pressing a button. Unlike most Turtle Beach headsets from the previous generation, the Atlas Air supports 16-bit and 24-bit, as well as 48kHz and 96kHz sampling rate. This 96kHz support is new to the Atlas Air, and greatly appreciated. The combination of 24-bit and 96kHz is considered an excellent bit and sample rate most audiophiles are more than happy with. Since that is available, I never feel like wireless is holding me back for movies or gaming. For music it's also fine, but many audiophiles (myself included) prefer bit-perfect playback where possible, so I hope Turtle Beach eventually adds 44.1kHz and 88.2kHz sample rate options. This would mean less than 1% of my music would have to be resampled, and that would be wonderful! But by missing 44.1kHz and 88.2kHz, it means CD and SACD rips can't be bit perfect, without taking advantage of a wired connection and an external DAC.

For Bluetooth, it supports Bluetooth 5.2 and its many features. The supported CODECs are SBC and AAC, which is about as good as you can hope for without Turtle Beach paying for licensed CODECs like AptX or LDAP. Since it supports Bluetooth 5.2 and its feature set, I was pleased and surprised to find it supports Bluetooth multi-input. This means if the 2.4GHz dongle is not powered on or connected, you can connect to two Bluetooth devices at once. Once the dongle is connected, the second Bluetooth device will disconnect. So while it is limited to two devices, that flexibility is still excellent. Especially since you can plug in the included 3.5mm cable in a pinch. With that said, the wireless mode and all of the app features are completely disabled when connected with a wire. Which, as an audiophile, is perfectly fine with me.

This headset does sound quite good when connected wirelessly, but these can be taken to the next level when connected via a 3.5mm cable. And despite using a quasi-proprietary 3.5mm TRRRS cable on the headset end, I was pleased to see it still works properly when using a more common TRRS or TRS cable. My desktop amplifier only works properly when connected via a TRS cable, and it worked as expected. I was pleasantly surprised to see Turtle Beach made sure everything continues to work when using standard cables, despite including the quasi-proprietary cable. When I did research into why the cable has five conductors like it does, the reason is likely to keep the shared ground of the microphone and headphone part separate as long as possible to minimize crosstalk.

When connected via a 3.5mm cable, the headset can get much louder than what the wireless connection supports, at least in my case as I have a very powerful amplifier I connect my headphones to. These things really sing when connected to a good DAC and amp stack. I am beyond impressed, and I feel like, properly amped, these go toe to toe with some audiophile headphones. With my stack, the instrument and space is improved, and especially the dynamics. These headphones sound effortless and crystal clear with great bass. These are beyond impressive.

They still sound good when used wirelessly, over both 2.4GHz and Bluetooth. The volume level is a bit tricky to dial in just right, because the loudness curve is a bit wonky, especially over 2.4GHz. The difference between 98 and 100 is much larger than the number difference suggests it should be, and below around 70 is too quiet to be usable. I believe the volume range could be easily corrected if 40 became 4, and the rest of the range was stretched out to be useful for the rest of the volume levels. It's strange as it is now, and hopefully gets corrected after a firmware update. Bluetooth volume levels are fine; it's only 2.4GHz that's wonky. Also, in 2.4GHz mode, the maximum volume could use a bump.

Outside of one notable missing button and wheel, the functionality of this Atlas Air is largely similar to those of the other new Turtle Beach headsets we reviewed recently, the Stealth 500 and 600 Gen 3. There is an application for Windows and Android/iOS called Turtle Beach Swarm II. It works well, and the interface looks nice. Like those other headsets, you can adjust volume, SuperHuman Hearing, Game/Chat Mix, Chat Boost, and enable or disable Waves 3D, the included form of surround sound emulation. With how good this headset sounds out of the box, including with spatial cues, I felt no need for any additional enhancement. There is a 'High Bandwidth Audio' option though, and recommend turning that on immediately.

There are also four stock EQ settings, Signature Sound, Bass Boost, Treble and Bass Boost, and Vocal Boost. You can also create custom 10-band EQ profiles if you like. Currently, only the stock four EQ options are available in the mobile app; that is promised to change, but has not yet.

The microphone also sounds excellent. I find it sounds best when dropped slightly below full volume, so the mic doesn't clip. You can also use four different EQ profiles for the microphone, Signature Sound, Full, Clarity, or Smooth. I like all of them but Clarity for my voice, they all sound pretty good. The Signature Sound option does not apply any EQ to your voice. You can enable microphone monitoring if you wish, and also raise or lower the Noise Gate feature, which can remove quieter sounds like keyboard typing from the mic input. There is also a High-Bandwidth Microphone option, which I recommend, as you can then get a 16-bit at 48kHz microphone signal, giving you pretty much as good as it gets for a mic audio signal outside of standalone XLR mics.