Description
The Sesh ANC Active publishes an IP67 rating and confirms multipoint pairing, both of which are better than most listings at this price manage. It then gives a single battery number, forty eight hours, and never says how much of that is in your ears. That one omission is the difference between a useful specification and a marketing figure, and it is the reason this review spends a section on it. Everything below comes from the published listing. We do not wear or measure the products covered on this site.
Who this is for
These are sealed in-ear buds in True Black and orange with adjustable active noise cancellation, a charging case and app control. Skullcandy records the recommended uses as running, exercising, cycling and travel, and describes “a specially designed Fit Grip that keeps it comfortably in place whether you’re at play or at home.”
The cycling recommendation carries a caution the listing does not give. A sealed bud with cancellation running removes the low frequency engine noise that warns you a vehicle is approaching. Skullcandy does supply an adjustable Stay-Aware mode, described as letting you “hear the world while you listen to your media,” but a mode you have to remember to enable is not the same as a design that never blocks your hearing in the first place. If you ride on roads, the designs in our open-ear headphone listings leave the ear canal open by construction. Whatever you use, keep the volume low enough that a car is audible before it is beside you.
Connection, and three things not published
Multipoint is confirmed in a bullet, alongside Google Fast Pair and Spotify Tap. Connecting to two devices at once is a feature most listings in this price range never mention, and it is worth real money if you switch between a laptop and a phone.
What is missing is more substantial. No Bluetooth version appears anywhere on the listing. No codec is named, so there is no basis for any high resolution or lossless claim, and the page does not attempt one. And no driver size or driver type is published at all, which is unusual even here.
The cancellation is described as “adjustable 4-Mic Active Noise Canceling,” with the Stay-Aware mode also adjustable. No decibel reduction figure is given, which is the honest outcome, since such a figure with no named test standard cannot be compared between brands. Cancellation of this class works on constant low frequency noise such as traffic hum and gym ventilation, and does much less against speech. Nothing here will make a room silent and the listing does not claim it will.
Battery: one number where two are needed
The bullet reads: “48 Hours of Total Battery Life. Sesh ANC Active stays powered for hours, and hours. Get an additional 2 hours of playtime on a 10-minute Rapid Charge.”
Forty eight hours is the total including the charging case. The listing never states the bud runtime, and the specification table has no battery life field at all, only a charging time of 3 hours. That leaves a buyer unable to answer the only battery question that matters day to day: how long can I wear these before I have to put them back in the case.
The comparison is worth making. Skullcandy’s own step up model, covered in our Skullcandy Rail ANC review, publishes seven hours in the buds and twenty in the case with cancellation running, and states the cancellation condition too. This listing publishes neither. Ask the seller for the bud figure and for whether it assumes cancellation on or off before ordering. The rapid charge ratio, two hours of playtime from ten minutes, is at least stated clearly.
The water rating: strong, and slightly oversold
The title and a bullet both state IP67, and the bullet describes the product as “Completely waterproof and sweatproof.”
IP67 is a genuinely strong rating and one of the better ones in this catalog. The 6 in the first position means dust tight, which is the top of that scale. The 7 in the second position means protected against immersion in up to one meter of water for thirty minutes, tested under controlled conditions. That comfortably covers sweat, rain and an accidental drop into a sink.
The word “completely,” however, goes further than the code does. IP67 certifies a specific depth for a specific duration in fresh water in a laboratory. It does not cover seawater, chlorinated pool water, hot water or pressurized water such as a shower jet, it does not certify swimming, and it does not certify anything at all once the seals have aged or the product has been dropped. Use the code, not the adjective. For a sports bud with the stronger IP68 rating and a named military test standard, see our Jaybird Vista 2 review.
Fit, app control and the fields to ignore
The components field lists a user manual and “Eartip,” with no count of sizes. On a sealed bud aimed at running and exercise that is a real omission, because the tip decides both how much bass you hear and whether the bud stays put when you move. The earpiece shape is recorded as rounded tips and the control method as app.
Two specification rows carry no useful information. The color field reads “Sesh ANC Active,” which is the product name rather than a color; the actual color, True Black and orange, appears only in the title. And the item weight of 56 grams, given again as 1.98 ounces, together with dimensions of 5.78 by 3.54 by 1.34 inches, describes the retail package rather than the buds. No bud weight is published.
The warranty is stated as one year in the United States, which is shorter than the two year terms several competitors in this catalog offer.
How it ranks, and the alternatives
Customer feedback sits at 3.7 out of 5 from 74 ratings. That is a low score on a small sample, so it should be weighed but not treated as decisive. The sales rank is given as 14,518th in Electronics and 1,271st in the earbud and in-ear headphone group. The model number is S2SAW-S749, the country of origin is the Philippines, and the date first available is July 2024.
This catalog also carries a second Sesh ANC listing under a different ASIN and model code, covered in our other Skullcandy Sesh ANC review, so compare the two before ordering. For a cheaper Skullcandy option without cancellation, see our Skullcandy Indy Evo review. For the wider field, start from the true wireless earbud listings.
Who should buy it and who should not
Buy it if you want a dust tight, immersion rated bud with multipoint pairing and an adjustable awareness mode, and you are willing to find out the per charge runtime from the seller rather than the page. IP67 and confirmed multipoint at this level are both genuine advantages. Do not buy it for road cycling despite the recommended uses field. Do not read “completely waterproof” as permission to swim or shower in them. And do not order on the strength of the forty eight hour figure alone, because that number is the case and the buds combined, and the buds are the part you actually wear.
