Skullcandy Crusher 1080 ANC vs Crusher 720 | Ultimate Bass
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Differences Summary
Crusher 1080 ANC
In short, the Crusher 1080 ANC is the absolute #1 best bass heavy pair of headphones out.
The primary drivers are tuned by Bose, and they're more detailed than the 720. They have more bass with less sharp highs.
And the Crusher haptics are incredibly focused on the deepest of the lows.
The 1080 also has ANC even though it's not that good.
Crusher 720
However, the Crusher 720 does have its advantages.
It has more Crusher bass vibration, much more actually. Not better, I'll talk in depth about that.
It has stronger treble.
It's slightly lighter by about 13 grams.
And it has a longer battery life - partially because there's no ANC.
Connectivity Options
Both headphones use Bluetooth 5.3. They can be used either wireless or wired with the included 3.5 mm cable.
When used wired without power, these use the primary drivers with no Crusher Bass, no EQ settings, and no ANC on the 1080 ANC. Neither can play audio from both 3.5 mm and Bluetooth at the same time.
If you are listening to these wired while powered on and you get a phone notification, it will stop the wired playback for a few seconds before resuming it.
Controls
The controls are very similar on both. All the buttons are nice and clicky but the 1080’s are slightly more tactile.
Crusher 720
Left earcup
Crusher Bass slider. This is a finite scrolling wheel that controls how much haptic vibration the secondary driver outputs.
Custom button. By default, pressing this once toggles between the default EQ presets. Holding for a second toggles THX Spatial Audio on and off.
Right earcup
Power button.
Joystick. It can be clicked in to play or pause media or answer and end calls. Pushing it up or down raises or lowers the system volume. Left or right is for reversing or skipping tracks.
Crusher 1080 ANC
Left earcup
Crusher Bass slider. Same function as the 720.
Custom button. Pressing it in toggles between the EQ presets. This one can be pushed up and down to control ANC and Stay Aware mode.
Right earcup
Power button.
Joystick. Same as the 720.
Battery
The Crusher 720 is listed for 65 hours of battery life. The Crusher 1080 ANC gets up to 60 with ANC off. 50 with it on.
These numbers line up with my use case. The best part is they fixed the biggest weakness with the Crusher Evo and Crusher ANC battery lives. After 15 minutes, these turn off automatically. The previous Crushers stayed on until the battery died.
Both have optional wear detection which can be toggled in the software. This will automatically pause your media when you take them off, and play it again when you put them back on.
Headphone Audio Quality
Primary Drivers
Audio measurements taken with my miniDSP EARS (not industry standard).
The Crusher 1080 ANC and 720 sound very different.
The Crusher 720 has 40.7 mm drivers and the Crusher 1080 ANC has smaller 36 mm drivers and these ones are tuned by Bose. You'd think 36 mm might not be large enough to push out that much bass. But these can and with very low distortion.
Both have a frequency response of 20 Hz - 20 kHz.
The Crusher 1080 ANC is my favorite sounding pair of headphones.
The sub-bass is thick, vocals are clear, but not overpowering. Highs are detailed, but contained so they're not jarring. The soundstage is wide, despite these being closed back. This is a masterpiece.
The Crusher 720 sounds more like the Crusher ANC 2. The highs are way sharper and the upper mids are prominent and open.
In terms of the primary drivers, the Crusher 720's sub-bass is far weaker than the 1080 ANC and and trails off hard. Like previous Crusher models, the 720 is very reliant on the Crusher vibration to make up for that low end. The 1080 ANC sounds full and rich even without it.
However, the active digital signal processing (DSP) is doing a lot of work for the 1080. If you use them powered off, they sound a lot different than when powered on. Mainly, the mids are shoutier when powered off, and the treble trails off.
So even if you use 1080 ANC wired, it's much better to keep it powered on.
From my testing, the 720 sounds identical whether it's powered on or off. But of course you don't get EQ presets or Crusher bass.
Crusher Bass
Here’s the #1 question: which device has more Crusher Bass vibration? The dry answer is, the Crusher 720 has more. A lot more.
But don’t write off the 1080 ANC yet. Hear me out. Literally, listen to the following audio samples with headphones on, especially Crushers.
Bass has different elements and they're measured in hertz (Hz). The lower the number the deeper the vibration.
What the Crusher drivers do is vibrate at a speed and frequency that replicates that sound, but with much more force than what traditional drivers can do. This is why you can literally feel the bass, not just hear it.
The Crusher 720 cannot really reproduce the deep sub-bass under 60 Hz, and that's why it rolls off so hard on the graphs.
The 720 disproportionately boosts the area around 60 Hz massively and it gives you that rattle. It’s not quite that deep boom like a sub-woofer, but definitely some shake. This is an improvement over the Crusher Evo which couldn't dip as low in the sub-bass, but that thing has even more vibration than the 720.
The Crusher 1080 reaches all the way down to 20 Hz and even below with the sub-bass and it really tickles your ear drums. It doesn't violently shake your skull - instead it vibrates your eardrums directly.
If you've ever heard an explosion before like from a gas leak or a car explosion, there's that super powerful thump that you feel in your chest. That's what the Crusher 1080 ANC can reproduce. It's the coolest thing I've ever heard. But it's definitely not as powerful as the 720.
If you want maximum rattle and shake for gaming, the Crusher 720 does have more.
The 1080 ANC really compliments whatever movie, music, or game you're playing without coming off like a foreign sound competing with it. An excellent song to use to feel the Crusher Bass is Cyanide by Dxrk ダーク.
I prefer the 1080 ANC's approach, but that's the best part. If you feel more vibration = better bass, get the 720.
If you want focused, powerful sub-bass like nothing else on the market, get the 1080 ANC. Plus the primary drivers are more capable on the 1080 ANC.
Active Noise Cancellation
Only the 1080 ANC has Active Noise Cancellation. It's not really that strong. Maybe a 6/10. Nothing really worth relying on. It lets in even constant recurring sounds like my PC fan without much resistance.
Stay Aware
Both headphones have a transparency mode called stay aware that you can toggle in the software. It's not as loud as others, but still useful.
Microphone Demonstration
Software
Skullcandy has abandoned their Skull-IQ app, and so now we're back to the Skullcandy app. You can control the some basic settings here and most importantly, you get the equalizer.
There's still only one custom equalization available on both devices.
Bose TrueSpatial and THX Spatial are both virtual surround effects. Bose's adds a lot more reverb, and the "fixed” version has head tracking. THX adds some reverb also, but spikes the highs even more.
Comfort and Build Quality
The build is almost identical on both headphones; they’re mostly plastic with metal frames. There’s a bit of cosmetic difference up top, but they have the same pleather padding on the headband. The ear pads are crazy comfortable with thick memory foam that still molds to your ears.
The outside is grippy, soft touch plastic. But that does make these fingerprint magnets. The frame height is adjustable on both, and the clamp is very secure, even during workouts. Both are foldable.
Crusher 720 carrying bag.
Crusher 1080 ANC carrying bag.
Problems
Unfortunately, I have two issues with the builds.
First off, they're both way too heavy. My 720 weighs 361 grams and my 1080 is 375 grams. That's brutal on the neck. And it makes me not want to wear them during certain workouts like burpees.
My 720 pads tore after less than a week…
Secondly, the pleather padding has extremely cheap stitching. And by cheap, I mean non-existent. On my 720, the lip portion that slides into slot on the headphone itself tore apart from the rest of the pleather.
Skullcandy doesn't sell replacements as of this writing, so I had to buy some replacement pads from Wicked Cushions, but they're not as comfortable and they have a limited variety of colors.
Verdict
Both of these headphones are Bass Arena approved. I prefer and recommend the Crusher 1080 ANC if you want a better overall pair of headphones with deeper and stronger sub-bass. The ANC is also a cool bonus.
Get the Crusher 720 if all you care about is maximum shake from the bass, and don’t really care about frequency response graphs.
