Choosing the right microphone or audio interface can be tough—especially when every brand promises “studio quality.” So instead of telling you how good our mics and processing can sound, we’d rather let you hear, and judge, for yourself.

To support the new A/B comparison experience on our website, we built a repeatable, real‑world testing process that reflects how people actually sound in a real-world environment—not in a treated studio. We treat other products with the same rigour as we do ours. Our goal is to make sure any product sounds it’s best. Read on to understand how we did it (without going too deep into the weeds).

Real People, Real Use Cases

We recruited people who regularly talk online for work or play: remote professionals, streamers, gamers, educators, and people on our team. They speak the way they’d typically speak if they were online. If they stream or teach to lots of people you may hear a more performative take vs. if they are someone who tends to be on private calls.

We let the participants monitor their voice while we recorded. This let him if the mic was too close, they were popping the mic, or it was too far away.

Each participant read short, scenario‑specific scripts (just a couple of sentences) matched to their everyday use:

Intro scripts

• Work‑from‑home:
  “Hey team, just giving an update on our progress. Let me know if you can see my screen.”
• Gaming / streaming:
  “Alright chat, we’re pushing mid - tell me if game audio is too loud or if the mic levels need tweaking.”
• Teaching / presenting:
  “Today we’re covering the basics of signal flow. If you have questions, drop them in the chat and I’ll pause to answer.”

These simple lines capture the tone, pace, and volume real users actually have.

The second section captures dynamics by capturing the speaker whispering, then using their loudest voice. This helps highlight how a given setup responds to the dynamic range of the human voice.

The last section may sound strange, but it’s intentionally capturing as many phonetic combinations as possible to demonstrate the clarity or intelligibility of a given speaker. The script is part of the Harvard Sentences (Revised List of Phonetically Balanced Sentences - Harvard Sentences)

Recorded in a Typical Room, Not a Studio

All recordings were made in a room like the one many gamers, creators, and remote workers use daily. It wasn’t overtly acoustically treated, and it wasn’t artificially noisy. It's most similar to a typical home office or gaming room. This aligns with the test approach we use across BEACN’s mic-testing projects – we emphasize capturing performance in lived‑in environments rather than clinical setups.

Every Mic Tested at Comparable Levels

Each participant recorded their voice at their typical speaking level. We used a reference mic during the recordings to make sure the speaking level was relatively consistent between takes.

To make the comparison fair:

1. We set gain for each mic individually

Before recording, we tested each voice at its loudest point and adjusted gain so the mic wouldn’t distort. In some cases, despite best efforts, a mic still clipped on certain words, which is a realistic part of the comparison.

2. We loudness‑normalized every file

After recording, we corrected the loudness of all files so every clip plays back at a similar perceived level. This step ensures listeners don’t mistake “louder” for “better,” a principle we consistently use in BEACN mic-testing workflows.

This normalization lets you focus on tone, clarity, noise handling, and intelligibility instead of possible volume tricks. Sometimes, microphones can't compensate for high SPL levels. In these cases we sometimes separate the dynamic section of the audio and normalize it to a different loudness (LUFS) levels. This makes the files easier to listen to, but all section and files use the same LUFS standard.

Processing On vs. Processing Off

Our goal with each product we test is to use all features of the product to make the recording sound it’s best. We start with default settings and then adjust to see if we can get a perceivable benefit. This means we don’t necessarily use the processing available to us. Sometimes the processing can make it sound worse. We do not modify the settings once recording starts.

What this means practically, often we don't turn on PC-based software that runs with USB enabled audio products or wireless headsets. The reason being a lot this software has been created for telephony use, which prioritizes intelligibility in every conceivable environment over natural voice quality. At BEACN we're about the latter. If we were doing tests that were focused on making the voice intelligible when there is a blow dryer beside your mic, we'd turn on more of those features. For the same reason, we don't turn on all the processing functions on our products, because they are not necessary in all applications for making the voice sound as natural and impactful as possible.

Why All This Matters

We designed this test to be transparent, fair, and grounded in how you actually sound in your space, whether you’re presenting to coworkers, raiding with friends, or recording content for your audience.

And because the tests include both BEACN and non‑BEACN mics, you can clearly hear where each one shines or struggles.

Hear the Results Yourself

We hope it helps you feel confident in choosing the mic setup that’s right for your voice, your room, and your workflow.