French audio brand Focal is undoubtedly best known for its studio monitors and audiophile speakers, but while its studio headphone range is considerably smaller, that doesn’t mean it lacks clout. As a matter of fact, Focal’s Listen Professional headphones have sat atop our list of the best studio headphones for the past few years.
Now the company has released a new model, the Lensys Professionals, which are positioned at a price above the Listen Professionals in Focal’s range, but still considerably more affordable than the company’s top-end, $1500 Clear Mg Professional cans.
Like the Listen Pros, the Lensys Professional headphones are a closed back design, well suited to creating and mixing in a variety of listening environments. The Lensys Professionals make use of 40mm aluminium/magnesium electrodynamic drivers that Focal claims offer ‘incredibly precise sound reproduction’. These feature an ‘M’ shaped dome, which apparently results in a more linear frequency response and improved sound dispersion.
Focal also claims that the positioning of the drivers allows for enhanced stereo imaging and better low-end extension.
One of our favourite aspects of the Listen Professional headphones was the comfort offered by the memory foam ear pads, and a similar design is used here, which Focal claims maximises both comfort and isolation. At 306g, the Lensys Professional headphones are slightly heavier than their cheaper sibling, but should still prove lightweight enough for long studio sessions.
Focal’s Lensys Professional headphones are available now priced at £599/$599. Whether the design offers enough to warrant the jump in price from the Listen Professional model – which you can currently pick up for less than a third of that price – remains to be seen. We’ll bring you the full lowdown when we test them for a full review.
For now, you can find out more at the Focal website.
