Introduction

A little over two years ago, I submitted my first HIFIMAN product review with the TWS800 wireless earphones. In a sea of very similar TWS products, it managed to do something no one else did then—or since then, even—by deliberately going for a high impedance voice coil and a dedicated amplifier module all inside shells that still had to fit the rest of the driver and the associated electronics and battery too. This made the HIFIMAN TWS800 one of the largest earphones I've ever used and it offered a decent take on the V-shaped tonality too. It does feel like HIFIMAN prefers to go V-shaped for its IEMs based on the single DD flagship Svanar from earlier this year, and the trend continues today.


HIFIMAN was teasing a high-end TWS set as early as the time my Svanar review went out. It was talking about how the brand's Hymalaya R-2R DAC architecture was setting a platform for products to go wired as with desktop DAC/amps or even wireless with adapters you could stick on to headphones. I suppose it was only a matter of time before HIFIMAN managed to miniaturize the tech enough to put it into TWS earphones. Enter the new Svanar Wireless that HIFIMAN claims gives you most of the sound presentation of the wired Svanar—which sells for $2000—at a significantly lower cost. The Svanar Wireless is not a budget set of TWS earphones and HIFIMAN says there is nothing cheap about how it looks or sounds either. I will note that HIFIMAN has since released two less expensive versions of the Svanar Wireless with cut-down features but this review should help paint a picture of all of them. So let's thank HIFIMAN for providing a review sample to TechPowerUp and begin our coverage with a look at the product specifications in the table below.

Specifications

Packaging and Accessories

I mentioned how the HIFIMAN Svanar Wireless isn't a budget set of TWS IEMs and it's more on the expensive side too. But somehow TWS earphones don't seem to have the expectations of a premium unboxing experience that expensive wired IEMs have these days, perhaps because of the proliferation of mainstream brands in the TWS market which itself has far fewer players. The Svanar Wireless ships in an average-sized box with the company logo and product name on the front along with a teaser of the uniquely shaped carry/storage case. The salient features are also listed here as well as on the back where we see the IEMs illustrated properly too. Product specs and contact info round up the rest of the packaging materials with two seals on the sides helping keep the contents in place during transit.


The lid lifts off to reveal a thick foam sheet with machined cutouts that snugly hold and protect the IEMs and the carry/storage case in the top layer with another foam sheet below that has the other accessories. Here we get the expected short USB Type-A to Type-C charging cable for the case as well as a wide plethora of ear tips to choose from. Indeed, HIFIMAN is fairly generous with eight sets of silicone and foam tips in the box. There are three types of silicone tips—a single flange set which almost looks like two flanges fused together in size M, two sets of actual double flange tips that seem to be the same size M confusingly enough, three sets of proper single flange tips in sizes S/M/L, and two sets of foam tips that again seem to be of the same size M. There is no documentation confirming or clarifying what is going on with these ear tips but somehow it's still better than the average state of TWS ear tips which says more about how sorry it is compared to wired IEMs than anything else. Lastly, while there is no printed manual in the box, HIFIMAN does have an online manual available here which walks you through the setup and use of these earphones so I highly recommend going through it.