Microphone Performance

The Movo UM300 is equipped with a single 14-millimeter electret condenser capsule, an obvious step down from the three-capsule array in the UM700. The capsule offers two different polar patterns: cardioid and omnidirectional. The specified frequency response of the capsule is 20–20,000 Hz, and the built-in ADC (analog-to-digital converter) is capable of 16-bit/48 kHz operation. The user manual actually lists the integrated ADC bit depth as 24-bit, but that's not correct since you can't go above 16-bit/48 kHz.

The cardioid polar pattern is what you'll want to use if you're the only one sitting in front of the microphone. The capsules will pick up the sound in front of them while to a certain degree rejecting everything coming from their sides, and even more from behind. In practice, that means room noise won't be as audible as with other polar patterns, especially if the microphone is close to your mouth.


The omnidirectional pattern makes the microphone equally sensitive from all sides. This can be useful when recording several people and/or instruments by placing the microphone in the center of the room, for example. For better or worse, the omnidirectional pattern will inevitably pick up a lot of room acoustics. While the omnidirectional pattern is generally much less sensitive to precise microphone and speaker positioning, the cardioid pattern is still generally a better choice for solo usage because most users don't sit in acoustically treated rooms. The omnidirectional polar pattern also eliminates the proximity effect, so your voice will sound much less bassy even if you're sitting up close to the microphone. Many users will prefer the bassy nature of the cardioid polar pattern.

Let's take a listen to the Movo UM300 USB microphone in its most natural state—while it's positioned on the table between the user and keyboard. For this test, I've adjusted the microphone volume to 100 in Control Panel and lowered its gain almost all the way by using the front-facing multipurpose volume knob. As I've already mentioned, small adjustments of the capsule gain drastically alter sensitivity, so it's best to set it as low as it can go to then slowly raise it from there. You probably won't ever want to go above a quarter of a turn of the knob. For direct comparison, I've also provided a sample recorded with the Movo UM700 in identical conditions. The cardioid polar pattern is of course used on both microphones.




The Movo UM300 sounds decent, unquestionably better than any microphone you might find attached to a headset in the $100 price bracket, although it significantly lags behind the UM700 in terms of sound quality. This is most audible in the lower part of the frequency spectrum, where the UM300 is fairly flat, while the UM700 manages to pick up a pleasant amount of depth in my voice. Some slight sibilance can also be heard in the UM300 sample, although in reality, I didn't find it particularly annoying. Overall, in direct comparison to the UM700, the UM300 sounds thinner and less refined, so after hearing these two samples, I'd definitely be inclined to stretch my budget by an additional $20 and just go with the UM700, especially if I was looking to buy a microphone for live streaming, podcasting, and voiceovers. For online meetings and Discord chats with your gaming buddies, the UM300 will do just fine.

The tonality of my voice does improve after bringing the Movo UM300 closer to my mouth, but not without some issues. Listen to the following samples.




The first sample above was recorded after mounting the Movo UM300 on the Rode PSA3 boom arm and placing it around 10 centimeters (around 4 inches) from my mouth. While my voice now sounds fuller, some popping noises are introduced when certain vocals hit the capsule from this distance. No such pops are present when the microphone is placed further away, as you can hear in the second sample.

Here's what the Movo UM300 microphone sounds like when set to the omnidirectional polar pattern. I am again comparing it to the UM700 with the omnidirectional polar pattern applied. My home office currently isn't acoustically treated, so these samples are greatly impacted by my poor room acoustics.




In omnidirectional mode, the Movo UM300 doesn't sound very good at all. My voice loses even more of its naturality, and any traces of depth are now gone. While some loss of the low end is to be expected when comparing the cardioid polar pattern to an omnidirectional one, the second sample shows that the UM700 still manages to preserve it to a certain extent. This isn't only important for vocal recordings, but also recording instruments, which is one typical use case for the omnidirectional polar pattern. To put it bluntly, if I was looking for a USB microphone with the intention of using it in omnidirectional mode, I'd steer clear of the Movo UM300.

Finally, here's a sample where you can hear how the Movo UM300 handles table tapping, stand touching, and background noise in cardioid mode. The background noise is generated by my mechanical keyboard, the Corsair K100 RGB, which uses the Corsair OPX switches. I've added two samples recorded on the Movo UM700 in the same scenario.





The Movo UM300 does a solid job of handling the background noise in cardioid mode, as well as dealing with accidental touches of its stand or body. This is one aspect where it actually performs slightly better than the UM700, primarily because its lackluster ability to pick up low-frequency sounds diminishes the noise created by my mechanical keyboard and my fingers touching the microphone.