Thank you 1MORE for sending us this set of wireless earbuds to review!

The 1MORE TWS Q20 is 1MORE's newest entry-level noise-canceling in-ear monitors (IEMs) and has a remarkable feature set, especially at the low price on $24.99. Even scouring Amazon, active noise-canceling (ANC) is a popular feature that is very rarely available at such a low price. Even without ANC, the Q20 offers pretty good sound isolation, and a great value.

The 1MORE TWS Q20s are available in black or white, and this review is for the black model. The charging case is fairly small, measuring (with the earbuds inside) to be 2.5" tall, 2 inches wide, and about 1 inch thick. These things are pretty small, and they have a slightly textured surface and all rounded edges, making them seem smaller than how they measure. They are pretty easy to pop into and out of your pocket. Being black, they are somehow easy to misplace, and I've done that a few times, but thankfully they never remained lost. I could see them popping out of your pocket unintentionally on a bus if you aren't careful, so be sure to put them under something else in your pocket if you can. Fortunately, they are not that expensive to replace if it comes to that.

Like many earbuds these days, they are controlled via touch commands. Near the top of the stem there is a tiny hole, and if you touch there, you can be sure the earbud will register it. If you double tap, you can play or pause. If you triple tap on the left earbud, you navigate to the previous track, and if you triple tap the right, you get the next track. You can also answer a call with a double tap, and decline it by holding for two seconds. To enable low-latency mode, you press and hold the left earbud for two seconds, and it will say 'Game mode' or 'Bass mode'. (There is also a hidden 'Pop mode'; more on that later.) Normal mode has an audio latency of around 500ms, but Game mode is quite excellent, at under 100ms. You can certainly play a game with such low latency without much trouble.

Pairing the first time is easy; you just take out the earbuds and they immediately go into pairing mode. You can switch devices somewhat easily but just disconnecting it from what it is currently connected to. So if it's connected to the wrong device, think back to what you last paired the Q20 with and disconnect it from there, and they should go back into pairing mode. Sadly you can't force a disconnect from another device, and there is no 1MORE app support for these earbuds.

The TWS Q20s are the only earbud I've ever seen that has two different physical listening modes. Most IEMs have a post that the silicone ear tips slide onto that then go into your ear canal. These instead have a silicone ear tips that slides into an opening, that then goes into your ear canal. While that does make the ear tips unique, it also offers a comfort mode, where you can remove the silicone tips entirely, and just insert the earbuds into your ear. This mode is definitely more comfortable, but it doesn't sound as good this way. It's still a really neat and unique feature, though. I like to use comfort mode when listening to something where sound quality matters less, like podcasts, because using an IEM for too long can irritate my ears, while comfort mode doesn't. This is doubly important for me because I can sometimes get outer ear infections from IEMs, so being able to switch when my ears get irritated is actually pretty great.

It's obvious the sound is tuned for IEM mode, because in the default 'Bass mode' EQ mode, it sounds really good, with solid bass and decent treble. If you wear them in comfort mode using this EQ mode, it sounds like most of the bass is gone. The other EQ mode, called 'Pop mode', frankly sounds terrible. It boosts the bass massively, and removes almost all treble. I can see some people preferring this for use in comfort mode, but even that is a stretch considering how bad it sounds. But it's the only way to get bass in comfort mode, so there's that. You change EQ modes through tapping the left earbud six times in quick succession, so it's not easy to trigger but it does work. It's funny that five, seven, or eight taps doesn't trigger the EQ change, so it has to be exactly six times. I would have never found this mode without carefully studying the manual, so hopefully this helps someone.

The comfort in general is pretty good on these. The shape is an interesting zig-zag of sorts that is meant to fit into your ear canals in a more comfortable way, and they do a pretty good job of that. If you don't mind IEMs, then I can recommended these; if you plan to wear them in comfort mode most of the time, then I recommend you look at 1MORE's TWS Q10 instead, as they sound much better. I actually slightly prefer the Q10s sound signature overall, because they sound a bit more balanced, but the Q20 is by no means bad. I do love the feature set available in the Q20, though.

When ANC mode is working at expected, it sounds good and it does quiet the background down a bit, though not as much as higher-end earphones. I often wear noise isolators when mowing my lawn, and ANC in addition really makes a difference. I intend to use these Q20s for lawn mowing duty going forward until something else comes along.