Here’s a review you never thought you needed – Singapore Airlines offers free take-home earphones when flying on Economy Class to use on the KrisWorld in-flight entertainment system, and Scoot, well, doesn’t offer you one outright since there’s no in-flight entertainment system on board the low-cost carrier. However, they do sell their earphones off the Scootalogue if you really needed a pair.

With my recent Restaurant A380 @Changi Economy Class Experience and KrisShop 11.11 Sale, I collected my free Economy Class earphones before boarding the Airbus A380 restaurant, and purchased my Scoot Zipper Earphones from KrisShop. Now to put them to the test on this no-frills review.

Free Singapore Airlines Economy Class Earphones

Singapore Airlines’ Economy Class Earphones are free to pick up on the aerobridge just before boarding the aircraft.

S$19 Scoot Zipper Earphones

With no in-flight entertainment system, Scoot understandably does not give out free earphones. However, if you do end up being bored on board with music and videos in your phone, and no earphones to listen to them with, you can buy Scoot’s Zipper Earphones for S$19 off the Scootalogue.

From now till 15 November 2020, as part of the KrisShop 11.11 Sale, the Scoot Zipper Earphones are going for S$10, before S$6 Singapore delivery fee. That’s almost a 50% discount. But remember to add more items like plane models to your purchase to even out the delivery fee, and don’t just pay S$6 to deliver a pair of earphones.

Earphones Packaging

At first look, you would know which one is the free earphones and which one is the paid earphones. The free Singapore Airlines earphones comes in a resealable ziploc bag, while the S$19 Scoot Zipper Earphones comes with its own hard case.

The free Singapore Airlines earphones have additional sets of earbud sizes for you to adjust to your ear canal perfectly. Also, being meant for the KrisWorld in-flight entertainment system, rather than providing just a straight two-pin headphone jack like most airlines would, Singapore Airlines is quite nice to provide a 3.5mm headphone jack with the two-pin converter so that you can use the earphones after your flight on your own device.

With no in-flight entertainment system to cater too, and passengers would be bringing their own devices for entertainment on Scoot, Scoot’s Zipper Earphones comes with the standard 3.5mm headphone jack, without a two-pin converter since there’s no use for it anyway. There are additional sets of earbud sizes for you to adjust to your ear canal perfectly.

Unveiling the free Singapore Airlines earphones, it is relatively simple and fuss-free with the wires connecting the earbuds being able to split up once when you pull it apart.

The Singapore Airlines keris logo is printed on both sides of the earphones.

The Scoot Zipper Earphones, as the name suggests, has a Y-cable zipper to split apart the earbuds and zip it up before rolling it back into the pouch. The fatter and solid design also prevents spaghetti from forming like the previous photo of Singapore Airlines’.

While the product description says “Exclusive zipper earphones in scoot design.”, Scoot’s logo is not found anywhere on the Scoot Zipper Earphones itself, though it’s seen on the black pouch it comes with. Although, granted, the striking yellow and black combination on the Scoot Zipper Earphones also relates directly to their branding.

Singapore Airlines vs. Scoot Earphones Sound Check

I don’t have an Economy Class seat at home, so I can only do the next best thing – use my Scoot “IFE”. And for a proper test for Singapore Airlines and Scoot earphones, I decided to use the most appropriate video for accuracy.

The free Singapore Airlines earphones sound very hollow and flat in a quiet room, and I could feel some distance from the speaker inside the earbud which was a bit awkward. So it’s really not the aircraft noise that was affecting the quality of sound after all, where I have to turn my volume up on the IFE after take-off.

But then again, it’s free.

The S$19 Scoot Zipper Earphones (I paid S$10 as mentioned), however, sounded pretty good. Granted, it’s Scoot-branded and not Bang and Olufsen, but the video sounded a lot clearer and sharper with it. There was also a heavier bass and the seatbelt click in the Singapore Airlines In-flight Safety Video was very distinct.

Perhaps a future check on board an actual aircraft is in place to properly compare it to the free Singapore Airlines earphones.

Verdict

A rare win over the parent company, Scoot’s earphones perform better than Singapore Airlines’.

However, that being said, this isn’t exactly a fair comparison.

First up, it’s comparing a free item with something that was paid for. It would already be expected that paid earphones, S$19 at that, would be better than free earphones anyway. (Although if Singapore Airlines wants to improve on the current free earphones I will be very happy to use it and take it home thank you.)

Furthermore, I tested them in a quiet setting at home – these things are not meant to be used in a quiet room but with engine noise in the background. So with the loud background noise, a good earphone might be drowned out anyway, making it the same quality as free ones. This will need a future test when air fares are not prohibitively expensive again.

If you’re planning to use your own earphones on Singapore Airlines in future, just take the two-pin converter from the earphone pack, and connect it with your own. Just remember there’s no need to rush and buy them overpriced (or at any price for that matter) unless you really want it as a keepsake and have no plans to fly with Singapore Airlines any time soon.