It’s been a long time since the original iPod hit the scene, but if you clamour for the days when MP3 players were all the rage, and when listening to music felt like a genuine hobby and not something that simply happens in the background of another task, then you’re in luck. Recreating those glory days of music playback but with a modern twist, there are tons of portable music players you can buy in 2026, and thanks to our tech experts, we know which ones are best.
Although we’re big proponents of portable music players (we wouldn’t have compiled this very list if we weren’t), there are sure to be some people reading this article wondering why on earth they’d ever invest in a dedicated music device when they can so easily jump into a Spotify or Apple Music stream on their smartphone. It’s a fair point, but it’s missing a ton of nuance.
For starters, the big appeal is that if you want to hear your favourite tracks with as much detail as possible, then a portable music player is the way to go. With one of these devices in tow, and a pair of wired headphones, you’ll spot the difference right away as there’s more depth, greater surround sound and a sense of energy that you just don’t get when listening to audio over a smartphone which is downgraded by the very nature of streaming.
However, unlike the music players of old, there are a lot of modern conveniences that can be found with newer tech. There are some devices which run on Android and, as a result, can give you access to your go-to streaming services, but here you can enjoy them with a notable audio boost. There’s a lot to like, but in order to separate the best from the rest, we put each music player through a series of rigorous tests.
Our review process includes listening to both high and low quality music files across an array of headphones, establishing a device’s versatility along the way, whilst also checking on battery drainage through everyday use. Only the music players that truly excel in all of these checks are then considered for this list. If you don’t already have a pair of cans to go with a new music player then our guides to the best headphones and the best cheap headphones have you covered.
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Learn more about how we test music players
We play a lot of music, different genres and at different file resolutions to get an idea of how well portable music players.
If there are features then we make sure we fiddle with them until we’re satisfied. We gauge on how long their battery life is and whether the player holds up to the manufacturer’s claims. We try them on their various wireless connections to see if they offer a smooth performance, and we’ll delve into their sub-menus and see if they work as they’re meant to.
Of course, it always comes back to the music. Portable music players are tested by reviewers who have a love of music, a knowledge of sound quality, as well as a context of the market. We’ll compare to similarly priced rivals, so when we recommend a particular model, it’s among the best you can buy for the money.
Obviously, we know not everyone has the same taste in music, so we won’t only test with the same perfectly mastered album, but with a variety of genres and file qualities, from MP3 to Hi-Res FLAC. Find out more about how we test in our ethics policy.
The price of the Astell Kern SP3000T puts the rest of portable players on this list to shame, though it’s (ironically) less expensive than its predecessor. At $3199 / £2999, it is among the most expensive music players we’ve tested.
Like the Astell and FiiO players that feature on this list, the SP3000T is portable in the loosest sense. It’s angular in a similar fashion to other Astell Kern devices but the build quality is outstanding. It’s built from 316L stainless steel, with the front adorned by a 5.5-inch 1080 x 1920 touchscreen that we found to be bright, crisp, and responsive.
Battery life is similar to the FiiO M17 at ten hours, though the overall feature set is less comprehensive than the FiiO. There are fewer inputs and outputs, and while the built-in storage is bigger (256GB), the SP3000T can only expand to 1TB with the help of a microSD card.
There is aptX and LDAC Bluetooth support, with sample rates of up to DSD512 and 32-bit/768kHz supported too. There are several DAC filters to play around with, the Crossfeed aims to create a soundstage that’s similar to listening to a pair of loudspeakers in a room.
When it comes to listening to music on the SP3000T, the player gives music a consistently natural and lifelike sound. Detail levels are high, control over decay and attack of notes is well-judged, dynamism is well conveyed whether on a small or large scale and integration across the frequency range is superbly well-realised. Its sense of timing is about as good as you can get from a portable player. The price is huge, but in terms of its performance, we found the Astell Kern SP3000T to be a superb portable player.
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Truly outstanding sound quality
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Wonderful build and finish
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Clever and flexible specification
If you’re an audiophile who’s constantly on the go, it makes more sense to have just one device that can serve as your go-to solution for music playback when travelling and when at home. Although such a thing might sound like a pipedream, it is absolutely available in the Astell & Kern PD10.
This is a high-end portable music player that works just as you’d expect on the move, but when you’re at home you can dock the PD10 in its accompanying cradle and use it as a front end to control playback from compatible speakers. It’s a great solution to have if you’re obsessed with music fidelity no matter where you are.
The PD10 also happens to be one of the most solidly built music players we’ve ever tested. Comprised of a stainless steel chassis, the PD10 is far from lightweight in the hand, clocking in at 435g, but it has that satisfying heft that you expect from a device at this end of the market.
The row of physical buttons on the side are wonderfully tactile and they give you a quicker means of interacting with playback than waking up the six-inch screen. Still, if you do decide to dive in for more granular controls, the bright display works brilliantly, as does Astell & Kern’s Crimson operating system, which feels more refined than ever.
In terms of battery life you’re looking at a solid 15-hours of use between charges, so you’ll have more than enough in the tank to get you through a long day of work and commuting. By default there’s a sizeable 256GB of storage included with the PD10, but if you want to expand that, there’s a Micro SD card slot that can add up to an additional 2TB to the mix. Sure, the whole thing costs a lot more than most music players but for a true all-in-one audiophile experience, there’s nothing quite like it.
The Astell & Kern A&futura SE180 is one of the South Korean brand’s most advanced players thanks to its DAC switching modules that allows the user to remove the DAC inside and replace with it another.
It’s an innovative idea, though we found the process of swapping DAC modules required some force. That’s an area Astell & Kern could make easier and swifter in future iterations.
The SE180 carries itself well, although like the SP2000T, its 280g isn’t exactly portable (the similarly-sized iPhone 13 is a mere 173g by comparison). It is well-built, less asymmetric in look that Astell’s other players and features wonderfully tactile volume wheel that mimics a dial on a expensive watch. Headphone outputs are catered for by 3.5mm unbalanced and 2.5 and 4.4mm balanced, with a USB-C port for charging and microSD expansion that supports cards up to 1TB.
The Quad Core processor offers a snappy and responsive performance, the 5-inch colour screen offers some lovely looking colours, while we liked the Android-esque interface, which is intuitive to use and easy to grasp. File support extends MP3 to DSD256 and resolutions up to 384kHz, though by changing the DAC modules the file support can be extended further. With support for aptX HD and LDAC, the SE180 is covered on the wireless High-Res Audio front.
All of that Hi-Res support allows the SE180 to set a high marker for sound. We tested the device with several headphones and found it brought a neutral and noise-free sound to whichever pair we used, featuring terrific amounts of clarity and detail. The soundstage is big and spacious, with the SE180’s sense of precision wringing as much out of music as it can. While it’s capable performer with lower-resolution files, this is a player that shines with higher bit-rates and resolutions, making this a portable player for the audiophile.
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Wi-Fi performance can be a little slow
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Battery life doesn’t feel too extensive
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Getting pricey for an entry level product
The A&ultima SR35 is one of Astell & Kern’s more affordable portable players, though at £799 / $800, it’s more expensive than the SR25 and SR25 MkII, putting dent in those ‘affordable’ credentials.
You get a lot of features and performance packed into the SR35’s compact frame. As usual, it comes with an off-axis screen that does look odd but we adjusted to it in time. The touch screen goes up to 720p resolution but is bright and colourful, while operation is simple enough with buttons on the side for power and playback, as well as the lovely tactile volume wheel. Compared to the cheaper FiiO M11S, the SR35 feels like a premium product.
Its feature set mirrors that of other Astell & Kern players on this list with its wide array of support for audio formats up 32-bit/384kHz PCM and DSD256. Wi-Fi and Bluetooth support is accounted for, though we found with the former that it takes a while for the Wi-Fi connection to boot up when the player is powered on.
Built-in storage is 64GB, but the SR35 supports expandable storage up to 1TB with a microSD card. Battery life is rated at around 20 hours, but in our experience, the player has a habit of chewing through its battery life quicker than expected. There’s also a choice of Normal and High gain settings to match the impedance of the headphone it’s connected to.
In terms of audio performance, the SR35 doesn’t show too heavy a hand in altering the sound of the headphone it’s partnered with. Unlike the SE180 model where you can hear the effect of the different DAC modules, the SR35 takes the audio signal and gives it more polish and refinement while still keeping true to the headphone’s sonic signature. Compared to the FiiO M15S, it’s sharper across the frequency range, offers more insight, and is more dynamically expressive.
It’s the more assertive and exciting listen of the two similarly priced players. While the SR35 isn’t perfect in all areas, in our opinion, it’s the best portable music player you can buy in the £500 to £1000 range.
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Detailed, composed and thoroughly entertaining sound
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Specified well beyond what the asking price might suggest
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Impressive standard of build and finish
If you’re completely new to the world of portable music players and just want to start things out with an inexpensive option that doesn’t require a sizeable investment, then the FiiO JM21 is a great place to start. This music player provides so much of what makes FiiO such a household brand in this market, but at a price that massively undercuts the competition.
Aside from the tempting £179/$199 price point, the key factor that makes the JM21 so alluring to new buyers is that the device itself is wonderfully compact. At just 13mm thick and weighing only 156G, the JM21 is more pocketable than the average smartphone, so unlike with a lot of premium music players, you won’t be bogged down. The Sky Blue colourway also has an eye-catching quality about it, which is more than we can say for a lot of smartphones right now.
When it comes to the sound quality, even though you’re spending less than what you would elsewhere, the JM21 still brings a respectable soundscape to the table with no less than two Cirrus Logic CS43198 DAC chipsets. This paves the way for playback in resolutions up to 32-bit/384kHz which, in layman’s terms, is a serious uptick on what you can get out of your smartphone.
Still, the experience of using the FiiO JM21 doesn’t feel all that dissimilar to that of a smartphone as it runs on a reworked version of Android 13, with a 4.7-inch touchscreen to boot. With only 3GB RAM onboard, you don’t want to be using it for much more than listening to music, but at least you do have the ability to access your streaming service of choice here.
One thing that is well worth making use of is the available Micro SD card slot. By default, there’s only 32GB storage built into the FiiO JM21 which might be fine for some users who just want a few albums to hand at a time, but for most people you’re better off expanding that memory so you can have a genuine library of music on the go.
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Hefty aluminium chassis
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Bluetooth pairing is easy, and works decently well
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The warmth and saturated feel of a cassette has a strange appeal
Being completely honest, we’re still a bit perplexed by the fact that cassette tapes are having a resurgence given that they were never exactly rated as a medium with noteworthy sound quality, but if an appreciation for all things retro has allowed vinyls to become popular once more, then it does seem like fair game. If you’re one such person who loves the idea of dusting off their old cassette tapes or even buying some of the newer ones that have started to appear, then the We Are Rewind WE-001 is made with you in mind.
Before we can talk about any other aspect, the most striking thing about the WE-001 is its design. Not too dissimilar to a product made by Teenage Engineering (the company behind the Playdate), the WE-001 features a striking, uniform aesthetic, with the orange colourway being particularly eye-catching. It also looks very similar to the classic Sony Walkman, and wouldn’t feel out of place in a scene from Guardians of the Galaxy.
If you’re not sold on the orange colourway then there are quite a few alternatives available. Fans of The King will immediately gravitate towards the special edition Elvis option, while anyone after a more subdued palette will appreciate the Keith model which comes in a dark grey. No matter which one you go for, the physical buttons have a wonderful tactility to them that makes them a joy to use, and they feel like a remedy to a world that’s now so dominated by touchscreens.
Still, even though it very much wears its retro inspiration on its sleeve, the WE-001 is meant to provide a more modern alternative to fans of cassettes. With a built-in battery, the device can be topped up with a USB-C cable and, more importantly, you don’t need to carry around a pair of wired headphones as the WE-001 supports Bluetooth. This means that you can wirelessly listen to your cassettes, making the format feel far less cumbersome.
You can enjoy up to 12-hours of use on a single charge which should get more than most through an average day. With regards to audio quality, your enjoyment will very much depend on how you view cassettes as a whole. In our testing, we were reminded of the warm sound that cassettes can produce, which does have a nice quality to it, but you won’t get the same level of detail that you can with digital music players.
FAQ
Is it worth buying a portable music player?
Smartphones are compromised in terms of their performance because they’re designed to do multiple things. A portable music player is expressly designed for one thing, so if you love your music and want to hear it in its best quality, it is worth investing in a portable music player.
Full Specs
| |
Astell and Kern Aultima SP3000T Review |
Astell&Kern PD10 Review |
Astell and Kern Afutura SE180 Review |
Astell and Kern Aultima SR35 Review |
FiiO JM21 Review |
We Are Rewind WE-001 Review |
| UK RRP |
£3199 |
£2500 |
£1399 |
£799 |
£179 |
£129 |
| USA RRP |
$2999 |
$2500 |
$1499 |
$800 |
$199 |
$159 |
| EU RRP |
€3599 |
– |
€1599 |
– |
€199 |
– |
| CA RRP |
– |
– |
– |
– |
CA$369 |
– |
| AUD RRP |
AU$5299 |
AU$3000 |
– |
– |
AU$249 |
– |
| CPU |
Snapdragon 6125 Octa-core |
Octa-Core |
Quad-Core |
Quad-core |
Qualcomm Snapdragon 660 |
– |
| Manufacturer |
Astell & Kern |
Astell & Kern |
Astell & Kern |
Astell & Kern |
FiiO |
– |
| Screen Size |
5.5 inches |
6 inches |
5 inches |
3.6 inches |
4.7 inches |
– |
| Storage Capacity |
256GB |
256GB |
256GB |
64GB |
32GB |
– |
| Expandable storage |
Up to 1TB |
Up to 2TB |
Up to 1TB microSD |
up to 1TB |
Up to 2TB |
– |
| IP rating |
– |
– |
Not Disclosed |
– |
– |
– |
| Battery |
5050 mAh |
5770 mAh |
3800 mAh |
3150 mAh |
– |
2000 mAh |
| Size (Dimensions) |
84.7 x 18 x 141.5 MM |
75.4 x 17.3 x 149.5 MM |
77 x 19.9 x 137.2 MM |
64 x 16.1 x 108.3 MM |
68 x 13 x 121 MM |
88.8 x 140.8 x 33.5 MM |
| Weight |
483 G |
435 G |
280 G |
184 G |
156 G |
404 G |
| ASIN |
B0D365BX5K |
– |
B094JZWX7S |
B0BZS29BVS |
B0DRYJ9FCG |
B0C6B2937N |
| Operating System |
– |
– |
– |
Android |
Android 13 |
– |
| DAC |
AKM AK4191 x2 (Dual Modulator) & AKM AK4499EX x2 (Dual DAC) |
AKM4191EQ x2 (Dual Modulator) + AKM4498EX x4 (Dual+Dual DAC) |
SEM1 ESS ES9038PRO |
Ciruss Logic CS43198 x4 |
2 x Cirrus Logic CS43198 |
– |
| USB DAC Mode |
Yes |
Yes |
Yes |
Yes |
Yes |
– |
| Release Date |
2024 |
2025 |
2021 |
2023 |
2025 |
2023 |
| First Reviewed Date |
– |
– |
– |
– |
– |
08/01/2026 |
| Model Number |
SP3000T |
PD10 |
AK-SE180-SEM1-MS |
SR35 |
– |
– |
| Resolution |
x |
1080 x 2160 |
x |
x |
x |
x |
| Ports |
– |
– |
USB-C, microSD, 3.5mm unbalanced, 2.5mm balanced, 4.4 balanced |
– |
– |
– |
| RAM |
8GB |
– |
– |
– |
– |
– |
| Connectivity |
Wi-Fi, Bluetooth |
Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 5. |
Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 5.0 |
Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 5.0 |
– |
Bluetooth 5.1, 3.5mm jack |
| Colours |
Silver |
– |
Moon Silver |
Charcoal Grey |
Sky Blue |
Orange, Black, Blue |
| Audio Formats |
WAV, FLAC, WMA, MP3, OGG, APE, AAC, ALAC, AIFF, DFF, DSF, MQA |
WAV, FLAC, WMA, MP3, OGG, APE, AAC, ALAC, AIFF, DFF, DSF |
WAV, FLAC, WMA, MP3, OGG, APE, AAC, ALAC, AIFF, DFF, DSF, MQA |
WAV, FLAC, WMA, MP3, OGG, APE, AAC, ALAC, AIFF, DFF, DSF |
AAC, AIFF, ALAC, APE, DSD, DST, DXD, FLAC, ISO, MP3, MQA, OGG, WAV, WMA |
Cassette |
| Touch Screen |
Yes |
Yes |
Yes |
Yes |
Yes |
No |
| Wifi Spec |
– |
– |
802.11 b/g/n (2.4GHz) |
– |
– |
– |
| Screen |
– |
– |
Yes |
– |
– |
– |
| Bluetooth |
– |
– |
Yes |
– |
– |
– |
| USB charging |
Yes |
Yes |
Yes |
– |
Yes |
Yes |
| Headphone port |
– |
– |
Yes |
– |
– |
– |
| Inputs |
– |
USB-C |
– |
USB-C |
– |
3.5mm jack for recording |
| Outputs |
3.5mm balanced, optical out, 2.5mm balanced, 4.4mm |
Unbalanced, Balanced, Optical |
– |
3.5mm unbalanced, 2.5/4.4mm balanced |
3.5mm/SPDIF; 4.4mm |
3.5mm jack for output, Bluetooth 5.1 |
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