Skullcandy's Grind ($89.80 at Amazon) is easily one of the manufacturer's more successful products in terms of design, performance, and value, and now the company brings us a wireless version of the headphones. At $89.99, the Skullcandy Grind Wireless (available March 31, 2016) rings in at $30 more than its cable-only predecessor. In terms of look and fit, the stylish Grind Wireless is a hit. As for audio, there's a solid balance between rich lows and crisp highs. There still aren't too many Bluetooth headphones in this price range that sound as good as this, and so the Grind Wireless wins our Editors' Choice award for being a bit ahead of the curve while staying priced like it's behind it.

Design
The Grind Wireless is available in a wide variety of unique color/pattern combinations—you can opt for a simple matte black or white design, or perhaps you'd prefer a camo-and-hunter's plaid motif? In all, there are six stylish options that combine various materials for strikingly different looks.

The supra-aural (on-ear) design of the Grind Wireless offers a secure—and exceptionally comfortable—fit, thanks to ample padding in the earpads. Behind the cushioned pads, each ear packs a 40mm driver. The right earcup houses three buttons that combine to control volume, playback, and calls.

The decision to make the Volume Up/Down buttons double as track navigation buttons depending on how long you press them is likely to result in some inadvertent track skipping or volume adjusting early on—we're bigger fans of the central multifunction button performing track forward and backward tasks while the Volume buttons are dedicated. This earcup is also the location of the connections for the charging cable and audio cable, as well as the pinhole mic.

The headphones don't fold down into a smaller size, nor is there an included carrying pouch, which makes them a bit harder to stuff into a carry-on or tote.

In fact, on the accessory front, the Grind Wireless is notably light. There's a 3.5mm audio cable for wired, passive listening (the headphones automatically un-pair and switch to battery-free, passive operation when the cable is connected). The cable, however, has no inline remote, so there's no fielding phone calls or controlling music—a slight surprise, but given the Grind Wireless's reasonable price, it's not a huge surprise nor is it a drawback. The only other inclusion is a micro USB-to-USB charging cable. 

Skullcandy rates the Grind Wireless's battery life at roughly 12 hours, but your results will vary in relation to your volume levels. Skullcandy claims the headphones will shut down automatically after 5 minutes in two scenarios: if they are not paired, or if the paired device is out of range. In all other scenarios, the Grind Wireless will not shut down, but will enter a standby mode that uses far less battery life than staying active.

Performance
On tracks with intense sub-bass content, like The Knife's "Silent Shout," the Grind Wireless delivers a palpable thump, and doesn't distort even at top volumes (no small feat for headphones in this price range). At moderate volumes, the bass response is still quite powerful, but is thankfully balanced out by similarly boosted high frequencies.

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Bill Callahan's "Drover," a track with less powerful deep bass content, gives us an idea of what the Grind Wireless's overall sound signature is like. His baritone vocals are delivered with an ideal level of high-mid treble edge, bringing out their contour and adding definition to the low-mid richness. The drums on this track can often sound overly bass-heavy on heavily boosted pairs, but here they sound fairly tame—neither weak nor brittle, but also not massively, unnaturally deep. Overall, this mix has a solid balance between lows and highs.

On Jay-Z and Kanye West's "No Church in the Wild," the kick drum loop gets enough high-mid presence to retain its sharp treble attack. We've heard this attack sound more piercing on other pairs that seem to tweak the high-mids and highs more, but the Grind Wireless still adds definition in this range. The sub-bass synth hits that punctuate the beat are delivered with a solid sense of deep bass, but the lows stop short of serious thunder here—the Grind Wireless's bass response is more firmly rooted in lows and low-mids than sub-bass frequencies. The vocals are delivered in a crisp and clear manner, well-defined and able to float clearly over the lows and mids while never sounding harsh or overly sibilant.

The Skullcandy Grind Wireless presents itself as one of the better-sounding, more comfortable Bluetooth headphone options available for under $100. We're also fans of the Jabra Move Wireless ($49.99 at Amazon) , the even less expensive Creative Sound Blaster Jam ( at Amazon) , and the in-ear JBL Reflect Mini BT ($59.95 at Amazon) . It's worth reading up on all of them if $100 is your budget limit for a Bluetooth headphone pair. But this remains a price range with many options and few all-stars, and for its overall high quality design and performance, the Skullcandy Grind Wireless earns our Editors' Choice award.

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