Shanling H5 vs Shanling M1 Plus

Both are portable players, $369 against $209. This page puts them side by side on the only three things a maker can be held to — power, output impedance and noise — and then asks the question that actually matters: which headphones do they treat differently?

The Shanling H5 reaches 100 dB on 565 of the 567 models here, the Shanling M1 Plus on 564.

Every published figure, next to each other

SpecificationShanling H5Shanling M1 Plus
Power into 32Ω227 mW195 mW
Power into 150Ω48 mW42 mW
Power into 300Ω24 mW21 mW
Power into 600Ω12 mW10 mW
Output impedance4.7 Ω0.6 Ω
Output noisenot publishednot published
Price$369$209
Headphones it reaches 100 dB on
out of 567
565564

A figure marked not published is missing from the maker’s own material, which is not the same as being good or bad. Where one of these two publishes a number and the other does not, the comparison on that axis cannot be made at all — and saying so is more useful than guessing.

The headphones that tell them apart

1 headphone reaches 100 dB on the Shanling H5 but not on the Shanling M1 Plus — Symphonium Crimson.

385 headphones are left alone by the Shanling M1 Plus under the one-eighth rule but coloured by the Shanling H5 (64 Audio Aspire 1, 64 Audio Fourte, 64 Audio Nio, 382 more).

564 of the 567 models here reach 100 dB on both. That is a power count and nothing more; whether either source suits a given headphone also depends on the two lines above.

Both pages in full

Each has a page of its own with every power figure traced to what the maker published and a full headphone list: Shanling H5 and Shanling M1 Plus. Or put either against your own headphones in the source comparison tool.

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