Hiss is the half of amplifier matching that power figures cannot warn you about, and it is the half that decides whether a sensitive in-ear is pleasant to use. This sorts every dongle and Bluetooth receiver here by the noise figure its own maker published, and counts how many of the 222 in-ears in this database stay below the audible-hiss threshold on it.
The count in the last column is not a measurement of the product. It is arithmetic: the maker’s noise figure delivered into each in-ear’s own sensitivity and impedance. Two products with the same microvolts will hiss identically; what differs is which headphones you put on the end.
| Source | Price | Published noise | In-ears it stays quiet with |
|---|---|---|---|
| iBasso DC03 Pro | $69 | 0.9 µV | 221 of 222 |
| FiiO BTR13 | $59 | 1 µV | 221 of 222 |
| EPZ TP50 | $210 | 1 µV | 221 of 222 |
| Tanchjim Space | $70 | 1.1 µV | 221 of 222 |
| Tanchjim LUNA | $140 | 1.3 µV | 221 of 222 |
| Moondrop Dawn Pro | $75 | 1.5 µV | 220 of 222 |
| Moondrop Moonriver 2 Ti | $190 | 1.5 µV | 220 of 222 |
| Truthear SHIO | $70 | 1.6 µV | 220 of 222 |
| FiiO KA5 | $99 | 1.6 µV | 220 of 222 |
| JadeAudio JA11 | $20 | 1.7 µV | 220 of 222 |
| FiiO KA11 | $29 | 1.7 µV | 220 of 222 |
| FiiO KA3 | $79 | 1.7 µV | 220 of 222 |
| HiBy FC4 | $99 | 1.7 µV | 220 of 222 |
| FiiO KA15 | $109 | 1.7 µV | 220 of 222 |
| FiiO BTR15 | $109 | 2 µV | 217 of 222 |
The table shows the first 15 of 22. The rest are in the full source list, where every figure is labelled with where it came from.
42 of the 64 dongles and Bluetooth receivers could not be placed on this list at all, because their makers never published the figure it sorts by. They are not at the bottom of the ranking; they are absent from it. Any list of this kind that does not say so is quietly presenting a fraction of the market as the whole of it.
This is not a ranking of sound quality and cannot be. It sorts one number that manufacturers printed, and manufacturers do not print anything about how their products sound. Every row links to that product’s own page, where each figure is labelled with the document it came from.
Lowest published output impedance · Most power into 300 Ω · Sources that drive everything here · Audio interfaces as headphone amplifiers · Sources under $100 · Hardest headphones to drive · Most sensitive in-ears · Quietest desktop sources · What balanced actually gains · Portable players by power · Most power per dollar · High-impedance headphones