The Focal Bathys MG headphone offers sumptuous sound and supreme comfort... and an eye-watering price

In its press material, Focal promises that its Bathys MG ‘pushes the boundaries of wireless sound excellence’. Well, a lot of headphones promise to do that. However, equipped as it is with a newly developed magnesium 40mm driver (hence ‘MG’), the Bathys does have something unique up its sleeve, which the makers promise will deliver class-leading sound fidelity.

And you’d best hope so, because with an asking price of $1,499 / £999, this headphone is comfortably double the price of most of the best Bluetooth headphones. With ANC, wired listening options, 30-hour battery life and an app-based five-band EQ, it ticks all the boxes such headphones should tick. But then you can get a wireless headphone that does all that for a fraction of the price, like the new Sennheiser Momentum 5.

So, does its comfort and sound quality justify its price tag? Let’s take a listen.

Sound profile

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As ever, when reviewing headphones the first thing I do is connect them up and start listening, without fiddling with EQ or hooking up the app, as this is what the majority of users are going to do. And I can report that the majority of users of the Focal Bathys MG will be pleased. The stock sound of this headphone is wonderfully well-balanced – rich and warm, with a very natural balance that just seems to fit whatever you throw at them.

A fuzzy, shoegazey album like Alvvays’ Blue Rev starts us off strong. There’s so much sitting in the midrange, all those crunchy distorted guitars and wobbly synths, but I can still pick the individual elements out clearly in what could so easily have been a mess. It sounds great.

Next, a trip through a heavier album, Wolf Alice’s Blue Weekend, is a chance to test out the bass response of the Focal Bathys MG, and I’m really impressed. It’s punchy and present, but there’s none of that bloat you so commonly get with premium headphones that are trying to impress you, which normally has me running for the EQ. Long-time readers will be pleased to note that I put the Focal Bathys MG through The Chain test (I honestly think putting The Chain on is one of the best ways to test any pair of cans), and it passed in exemplary fashion. The high twang of Buckingham’s guitar in the trebles sits elegantly on top of the vocal, clear and distinct and when McVie’s bass hit comes, it’s rich and warm and melodious, just as it should be.

I was honestly curious whether everything was just going to sound great through these headphones, and I started throwing some curveballs. Listening to an ambient electronic album, Ardour by Teebs, was a wonderfully textural experience, with all the subtle complexities of the sounds fully delineated. A four-footed punk rock album like The Menzingers’ After the Party? Crunchy and punchy, with the right level of crispness and attack to the drums. René Aubry’s wonderful orchestral score to the adaptation of Julia Donaldson’s Stick Man? Sublimely balanced and refined, with the classical guitars sitting centre stage over the delicate softness of the strings and woodwinds. Screw it – ‘Who Do You Think You Are’ by the Spice Girls? Yep – sounds great. Everything does!

Features

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You can customise the sound and settings of the Focal Bathys MG using the Focal & Naim companion app, which features a five-band EQ. Normally I always EQ my headphones, but this is the first time where I’m somewhat ambivalent about it. Two key reasons: first, as mentioned, the stock sound of these headphones is so good. Second, because a five-band EQ in this case feels like a bit of a blunt instrument, especially when there aren’t any obvious issues that I want to correct. If there were a properly granular EQ like the one you get with the Sennhesier HDB 630 I might be more tempted to have a fiddle, but here I’m not. And I guess that’s mostly a good thing!

One interesting feature in the app is Sound Personalisation, which is designed to allow you to construct a sound profile unique to your individual hearing profile. You’re presented with a series of hearing tests, one ear at a time: a beep intermittently plays at increasingly high frequencies, you hold down the button when you hear it and release it when you don’t. Once done, you have a custom listening profile molded to how you hear.

For me sound personalisation did bring the stock track into sharper focus, with more detail legible in the background. But here’s the thing – for real-world listening, I actually didn’t like it. In my case it made the trebles too insistent (I don’t think I did a very good job of picking out the high-frequency beeps, which is possibly the result of a misbegotten youth spent behind a drum kit). Listening to the Decemberists’ The King Is Dead, I found myself constantly distracted by background percussion, with jangling tambourines and the like given far too much prominence in the mix. I’d encourage you to try Sound Personalisation out for yourself, but in my case, I turned it off and didn’t miss it.

ANC is present and correct, powered by four mics on each earcup. It only comes in three settings – ‘Silent’, ‘Soft’ and ‘Transparent’ – but I have contended before on these very pages that I don’t think you actually need more than this. These settings do indeed work as advertised; on ‘Silent’ mode, my cat was yelling next to me for an amount of time and I didn’t notice, while ‘Transparent’ later allowed me to keep listening while keeping an ear out for the doorbell, which I did indeed hear. ‘Soft’ provides a nice balance for those who aren’t keen on the complete isolation that good ANC can provide – and this is good ANC.

Value

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If you’ve been liking what you’ve been reading so far, this is likely to be the major sticking point. As a premium headphone, the Focal Bathys MG comes with an asking price of $1,499 / £999. That’s not the most expensive headphone I’ve ever tested, with the $1,699 DALI IO-12 still sitting as the reigning champ, but it’s not far off.

Two things can be true at once. One: the Focal Bathys MG is an exceptionally good headphone. Two: the Focal Bathys MG costs three to four times as much as the Sennheiser Momentum 5, depending on where you are, and cannot reasonably be described as three to four times as good.

Comfort & build

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Focal’s headphones have quite the distinctive look, and I’d understand completely if it weren't your cup of tea. There’s none of the anonymous matte black of something like the Sony WH-1000XM6; the Focal Bathys MG is styled in a warm shade of chestnut (their word), with Focal’s signature honeycomb pattern on each cup surrounding a glowing LED logo.

Safe to say, it’s not for everyone. When I first wandered into my living room wearing the Focal Bathys MG, my partner described me as ‘steampunk-looking ass’ (unnecessary). She’s a relevant data point here though, because while the look of the Focal Bathys MG doesn’t greatly bother me one way or the other, I know for a fact that she would never even consider buying it, or wearing it publicly, solely due to how it looks. And I doubt she’s alone on that point.

Still, it undeniably feels fairly premium. Built around a yoke constructed from aluminium and magnesium alloy, the Focal Bathys MG benefits from memory foam earcaps and a leather padded headband. It’s very comfortable – I wore it for all-day marathon listening sessions, am still wearing it while writing this, and have not felt any overheating or major discomfort.

Should you buy?

Fundamentally, it’s going to be a matter of heart over head. There’s no sensible reason to buy the Focal Bathys MG while options like the Sennheiser HDB 630 exist at half the price.

But if you are just won over by the vibe of this headphone, if you love the idea of a superbly balanced stock sound from the moment you open the box, of something that looks and feels visually distinct among the admittedly somewhat bland world of premium headphones, and – crucially – you are willing to spend a significant amount of money on those things… all I can say is, enjoy!