Kiwi Ears Chorus

A Single-DD IEM with a Warm, Engaging V-Shaped Signature

A deliberate change of direction from the neutral-leaning crowd at this price — and in the USB-C form, it comes with parametric EQ in the box.

The Chorus is a collaboration between Kiwi Ears and B_Media, an audio reviewer known for a no-nonsense, real-world approach to IEM tonality. Pairing that tuning sensibility with Kiwi Ears’ budget-IEM manufacturing, the Chorus is pitched as an engaging single-dynamic-driver IEM for everyday music lovers rather than a spec-chasing exercise.

It is a single dynamic driver, and the interesting part is what they have done with it. The tuning is V-shaped, which here means the bass is lifted and the top end has some extra bite, while the midrange between them sits lower than either — vocals end up slightly behind the bass rather than in front of it. A lot of the sub-$50 field is tuned toward Harman or something close to it; the Chorus deliberately is not, and that makes it a useful thing to have in a collection rather than another variation on the same theme. There are a few versions: a standard 2-pin from $39.99 (or $41.99 with an inline mic), and the one reviewed here — the USB-C variant with an onboard DAC, microphone and PEQ — at $44.99.

I have used the Chorus with a phone over its USB-C cable. The short version is that it is a likeable, slightly warm IEM that responds very well to a touch of EQ — and that, in this USB-C form, it offers PEQ at a price where that is genuinely rare. But first, let’s take a look at what’s in the box.

Unboxing and Packaging

The Chorus arrives in Kiwi Ears’ tidy black-and-white packaging, with the IEMs and the driver billing on the front:

The side panel carries the specifications and the back the regulatory details — worth a glance before you open it, since the published figures are the only ones you get at this price:

Inside, the IEMs sit in foam above a Kiwi Ears document folder. The presentation is tidy, but this is where the budget shows: there is no carrying case of any kind, which is the one omission I would call out at this price:

The faceplates are visible as soon as the lid comes off, which is clearly the intention:

Accessories are similarly thin. You get one set of silicone tips in black and clear, and that is it — no foam option, no second bore style, and as noted nothing to carry them in:

Design and Build

In the hand the pair has a clean, symmetrical look with the sunburst faceplates facing out:

The shells are glossy black resin with a silver sunburst faceplate around a gold central vent. For a $45 IEM the finish is better than it needs to be — the sunburst catches light without looking cheap about it:

The nozzles use a gold mesh grille, and the shell is a comfortable, ergonomic shape that disappears in the ear over a long session:

Fit, Vent and Isolation

The shells are small and very light, which is most of why they are as comfortable as they are — these are among the easier IEMs to forget you are wearing. Two things are worth knowing before you buy, though.

The nozzle is on the wide side. That works in my favour for seal, but if you have narrow ear canals it is the thing most likely to cause a problem, and it is worth checking your experience with wide-nozzle IEMs before ordering. The shell also has some internal anatomical shaping, which is comfortable for me over long sessions but is the kind of thing that suits some ear shapes better than others.

That gold circle on the faceplate is a functional vent, not decoration, and it is a large one. Venting a dynamic driver this generously relieves pressure build-up — part of why the Chorus stays comfortable over hours — and it opens the presentation up compared with a more tightly sealed design. The trade-off is isolation: this does not block outside noise the way a sealed IEM does. It is fine for a desk, a walk or a quiet train, but it is not the thing to take on a plane. How much this bothers you will depend heavily on your seal and your choice of tips.

The USB-C Cable, DAC and PEQ

The variant reviewed here ships with the USB-C cable rather than a plain analogue one. It is a silver, lightly braided cable terminating in a USB-C plug with an inline microphone and controls, and 0.78mm 2-pin connectors at the IEM end:

The reason this is the variant to get is the same DSP-based PEQ trick that Kiwi Ears use on their S-Link cable: the USB-C connection carries a DAC and DSP that let you store a parametric EQ. Having PEQ on a sub-$45 IEM is genuinely unusual, and as the sound section explains, the Chorus is an IEM that benefits from a little EQ — so being able to apply it from the bundled cable is a real advantage. You can tune it through Kiwi Ears’ web EQ editor.

Sound Impressions

I started with the analogue 2-pin cable, and I did not stay there long. The USB-C adapter is not just a convenience — it applies some DSP of its own, and the difference is easy to hear and visible in the graphs above. It takes a little of the warmth out of the mid-bass and adds some energy back at the top, which tidies up the one thing the analogue version most wants tidying. It keeps the V-shaped character that gives the Chorus its personality; it just stops the bottom end leaning quite so heavily on everything else.

Almost all the listening below is over the USB-C cable. If you have a USB-C source and you want the EQ, that is the version to buy; if your source has a 3.5mm jack and you have no interest in PEQ, the cheaper analogue version is the sensible choice and the EQ filter below covers most of the gap.

Bass

The bass is the Chorus’s defining trait. There is real weight and a snappy, responsive quality to it, and on “Angel” by Massive Attack the low end is full and satisfying without ever losing its shape. Over the analogue cable there is a little too much of it — the mid-bass runs warm enough that the boundary between the bass and the lower midrange softens. The USB-C version pulls that back and the same track tightens up noticeably.

“Limit to Your Love” by James Blake is the track that finds the limit. The Chorus’s low end is a mid-bass lift rather than a sub-bass one — the measurement below shows it sitting slightly under target at 20Hz — so the famous sub-bass drops register as notes rather than as pressure you feel. That is a fair trade at $45, and it is worth knowing that the warmth you hear is coming from higher up than the very bottom.

Midrange

The midrange is not as recessed as the V-shaped description might lead you to expect. Measured against the target it sits roughly where it should — it is the bass lifted above it that makes it read as set back rather than any real scoop. Vocals stay present and keep their body, and on “Fast Car” by Tracy Chapman the vocal is clear and unforced, sitting in the mix rather than behind it.

This is the region the cable choice affects most. Over the analogue cable the lower midrange picks up some of the mid-bass warmth and “Sweet Jane” by the Cowboy Junkies loses a little of Margo Timmins' separation from the arrangement behind her. Over USB-C that clears up.

Treble

The treble is where the USB-C option earns its extra few dollars. Over the analogue cable it is safe — smooth, inoffensive, and a touch polite for a tuning with this much bass underneath it. The DSP adds energy back up top and the balance makes more sense for it.

On “Billie Jean” by Michael Jackson the hi-hats are clean and present without ever turning sharp, and over USB-C they have more presence in the mix rather than sitting politely behind everything. On “Chocolate Chip Trip” by Tool there is enough cymbal energy to follow the percussion work, though this is not an IEM that will impress anyone chasing the last word in air and sparkle — that is not what it is for.

Soundstage and Imaging

The stage is reasonable rather than expansive, which is fair at the price. “Hotel California” by the Eagles places instruments clearly enough to follow, without the separation and layering you would get from something several times the money. The V-shaped balance helps here — the recessed midrange leaves room around instruments — but it is the kind of presentation that sounds bigger than it images precisely.

EQ suggestion

If you are on the analogue cable, the single most effective change is a small mid-bass cut to tighten up the bass-to-midrange transition:

Filter 1: PK Fc 150 Hz  Gain -3 dB  Q 1.0

One filter is enough to hear the improvement. On the USB-C cable much of this is already done for you by the onboard DSP, so start by listening to it stock before deciding whether you still want the cut.

Specifications and Measurements

Specifications

The figures above are Kiwi Ears’ own published specification. Kiwi Ears rate the DLC diaphragm at less than 0.1% THD at 1kHz with a linear phase response; my own measurements follow below.

Frequency Response

All measurements were taken on my own clone IEC60318-4 coupler. First, the Chorus on the plain analogue cable, both channels, against the Harman Adjusted target:

Channel matching is very good. The shape is the interesting part: the bass sits above the target from roughly 60Hz to 200Hz, which is the warmth you hear, while at 20Hz it is actually a little under Harman — so this is a mid-bass lift rather than a sub-bass one. Through the midrange it runs slightly below target, the pinna gain comes back up to meet Harman around 3kHz, and then 4kHz to 6.5kHz is recessed before a narrow peak at 8kHz. That combination — lifted mid-bass, dipped lower treble, spike above it — is what gives the Chorus its V-shaped character.

USB-C DSP vs the Analogue Cable

This is the graph worth looking at, because it shows what you are actually buying with the USB-C version:

The DSP does two things. It takes about a decibel out of the 60Hz–400Hz region, which is exactly the warmth that makes the analogue version feel thick through the lower midrange. And it adds energy at the top — a little through 4–6kHz, more at the 8kHz peak, and a substantial lift through 9–12kHz where the analogue cable drops away.

That is a small change on paper and a clear one in practice. It does not turn the Chorus into a neutral IEM — the V-shape survives intact — it just stops the bottom end dominating and gives the top end enough presence to balance it.

Comparisons

Against two other Kiwi Ears models, the Airoso and the Belle:

The Chorus and the Belle measure near-identically from the bass through to about 4kHz, which matches how they struck me — I heard these two as close relatives rather than different tunings.

It is worth being careful with that conclusion, though. Several reviewers have described the Chorus as clearly bassier and warmer than the Belle, and I can see why. Nozzle length, insertion angle and seal all shift a measurement more than people tend to assume, and two shells with different geometry can land differently in one coupler and differently again in somebody’s ear. My graph says one thing about my fit; it does not settle what the difference sounds like in yours.

What is not in doubt is that the USB-C version changes the comparison entirely. Whatever the analogue Chorus is or is not next to the Belle, the DSP tweaks make it a different proposition — and that is a difference you cannot fit-adjust away.

Worth a look alongside the Halcyon, which is the other Kiwi Ears I have been using recently — the Chorus on the right with its sunburst faceplate and gold vent, the metal-shelled Halcyon on the left:

They are aimed at completely different buyers — one is a $45 warm-tuned single dynamic, the other a $259 tribrid — but the pair does show how much shell size the Chorus saves, and how visible that central vent is compared with a sealed metal shell.

Since I have both on the same coupler, here they are measured against each other. This is the Chorus on the analogue cable, which is the fairer comparison — the USB-C DSP version is a different curve, as the graph further up shows:

I want to be straight about what this shows, because it would be easy to read the overlap through the midrange as the Chorus getting close. It does not. The Halcyon is the better tuning — to my ears it is arguably the best-tuned IEM Kiwi Ears make, in the same territory as the Astral, which is my favourite of theirs. The graph shows why.

In the bass the Halcyon has roughly 4–5dB more at 20Hz and holds it above the Chorus until they meet near 100Hz. That is real sub-bass against the Chorus’s mid-bass lift, and it is the difference between a low end that extends and one that is merely warm. The Chorus also digs a deeper trough at 700–800Hz, so its midrange sits further back even where the two curves run close.

In the treble their peaks land in different places — the Halcyon’s around 7kHz, the Chorus’s around 8kHz — and above 10kHz the Halcyon keeps considerably more energy where the Chorus falls away steeply. That is the MEMS driver doing a job the Chorus has no equivalent for.

So this is not a case of a $45 IEM nearly matching a $259 one. The reason to own the Chorus is not that it approaches the Halcyon but that it is doing something different: a warm, V-shaped tuning in a field that mostly is not, at a price where you can own it alongside better IEMs rather than instead of them. If you are building a collection and want variety in it, that is a real argument. If you are buying one IEM and the budget stretches, the Halcyon is the better tuning and this graph does not say otherwise.

The Airoso is the one that separates itself on the graph, with more energy through 4–6kHz and a lot more in the upper treble around 12–14kHz. If the Chorus reads as too dark up top, the Airoso is the Kiwi Ears that addresses that.

And against the Juzear Nimbus, which sits a little above it in price:

The Nimbus has a couple more decibels of genuine sub-bass at 20Hz, and the two are near enough identical from 100Hz to 1kHz. Above that the Chorus carries more through the presence region and has the more prominent 8kHz peak, while the Nimbus has more air at the very top.

Distortion

Distortion is low at normal listening levels — it sits at the noise floor across the midrange and treble, with only a small rise in the lowest bass, and that measured at a level louder than anyone listens.

Rating Explanation

The Pragmatic Rating of 4 reflects an enjoyable budget IEM that does the fundamentals well and then adds something the competition mostly does not: onboard PEQ. The DLC driver is snappy and low-distortion, the tuning is warm and easy to live with, and the build is good for the money.

The honest caveats are that the stock tuning is a little warm in the mid-bass and the treble is on the relaxed side, so it is not the last word in separation or air out of the box — though a single EQ filter addresses the first of those neatly. And the sub-$50 single-DD market is fiercely competitive, so the Chorus has to fight for attention.

This one is for the budget listener who wants a warm, fuss-free IEM — and especially for anyone who values being able to EQ it, in which case the $44.99 USB-C variant is comfortably the pick of the range.

Conclusion

Between them, Kiwi Ears and B_Media have arrived at a warm tuning that a lot of listeners are going to get on with. It is not trying to be a neutral reference, and it is not trying to be another Harman clone — at a price where most of the field chases the same target, having a clear point of view is worth more than another marginal refinement. The mid-bass warmth means it rewards a small EQ nudge, but transients land cleanly rather than smearing, distortion measures low, and nothing about the tuning asks you to concentrate.

What pushes it from “good budget IEM” to “great value” is the USB-C variant’s onboard PEQ. Being able to carry a parametric EQ on a sub-$45 IEM is rare, and it turns the Chorus’s one real weakness into something you can simply dial out. For me, the USB-C version is easily the best value of the three.