Boss Waza Air Guitar Headphones

It's really cool to be able to plug the dongle, put the headphones on and play. It's fairly easy to dial in good sounds, and the options with the effects are fairly flexible.

The static mode works as advertised, but it feels weird and a bit unnatural. The panning is quite brutal, and the effect is much more pronounced than it would be when you turn your head around with an amp in the room. The stage setting is gimmicky at best, and I don't find it more immersive than the standard mode. the ambiant reverb settings can be very annoying as well, but thankfully it can tuned down. These are fun gimmicks, but not a major selling point. I would have bought a cheaper version without these features any day, and I think a lot of people would agree that this isn't the main selling point.

The main issue is the bug in the app for iOS. it doesn't respect the safe areas, so if you have an iPhone with a notch, the app is unusable. Once you enter the effect setting screen, you can go back to the main screen. It works on iPad and iphone 7 / SE though.

I also wish there'd be a way to toggle effects on & off from the headphones, but the only option is to change patches. It's workable this way, but since there are only 6 slots for patches on the headphones, it's more limiting. This would truly make the headphones perfectly usable without the app, but for now I still feel like I need a phone or tablet to use it. Which you'd probably have if you want to play backing tracks, but this forces you to juggle between the music app and the boss waza-air app. The split knobs for effects is inherited from the katana interface, but on a digital app it feels weird. it might stem from a limitation on the DSP, but it would have worked better to have separate knobs & toggles for booster / mod, delay / fx and reverb. It would also be nice to be able to toggle an effect off by clicking the color switcher instead of having to dial down the knob.

For those who complain the connexion isn't working well for bluetooth audio, it's pretty well explained both in the manual and on the web. There are 2 bluetooth devices in one:
WAZA AIR MIDI: this one is used to connect to the app and control the amp / effects settings on the headphones via midi
WAZA AIR AUDIO: this is used to pair the headphones as a bluetooth media receiver to stream audio from the device.

When you pair the MIDI one on the app, it doesn't automatically pair the AUDIO one on the device to use in your music app. For this - as the manual says - you need to hold the BT button on the headphones to enter pairing mode, then go to your device's bluetooth settings and pair the WAZA AIR AUDIO. Once this is done you can control the headphones with the app & stream music at the same time, which is one thing that doesn't always work well with this type of product (on the yamaha THR for instance, you can't sync settings on the app while streaming audio & vice versa)

A cool product, although it could deserve a little love in terms of UX, especially in the app which has this very critical bug that still hasn't been resolved since the last app update 3 months ago.

Edit: I updated my rating to 5 stars. The tones are amazing, it's really comfortable, and I even sold my yamaha THR 10IIW
this is simply awesome and highly recommended !

I had a nice and easy experience with Boss Katana 50 Mk ii so soundwise had a smooth transition with these bad boys. I needed to sell my 50 mk ii and shortly after that, I moved into an old and small apartment so that's the time I decided to pull the trigger and buy the Waza air.

A great investment for sure. Busting your axe without hurting your loved ones' ears is a huge plus.

One minor downer, which I couldn't find as a reason to lower any star for that, is the battery life. Not a deal breaker, I barely recall any time that I left without any juice to power up the headphones when I'm in the zone and riffing/exercising. Still, something to be mindful of. You better put it on the plug every time you finish playing though.

I'd blindfoldly recommend the Waza Air to anyone living in close quarters or needing to practice without noise complaints. They're particularly ideal for late night musicians or those who share their living space with others.

Important update after 2.5 years of heavy use:
I’m still using the unit, but this part is more about Thomann’s excellent customer service. The Bluetooth module on my Waza Air failed. The headphones still worked, but it became impossible to connect them to the Boss Waza Studio app. I reached out to other users on Reddit and couldn’t get any solid answers — most of them just kept using the unit in its broken state.

What I noticed is that this unit has very strong noise reduction. If your guitar is near your PC tower, it can create a terrible magnetic field and noise, which stresses the unit (I ran into this when testing with the Tonex). Boss support usually gives unhelpful tips like “don’t use it near a wireless router” or “keep away from your modem”, which only highlights the phantom menace of this product and still doesn’t solve any real issue.

It’s frustrating, but worth keeping in mind: if you’re relying on Boss’ 1-year warranty, you may have to accept using the product as-is without a proper BT module replacement. I couldn’t even get a cost estimate for a module swap. Luckily, Thomann stepped in and sent me a brand-new unit. So yes, I’m happily but also cautiously still using this product, lol.

Bearing all this in mind, I lowered the quality score to 3 stars. (Btw i rarely have connectivity issues but for this price tag there should’nt be any) I would have lowered the overall score by one star, but this product really makes me play more, day and night. So value wise it’s still a bit of a ‘bomb’ in the best way, though I know that might blow up differently for some :)