Focal Utopia Review
This is my review of the Focal Utopia. Special thanks to Headphones.com in offering a loaner for extended evaluation. The Utopia was provided only on the condition that I submit my impressions or a review to their website. The views expressed below are my own alone and follow from direct experience with all products listed.
Personal focus with audio
I pay more attention to music than audio equipment. My hardware purchases follow a quest for: (1) neutral, high quality reproduction, and (2) low fatigue over long listening sessions. I’m treble sensitive and many products result in hiss, piercing pain, or growing discomfort over time. Some headphones or IEMs result in hiss or pain within seconds – these usually have jagged, random, or excessive treble.
I will seriously consider buying any product that improves sound quality and/or minimizes fatigue. However, I direct my spending elsewhere when my needs are met. At this point I heavily use the Focal Clear, but regularly use the Sennheiser HD-600 too. To my ears the Clear is very close to neutral on most amplifiers with a faint and pleasant gleam (e.g., metallic drivers). To my ears the HD-600 is smooth, slick, and close to neutral on an appropriate amp – but bright, harsh, and thin with limited bass on a weak amp or the wrong amp.
My buying and listening preferences:
- Neutral to barely warm tone – warm headphones don’t pair well with warm tracks.
- Narrow or standard soundstage – if a headphone starts wide it can never be narrow, nor does a wide stage match space-enhanced tracks (e.g., Beatles and Beach Boys stereo mixes, etc.).
- I easily hear differences between single-ended and balanced amps with many dynamic driver headphones. The same set of headphones literally transform from causing heavy hiss and rapid fatigue (i.e., ear pain), to becoming clean and pleasant with a balanced setup. Furthermore, a balanced setup usually reduces my perception of brightness and improves treble clarity. I hear no significant changes to planar headphones with balanced amps.
- I prioritize utility and function over style or luxury hardware.
Focal Utopia: Findings
Children, please eat my candy. My candy is so sweet. You’ll love my candy.
Introduction
The main strength of the Utopia is that it does everything it’s asked to do.
The main weakness of the Utopia is that it does everything it’s asked to do.
The Focal Utopia is a $4,000 headphone and considered by some to be the best on the market. As the Utopia has been available for quite a while, other reviews already provide photos, detail what’s in the box, and explain its fit, comfort, pads, etc. The present review doesn’t repeat such information.
This review compares my impressions of the Utopia to several lower priced neutral headphones. I was eager to evaluate it, as I already own the Focal Clear ($1,500) and Elex ($700), plus the Sennheiser HD-600 ($400). This loaner an opportunity to conduct A-B-C-D tests, and also see what one gets for the money in the Focal open-backed lineup. My primary considerations were technical performance and fatigue over long sessions. The evaluation process included my 50-track fatigue ramp-up playlist. It starts easy and ends with my 100% tinnitus-inducing tracks.
Out of box disappointment: The Utopia ships with two of Focal’s typical headphone cables, and they aren’t very good. These include a short 3.5mm single-ended cable with 1/4” adapter, and a very long XLR-4 balanced cable. Unfortunately, the wire portions appear to be identical to the Elex and Clear. They are very stiff and do not relax over time. To make matters worse, the Utopia uses a different cable connector so I was unable to swap them for my comfortable aftermarket cable. Finally, both of the Utopia’s connectors have red dots – these indicate snap-in orientation rather than left vs. right. Tiny “L” and “R” markings are present on the rubber cuffs, but hard to spot or read. Buyers will either need to live with the factory cables or perhaps spend hundreds of dollars for aftermarket cables.
Audio Quality, Presentation, Details, and Tone
The Utopia is technically superb. The depth, detail, and precision of the bass outclasses anything I own. It outclasses my beloved Clear on most every point. It reaches the highest highs and lowest lows with full control and ease. Effortless. Small effects, such as cymbals and percussion, are incredibly well localized and articulated. Panning moves smoothly and with clarity from point to point, while the volume ramps-up or fades away in the same nuanced fashion. These refined transitions result in a roundness, buttery feel, and fullness that most other headphones lack, and it delivers an experience they can never generate. Try for yourself to understand.
The Utopia has a neutral to bright tone profile. The bass and midrange sound natural and transparent to my ears. It can deliver neutral treble with mild sources, but is often quite bright. The drivers have (1) full frequency extension from deep bass to high highs, and (2) high sensitivity to any treble in the source. Full range extension isn’t brightness per se, but causes a lot of high notes hit the ear in a sensitive frequency range. The Utopia’s genuine brightness follows from drivers that reproduce treble more efficiently than most other headphones. Even the smallest input will be heard.
I perceive a slight metallic tone with the Utopia and other Focal products. Metal drivers avoid the fuzzy, flexing, dampened lack of precision present with the HD-600, but the trade-off is an elevated treble response. I’ve concluded that music can be calibrated for paper, plastic, planar, non-metallic drivers or metal drivers – but likely not calibrated for all driver technologies at once. Most music was seemingly produced and mastered for less-bright (not Utopia or Elex) transducers.
Utopia Defining Characteristic #1: Subtle Differences in Volume. The Clear delivers perhaps 80% of what the Utopia can do in distinguishing between source volume differences. Following my testing, subtle differences in volume underlie much of what is perceived as “details,” “nuance,” or “resolution” in reproduction. Both the Clear and Utopia present the large majority of what was recorded, but even cheap headphones do this too. Transducers with less nuanced volume control present a flat image of the source: details are either heard or not heard. If a detail is slightly softer than other elements it’ll end up buried under other sounds. You simply don’t know how much you are missing until you compare against the Utopia. But, after hearing content on the Utopia (or often the Clear) one can later spot subtle differences that were previously overlooked. The Elex and Utopia both have more intensity than the Clear. However, the Elex has nowhere near the nuanced control of the Clear or Utopia. If you want intensity, get the Elex or Utopia. If you want nuance get the Clear or Utopia. If you want (an often overwhelming) combination of intensity and nuance get the Utopia.
Utopia Defining Characteristic #2: Bass Definition and Extension. The Utopia’s bass outclasses the already good Clear by a wide margin, and outclasses both the Elex and HD-600. It extends deeper, has more authority, and provides high precision to location, shape, attack, and decay. It’s the polar opposite of one-note bass or rubbery bass. However, I’m not a bass-head nor is bass a priority – most of my musical content is in the mid range. The Utopia demonstrates what is possible.
Utopia Defining Characteristic #3: Extremely Responsive Treble. Treble is the Utopia’s doubled-edged sword, and the reason to fully understand your goals and taste before buying. With flat, controlled, smooth, filtered sources the Utopia presents pleasing reverberations, gloss, or a holographic three-dimensional presence. It’s not always bright, and does remain neutral with some content. However, any music with less-than-perfect or harsh treble tends to glare, become excessively bright, or result in piercing pain.
To my ears, most headphones can’t reproduce extreme highs with precision. In owning the HD-600 as well as the Elex and Clear, the highs are handled quite differently. The HD-600 generates gobs of shrill hissy noise on many single-ended amps, while the Elex generates piercing and peaky frequency bands akin to a trumpet. Only the Clear controls the highs and ‘fails’ in the direction of comfort. It combines strong details (Utopia Jr.) and environmental distinctions (e.g., air, room) with minimal fatigue. The Clear seems to convert ‘issue’ treble into general grain and background haze. Music will be heard with reduced dynamics and resolution, and with an elevated sense of ‘wind’ in the recording room. This is a very good thing for minimizing fatigue. I can listen for hours and walk away refreshed. Not so with the Utopia. In sharp contrast, it extends the treble to the highest highs and retains a very black background. So, poor quality or flawed productions result in piercing and harsh treble. There’s minimal grain and grayness, but boy oh boy you will hear every little high-frequency excess or mistake with the Utopia.
An underlying issue with highly technical playback hardware (i.e., the Utopia, and Clear to a lesser degree) is that most studio production uses speakers and less resolving, less extended, less dynamic, and less precise hardware. If the creators and production engineers could not hear the potential flaws, then users with more technical equipment are subject to unknown and never-heard production issues. Many recordings were made at the Sennheiser HD-600 or HD-650 level [or they literally used the HD-600 for critical mastering decisions]. So, the Utopia’s technical excellence creates endless and constant vulnerabilities to random glare, harshness, and piercing pain. Unless production shifts to Utopia-class hardware this danger seems bound to persist for the foreseeable future.
The Utopia led to unexpectedly harsh results with mild sources on my balanced setups (all played through Amazon HD). Before trying the Utopia I considered all of these to be very easy on the ears.
Good to my ears on the Utopia:
- Lorde Pure Heroine – great delivery, with full richness and clarity
Treble issues or fatigue with the Utopia but fine on the Clear:
- Norah Jones Come Away With Me – simple vocal peaks became shrill
- Vampire Weekend Father of the Bride – glares and stabs my ears
- Lana Del Rey Born to Die – even mainstream pop turns into glaring vocals
- Vance Joy Dream Your Life Away – harsh glare from his tenor voice and ukulele
- Tool Fear Inoculum – portions are piercing, have glare, or cause instant hiss/fatigue
During testing I repeatedly said to myself “This hurts. I want to stop listening now.” If I didn’t stop I ended up with a headache and hissing ears – much like the HD-600 on a bad amp. I tried to listen to the Utopia at my normal volume (70 to 75 dB), but ended up turning it lower to control the glare and minimize the random piercing blasts.
Not a Defining Characteristic for Me: Staging. I personally do not focus on staging with headphones. Most enthusiast-oriented headphones are acceptable. There’s only so much one can do with a standard headphone design, and all the Focal products improve staging beyond the HD-600. The Utopia delivers neutral staging and that’s exactly what I want.
Controlling treble with amplifier pairings and equalization
Crank it down!
The Utopia is prone to delivering too much treble. For me, very clean balanced solid state amps (e.g., Drop THX AAA 789) result in narrow piercing tones and mid-high glare with voices, while less resolving solid state amps (e.g., Schiit Magni 3+) result in unfocused hiss and broadly excessive brightness. Neither option is pleasant, nor can either be endured over long listening sessions. Therefore, either equalization or tubes would be essential for regular or heavy use of the Utopia.
I experimented with tube hybrid amps (e.g., Loxjie P20) and an equalizer (Schiit Loki) to soften the treble. This works, but it’s tricky to find a balance between preserving the Utopia’s technical advantages without over-smoothing the output. With too much processing the presentation resembles the Clear or Elex, while only the bass remains superior in all configurations. If one cannot use or enjoy the Utopia’s high frequencies why spend $4,000 instead of $1,500 on the more forgiving and mid-focused Clear?
Who should buy the Utopia?
Take care to avoid the needles in the butter
I see the Utopia as appealing to three types of buyers. Its high price suggests that Focal intends the product for dedicated and knowledgable users. The profiles include:
- Hobbyists who want to maximize dynamics and definition with (1) too flat, too gentle, dead, or very calm music, or (2) those who want to experiment with amps and DACs to find a way to control the treble needles and luxuriate in the Utopia’s buttery greatness. To my ears the Utopia is always a double-edged sword or akin to sleeping with a tiger in your bedroom. A tiger may be a good ‘watch cat’ to keep the burglars away, but may also eat you for breakfast.
- Studio engineers who need to hear potential flaws during production or mastering. Many albums likely sounded fine on the original studio equipment (e.g., 20, 40, 50 years ago), but not so good on recent and highly technical playback systems (beyond Focal’s products). If music sounds good on the Utopia then the treble likely won’t be harsh on other enthusiast equipment, and its brightness helps to detect other production flaws.
- Music enthusiasts who are either not treble-sensitive at all, or who suffer from hearing loss. The Utopia’s nuances are very enticing except for the energetic treble. So, it could be a perfect out-of-box solution for some people.
Average hobbyists with a big budget may pick the Utopia over the Clear based on price as the “better” product – that could be a serious mistake. For me the Utopia was unpleasant with all imperfect, energetic, or bright music. It shocked me by adding glare and harshness to even extremely mild vocals. Try before you buy. After the Utopia demo I returned to my Clear and routine listening habits. For the first few hours I noticed the Clear’s grain and relatively inferior bass. However, my ears recalibrated and it remains fully satisfying. I still want to use the Clear all day, but I don’t want to use the Utopia very much or in the same way.
Comparison Table: Neutral Headphones by Price, Performance, and Use
| Category | Focal Utopia | Focal Clear | Focal Elex | Sennheiser HD-600 | Dan Clark AEON Flow Closed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Retail Price (MSRP) | $4,000.00 | $1,500.00 | $700.00 | $400.00 | (Discontinued) AEON RT is $500 |
| Experience Summary | Effortless – does everything it is asked to do. Full range, strong dynamics, subtle details, fine control over most aspects of the sound. Slightly glossy and resonant with complimentary sources; too much glare and harshness with many sources. | Details and definition, under control and smooth with most setups. Without hearing the Utopia it sounds fantastic, but does not offer “as much” technically. It still outperforms most studio equipment and music sources. | Clean and strongly dynamic, but often piercing. Very bright on a noisy single-ended amp. Random and uncontrolled content is channeled into exaggerated treble bands. Tone resembles a trumpet. | Accurate reproduction, but with limits to its range, speed, and dynamics. The drivers are plastic and indeed sound like plastic. On a clean balanced amp it becomes smooth and slick. | Closed, sealed cups provide the sensation of listening in a black hole. Accurate to the limits of the driver technology, but not very dynamic or precise. Diffuse. |
| Frequency Range (Useful performance) | (5/5) Deep bass to very bright | (4/5) Good bass to reasonably bright | (4/5) Good bass to very bright | (3/5) Okay bass to very bright | (3/5) Okay bass to pleasant highs |
| Dynamic Character | (5/5) Many perceptual steps between loudest and softest elements. Rounded and nuanced. Sounds emerge, peak, and decay in perfect order – more perfect order than the creators heard. The loudest content is punchy and intense. | (4/5) Many perceptual steps between the loudest and softest elements. The loudest content is typically smooth and comfortable, but can be edgy and unpleasant on some amps. More atmospheric and less punchy than Utopia or Elex. | (3/5) Three exaggerated perceptual steps: s-o-f-t, normal, and L-O-U-D. Has the Utopia’s tuning and tone without its nuances. Sometimes separates instruments from others by volume. | (2/5) Two perceptual steps only: louder or softer – results in a smooth slickness and relaxing listening. In my experience two steps exceeds the potential of most consumer-grade headphones. | (2/5) One to two perceptual steps given the limited potential of the folded planar drivers. Flatness is desirable in closed headphones as dynamics leads to rapid fatigue. |
| Clarity and Precision | (5/5) Beyond the technical capabilities of most sources; extreme accuracy clearly reveals panning and volume changes; clearly distinguishes between elements (e.g., cymbals and percussion occupy their own spaces). | (4/5) Beyond the technical capabilities of most sources; technically able to distinguish between intended recorded content (e.g., voice or instruments) and the room, air, or unintended artifacts. | (3/5) Clean tones and notes, but treble and dynamic exaggerations throw off the balance with some sources. | (3/5) Accurate tone. Slight dampened fuzziness and slickness seems to follow from the random flexing of its plastic drivers. | (3/5) Limited potential of folded planar drivers to reproduce details and nuances; overall presentation is diffuse or dithered. |
| Fatigue: My ears are my guide | (3/5) Average | (5/5) Very low | Worse than average on a single-ended amp (2/5); average (3/5) on a balanced amp | High fatigue, bright, and harsh on a bad single-ended amp (1/5), better than average (4/5) on a clean balanced amp | (2/5) Closed headphones can never be better than fair under any circumstances |
| I want to keep listening | (3/5) Average. Moments of sublime glory interrupted by glare and stabs of pain. | (5/5) Best I own | (2/5) Shudder. Not without EQ or tubes. | (4/5) Relaxing when sorted | (3/5) Pleasant until closed-cup air pressure fatigue begins (1-2 hours) |
| Value | (2/5) Fair | (4/5) Very good | (3/5) Average | (5/5) Excellent | (3/5) Average |
| Amps | Technical potential is a double-edged sword, and it’s ready to stab you in an instant. Often must turn down the treble somehow (EQ or tubes), but it can be tricky to do this without losing nuances and some of its advantages in the process. | Forgiving with less-than-edgy amps (e.g., other than THX), as it tends to convert noise into diffuse grayness rather than piercing treble. Balanced amps are blacker, more dynamic, and minimize the grain/haze vs. single-ended. | Balanced amps help to minimize its piercing shrillness, but any amp may not be enough. May also require EQ to control the treble. | Balanced setup very effective in controlling high-end noise; can work well with many amps; reaches its technical potential with inexpensive amps. | Requires a powerful amp to perform well – otherwise congested and shaky. Thick-toned Magni 3+ helps to smooth its (substantial) technical limitations. No noticeable improvement with balanced amps. |
| Who should buy it? | $5,000+ system budget and an interest in exploring amps, or using it for well-behaved “pleasing” source content. Studio engineers – it reveals even the smallest issues. | $2,000 system budget and an interest in all-around performance. Good for those who listen to harsher source material and want flexible amp options. | $1,000 system budget, into strong dynamics, and not treble sensitive. May improve on some amps (TBD). | $500 system budget and an interest in audio quality and accuracy. Go balanced for a clean top end. Get the HD-6XX to save money or have a warmer tone. | $750 system budget and a need for a stationary (non-mobile) closed headphone. Do not buy unless you NEED closed headphones. |