Sennheiser HD 800
Sennheiser’s big open flagship — an enormous stage and unflinching detail, with a treble character that rewards good sources.
Our take
The HD 800 is about space and resolution: a huge, precise soundstage and treble that surfaces everything, including a well-known peak up top. Good recordings soar; harsh ones get exposed. EQ tames the peak cleanly — Attune shows you exactly where it sits.
Measured by Jamey Warren on a Head Acoustics HMS II.3 artificial head — raw response, left/right averaged, normalized to 0 dB at 1 kHz. From the Sonic Temple Archive(2008–2014, one unit per model). Honest limits: seating variance runs ±0.4 dB in the mids to ±3.9 dB above 12 kHz, and open headphones read bass-light on this fixture — don’t read fine treble detail as settled. How we measure →
Common questions
Straight answers — the same ones our measurements support.
Does the HD 800 need an amp?
It scales with a good one. At 300 Ω and highly revealing, it wants a clean, capable source to sound its best — more than the 600 or 650 do.
Is the HD 800 bright or harsh?
Detailed, with a treble peak that can read as bright on some tracks. A few dB of EQ around the peak keeps the detail and drops the edge.
HD 800 vs HD 800 S?
The S softens that treble peak slightly out of the box. On the graph the difference is small and exactly where you would expect it.
If you like the HD 800
Close on the graph, or a deliberate step in one direction.