HIFIMAN Arya Stealth Review: Can You Resist Loving It?

Audiophile headphones involve preferences. Some of them are detailed, some are wide, some dynamic, deep, or extend well. The Arya Stealth has it all for just $759.

Build Quality and Comfort

It’s built to be lightweight, not premium. That’s probably why you don’t immediately feel that it’s a premium product when you pick it up. On the other hand, it’s the cheapest headphones from HIFIMAN that’s so comfortable.

It features their highest-end headband style, which has a suspension strap design. It allows for full 360-degree cup rotation, tilt, and size adjustment. This, combined with these large earcups, and low weight, makes it extremely comfortable, even for extended listening sessions.

This headband, unlike lower-end ones, is a bit different. Besides allowing for swivel, it also has a different shape, making its clamp force more evenly spread. But it looks kind of silly when you wear it. When it’s on a headphone stand it looks very nice, all blacked out for a stealthy (pun intended) look. One more difference between this headband and the cheaper ones is that it’s also padded on the side that touches your head. There’s a thin layer of soft foam that helps to even out the pressure just a little more. It’s not clamping super hard - it’s more in the lower medium territory, I’d say.

The pads are, of course, huge - good luck finding a headphone with larger pads than these. They’re also a hybrid of 3 materials, which is a thing HIFIMAN likes to do.

The only thing I’m not a fan of is one small aspect of its appearance, namely the earcups material and color. It’s not a true black - more like a gunmetal color, which upon closer inspection looks a bit cheap, but does its job just fine.

For the connectors, they are regular 3.5mm jacks - one on each earcup, which allows for a balancedA signal transmission method using two opposite-polarity signal lines plus a ground; noise induced on both lines is cancelled at the differential input. connection with an aftermarket cable, or single-endedAn amplifier configuration using one output device for the complete audio waveform; produces even-order harmonic distortion considered "euphonic" by many. with the included one. HIFIMAN is known for its ergonomically problematic cable. They used to offer the copper-colored ones with the conductors sitting freely inside a long time ago, which I have to say were quite terrible. Then they switched to something very simple - just regular, black, rubberized cables. That was nothing special but solved most of the issues with the previous version.

The cable we’re getting in a box now is yet another improvement. It has a material braiding over it, making it feel much nicer and more premium while adding a bit to the ergonomics, as the cable doesn’t have as much memory. The connectors are generally decent, but the 1/4-inch plug has a huge strain relief.

Technologies

All sorts of trickle-down goodies can be found here. Starting from the Window Shade Grills, that offer special geometry made to decrease reflections, which are detrimental to optimal sound quality. Luckily enough, they’re blacked out, unlike the Anandas or the Edition XS.

Then, as the name suggests, we have Stealth MagnetsHIFIMAN's asymmetric magnet geometry on their planar magnetic drivers, designed to present a more acoustically transparent surface to the diaphragm and reduce wave reflections that would otherwise distort the response.. It’s the first iteration of Arya with this tech. It allows the sound waves to pass through them without generating any sort of interference, to create an acoustically transparent design.

Lastly, it’s equipped with a nanometer-thickness diaphragmThe vibrating membrane in a transducer that converts between electrical energy and acoustic waves; its mass, stiffness, and damping determine driver character. for fast transient responseHow accurately and quickly a system reproduces the onset and decay of sounds; slow transient response produces a "veiled" or "smeared" character., more details, and lower distortion. All that, in theory, means that HIFIMAN put all of their best stuff in there to make a very good headphone at a price point much lower than a flagship - without cutting down on features just to get you to spend more.

Technical Specifications

Its frequency responseA graph showing output amplitude vs. frequency - the most fundamental measurement of any audio component's tonal character. ranges from 8Hz up to 65kHz. That’s just crazy - this driver is capable of doing pretty much everything it’s asked to do. And it does it quite efficiently, with a sensitivityThe output sound pressure level for a standardized input - typically dBSPL at 1W/1m for speakers, or dBSPL at 1mW or 1V for headphones. of 94dB/mW (not the highest, but quite high for a big planar) and an impedanceThe total opposition (resistance + reactance) a speaker or headphone presents to the driving current, measured in ohms and varying with frequency. of 32 ohms (again, not the lowest, but pretty low for what it is). This combo makes the Arya greatly benefit from a good and powerful amplifier, but you don’t have to go crazy, and it’s not that picky about the amplification quality.

Sound Quality

I expected it to sound a bit bright, like most HIFIMAN’s planars do. However, in reality, it’s very difficult to call it a bright headphone. It’s leaning on the warmer and fuller presentation, in comparison to other headphones from this company. It isn’t soft, recessedA perceived dip in a frequency region (commonly the upper midrange or lower treble) that pulls instruments backward in the soundstage and softens overall presence., or lean in the top end. Likewise, it retains all that, while lacking the typical boost in the treble that a lot of people find fatiguing.

Generally, it is a very tonally balanced sound, with just a slight dip in the upper midrangeThe frequency range from approximately 250Hz to 5kHz where most musical information, vocals, and instrument fundamentals reside. that can be described as starting the ear gainThe combined acoustic gain of the outer ear and ear canal (typically 8-15dB centred near 3kHz). Headphone manufacturers tune frequency response to compensate for the fact that the headphone bypasses some natural ear gain. region about one kilohertz later than the Harman target calls for.

The bass is well extended, down to 20Hz. It’s fast and transparent but doesn’t offer a sense of weight. It’s mostly true to the recording. The vocal presentation is good, yet slightly less weighty than you’d expect.

In terms of the soundstageThe perceived three-dimensional acoustic space in a stereo recording - width beyond the speakers, depth front-to-back, and sometimes height information., I’ve heard that the Stealth Magnets shrink it down quite a bit. At least in the Stealth Magnet edition Arya, it’s not a super wide soundstage, but it can get out of your head easily - simply not too far out. But what it can lack in soundstage, it makes up in the precise imagingThe ability to place individual instruments in precise, stable positions within the soundstage - good imaging means you can "point" to a violin in the mix.. It’s very nice, with lots of places where sounds can be. In most songs, it gives you an impression of being a real 3-dimensional experience. I’d say that if anything, the imaging would be the only real stand-out of this headphone - it’s simply unbeatable.

It also can do large-scale music extraordinarily well. It might not sound that wide, but it does sound big, especially in the vertical sense - it tends to stretch things to a great extent, probably because of the driver’s shape, which is a pretty tall rectangle.

The timbreThe tonal quality of a sound - what makes a violin sound like a violin vs. a trumpet at the same pitch and volume; determined by harmonic content and envelope., while not top-of-the-line level, isn’t annoying. It has just a tint of plasticky nature. Sounds are separated in a way that leaves space in between them. You can easily tell when one instrument ends and another one starts.

Detail retrieval - it’s very inoffensive. You have to try to hear the underlying, hidden elements of the music, but it’s available to you. It doesn’t scream “details” at you like the Ananda Nano or the Sundara. That’s mostly related to the frequency response being tamed down in the top registers. Nevertheless, it’s a fairly resolving headphone - not the most, far from that actually, but it’s not lacking.

This headphone generally gives you a taste of high-end at a price that’s not usually associated with high-end products of this category. It doesn’t have one single thing it shines at - rather it’s a combination of all things that make it a genuinely satisfying package.