Sennheiser Momentum 5 Headphones Feature a User-Replaceable Battery Design

The move comes as Sony, Apple, and Bowers & Wilkins have all refreshed their flagship over-ears in the same window, and as Sennheiser's consumer division sits inside Sonova, which is itself exploring a sale. For buyers weighing longevity against the usual sealed-cell lifespan of premium cans, the serviceability signal is the headline.

Battery, endurance, and the right-to-repair angle

Sennheiser rates the Momentum 5 Wireless at up to 57 hours of playback with ANC enabled. Per the WIRED review, that figure sits almost double the Sony WH-1000XM6 and Bowers & Wilkins Px7 S3, three hours short of the older Momentum 4, and 13 hours behind the similarly priced Marshall Monitor III ANC. Real-world use reported over a month of daily wear tracked close to the claim — roughly 50 percent remaining on a single cycle.

The more material data point is repairability. The battery is accessible: the left earpad comes off, four Phillips-head screws are removed, the cover lifts, and the cell unplugs for swap-out. WIRED notes this is the first instance of a major headphone brand actively encouraging end-user battery replacement, rather than routing the job through service centers. At publication, the replacement cell itself is not yet listed for sale, which leaves the feature more of a design commitment than a fully realized aftermarket path — worth tracking.

Audio pipeline, ANC, and control surface

The Momentum 5 Wireless supports SBC, AAC, aptX, aptX HD, aptX Lossless, and aptX Adaptive, alongside multipoint connectivity. Wired input runs through a 3.5 mm jack; the USB-C port accepts digital lossless audio up to 24-bit/96 kHz. The Sennheiser Smart Control Plus app exposes adjustable ANC, transparency, an eight-band EQ, connection preferences, Dolby Atmos, and location-based profiles — for example, maxing ANC at a tagged "office" coordinate. On-device control is touch-only on the right earcup: tap to pause, swipe for volume and track skip, double-tap to toggle ANC and transparency. ANC itself is driven by an eight-microphone array, which WIRED characterizes as good and approaching great.

The buy/skip read

For a buyer cross-shopping the WH-1000XM6, AirPods Max 2, and Px7 S3, the relevant inputs are these: 57-hour rated endurance with ANC, a 10.3-ounce mostly-plastic build, a serviceable battery architecture that currently lacks a purchasable spare, and a codec stack that covers aptX Lossless and wired 24-bit/96 kHz USB. The data favors the Momentum 5 on stamina and on long-term serviceability signaling; it trails on available replacement parts today. That is the split to verify before purchase — the rest of the spec sheet is competitive rather than category-defining.