News

French Headphone specialist Focal has redesigned and upgraded its Utopia over-ears, originally launched back in 2016. The design of the new model takes the aesthetics of Focal’s latest open-back (Clear Mg) and closed-back (Stellia and Celestee, HFC 452 and 475 respectively) headphones, including the signatory honeycomb grille on both the outside and inside of the earcups.

In addition to its distinctive Black Chrome rings – which are now attached from the inside for a cleaner appearance – these headphones introduce new design codes, which will also be used on Focal’s future Utopia products. Among them, there’s a Yin & Yang featured on the outer case to symbolise the company’s professed aim of achieving the:“perfect balance between design and technology.” Additionally, there’s a new voice coil made from copper to improve reliability, and aluminium, to make it more lightweight.

Focal explains: “this alloy provides a rejuvenated sound signature that lends even greater neutrality, with powerful bass and more mellow treble. What’s more, the grilles inside the earcups are now M-shaped, following the curves of the speaker drivers, to give improved linearity and even more precision.”

The new Utopia headphones still include the previous model’s full-range speaker drivers with pure Beryllium, ‘M’-shaped dome and fully open-backed design. Focal says the patented speaker drivers run with zero active or passive correction, from 5Hz to over 50kHz. The new yoke is made from forged, recycled carbon, the headband from leather and the earcups from perforated memory foam bound in leather.

The new Utopia has a black fabric thermoformed carrying case and two hi-fidelity cables (3m and 1.5m) for using at home with an amplifier or on the go with Lemo connectors and a jack adapter.

Available to buy now for £4,700, we'll be reviewing the Utopia 2022 in our January 2023 issue and you can find out more about it here .