BlueParrott specializes in Bluetooth headsets that need to work in busy, loud environments, and the M300-XT is made for people frequently on the go. Its single lightweight earpiece fits comfortably and securely, and its unassuming boom mic stays out of the way. Best of all, at $99.99, it's priced lower than many of the pro-grade Bluetooth headsets we test. The only potential stumbling block is that, while weather resistant, the headset isn't fully waterproof, which may or may not be necessary for the type of work you do. Otherwise, the M300-XT nails the balance between performance and affordability.Small and Comfortable Weighing in at just 0.7 ounces, the 4.4-by-2.4-by-1.0-inch M300-XT (HWD) has a secure fit that doesn’t weigh your ear down even during daylong use. Its black, over-ear hook design has a built-in boom mic that swivels not only toward or away from your mouth, but also rotates at the base so that the earpiece can be worn on either ear. There’s a flexible portion of the earpiece that sits just over the top of your ear—the fit might be a little tricky at first for those who wear glasses, especially if those glasses have chunky frames with thicker temples, as the temples will be sharing real estate with the somewhat bulky back end of the earpiece. This isn’t a deal breaker, you just have to fiddle with the fit early on to get things secure, and this is more or less par for the course in the realm of monaural Bluetooth headsets.The M300-XT ships with three ear gels in small, medium, and large sizes. It’s important to try the various ear gel sizes and get the best possible in-ear seal—the medium gel is the default option and should fit most users well. Aside from the gels, the headset ships with a USB-C-to-USB-A charging cable of generous length, which connects to an uncovered USB-C port at the back end of the ear hook portion of the headset. We were able to get a secure fit, but it’s worth noting that the shape of the eartips isn't that of typical in-canal eartips. As a result, your ear canal doesn’t necessarily get sealed off in the same way, and this can create scenarios that, despite the actual fit being secure, can feel somewhat open at the ear canal. It’s possible to fiddle with the fit and get a tighter seal, but we’d have preferred a more traditional eartip with a simple in-canal seal. Because the end of the eartip widens rather than narrows, it doesn’t actually enter the edge of the canal and seal it off; it instead sits outside the canal and sort of blocks it a little. Perhaps the goal here is to keep a semi-open feel, allowing you to still hear a bit of your surroundings, but you already have that with your open ear. I’m sure a compelling argument can be made for the almost-open eartip design, but it can at times make it harder to hear what’s coming through the earpiece, depending on surrounding noise levels and what you're listening to on the other end.The headset carries an IP54 durability rating. This means that, on scale of 1 to 6, it has a dust ingress protection rating of 5, which is quite good, and on a scale of 1 to 8, it has a liquid ingress protection level rating of 4, which is fairly modest. It means the headset can withstand light splashes or misting, but don’t rinse it off under a faucet, submerge it, or wear it in heavy rain. Along the headset’s back end, there are three buttons for power, volume up, and volume down. The power button also answers or ends calls, and summons your phone's voice assistant when held down. The plus/minus buttons control volume. You can stream audio to the earpiece, but there’s no track navigation function for skipping forward or backward, and obviously, any musical audio experience is going to be fairly limited by the single-ear design.There’s also a multifunction Parrott button, which requires configuration in the BlueParrott app for Android and iOS. As of this writing, the app hasn't been fully updated to reflect the recent relase of the M300-XT; it was able to recognize the M300-XT, but not unlock all of its potential. Once the headset is fully supported, you can use the app to assign various functions to the Parrott button—for instance, it can trigger a third-party push-to-talk app, such as Verizon Push to Talk Plus, AT&T Enhanced PTT, ESChat (Push-to-Talk), or PoC PTT Profile. The button can also trigger voice memos, speed dialing, or be used to mute audio. All of these functions, and assorted other options, are assigned in the app.The M300-XT supports Bluetooth 5.1 and the SBC codec. Internally, the headset houses a 10.3mm driver delivering a frequency range of 20Hz to 20kHz and an impedance of 32 ohms.BlueParrott estimates battery life to be roughly 14 hours, but your results will vary slightly with your volume levels.Clear Calls From AnywhereThe M300-XT employs two MEMS microphones and background noise redction to deliver audio emphasizing your voice. This style of microphone isn't necessarily focused on the same type of clarity that a broadcast or recording studio microphone is after—instead it zeroes in on the human voice and rejects frequency ranges that interfere with intelligibility. Thus, when there’s no noise to contend with, you don’t necessarily get what amounts to a pristine signal; it can sound a little bit like a walkie-talkie signal, but with much better intelligibility. When you finish speaking, and in between words, the signal often sounds like it drops out completely, even when there’s no background noise to contend with. This can be disconcerting at first, but it’s unlikely you'll ever misunderstand a word spoken through this mic.When we tested the mic's intelligibility against a bed of loud music playing through near-field monitors, it performed well in the sense that we could always understand every word we recorded for reference. Obviously, this kind of stress test is intended to expose the headset’s weaknesses, so if you’re in a scenario that is as loud as rock music blaring from speakers just a few feet away, the result will sound something like the music getting squashed and reduced to a thin static, while your voice also gets a little squashed, but is the only intelligible part of the signal the mic picks up. In this type of situation, there’s always going to be some distortion, but again, we could understand every word that was spoken, even if the audio was less than pristine. In a more typical scenario, with the volume lower, your speaking voice comes through far more clearly. When your voice switches from calm, measured tones to nearly yelling, the mic doesn’t seem to change in terms of intelligibility—the background audio is still squashed, and your voice is still transmitted with the same clarity. Switching from music to a TV commercial in the background with lots of voiceover speaking to contend with, the mic still did an excellent job of picking up my voice and separating it from the other voice in the background. With low-frequency rumble (somewhat similar to what you’d hear inside an airplane) playing at high volume through near-field monitors at close range, the M300-XT does some interesting things. Between words, we hear nothing at all, and when I speak, it lets my voice through and the least amount of outside noise it possibly can. Some of the rumble makes it through, which makes me sound a little bit like a cyborg or Kylo Ren, but the words are always intelligible. The same is true with a recording of a busy cafe playing at a high volume, including chatter, laughter, along with plates and utensils clattering and clinging. Ultimately, in all of these high-volume noise tests, every word I spoke was easy to understand. It Gets the Job DoneFor the price, the BlueParrott M300-XT is one of the best affordable Bluetooth headsets we’ve tested in recent memory. For more money, the monaural, over-ear $200 BlueParrott B550-XT is an excellent alternative, while the $280 Sennheiser Presence UC ML is an even smaller single-ear option for noisy scenarios. For $100, however, there’s really very little to complain about here, as the M300-XT really only needs to do one thing well: deliver ideal vocal clarity in loud scenarios. The headset gets the job done, and does so a price that many people will find just right.

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