How We Research
We compare products from their published specs and features; the verdicts below are our independent editorial opinions.
If you want a do-everything open-ear sport headphone for running, cycling and calls, choose shokz OpenRun Pro; if you need a bone conduction headphone that actually survives underwater swimming, choose Pmjebe Bone Conduction Swimming. That's the short version. The long version is more interesting, because these two products only look like competitors until you read what each one is built to do.
• shokz OpenRun Pro — biggest strength: a lightweight wraparound titanium frame, 9th-generation bone conduction with TurboPitch tuning, and 10 hours of Bluetooth music and calls with a 5-minute quick charge.
• shokz OpenRun Pro — biggest trade-off: it's a Bluetooth headphone with no waterproof swimming rating and no built-in music storage, so it needs a paired phone nearby.
• Pmjebe Bone Conduction Swimming — biggest strength: an IPX8 depth waterproof design with a built-in 8GB MP3 player, so it plays music with no phone and no signal at all.
• Pmjebe Bone Conduction Swimming — biggest trade-off: Bluetooth doesn't work underwater, so you're locked into MP3 mode in the pool, and it's the heavier of the two at 50 g versus 29 g.
• Who each pick is for: the shokz OpenRun Pro for land training and everyday listening; the Pmjebe for lap swimming and other wet sports.
The OpenRun Pro is the more polished everyday product of the two. It's an open-ear bone conduction headphone built around a lightweight titanium wraparound frame — 29 g in total — that's designed to stay put during intense training instead of bouncing around. The driver is a bone conduction type covering a 20Hz–20,000Hz frequency range, and Shokz pairs it with its 9th bone conduction technology and TurboPitch tuning for what the spec sheet describes as clear sound with powerful volume and rich bass. There's a volume control on the headset itself, and the package includes a cable, a headphone bag, a user manual and a warranty card.
The core idea is awareness. Because nothing goes inside your ear, you hear traffic, other runners, gym announcements and your own surroundings while your audio plays through your cheekbones. If you train on roads, in busy parks or on a bike, that's the whole point — and it's the reason I'd steer most runners and cyclists here rather than toward sealed earbuds.
Battery is the other headline: 10 hours of continuous music, calls and podcasts, plus a 5-minute quick charge that gets you up to 1.5 hours of playback. Charging from empty takes about an hour. Bluetooth handles the connection, and there's no headphone jack at all.
Who should skip it? Anyone whose main sport is swimming. There's no IPX8 or depth waterproof rating in the specs here, and no built-in memory for music. This is a land-and-sweat headphone, not a pool headphone. Note too that this is the renewed version, which carries a 90-day limited warranty — worth knowing before you commit.
The Pmjebe S3 is a different animal entirely, and its spec sheet is refreshingly blunt about why. It's a bone conduction headphone with a built-in MP3 player and 8GB of storage — roughly enough for a couple of thousand songs — and it supports MP3, WAV, FLAC and WMA files. You load music by plugging it into a PC or Mac and dragging and dropping, or copying and pasting. No app, no account, no subscription.
The critical detail is the water. Pmjebe states plainly that Bluetooth signal is isolated in water, so when you swim, the headphone can only play in built-in MP3 mode. That's not a flaw in this product specifically — it's physics. Radio signals don't travel well through water, which is exactly why a built-in player is the right answer for a pool. If you want music while doing laps, this is the architecture that works.
It carries an IPX8 professional depth waterproof rating, which makes it suitable for swimmers, diving, surfing and skiing, and it can be worn alongside a swim cap and goggles. The bone conduction driver here is a 13.8mm horn vibrator, which Pmjebe says delivers clear sound on and off the water. Controls are three large tactile buttons designed to be pressed mid-stroke, plus an onboard shuffle mode so you can refresh your playlist without touching a phone. Battery life is listed at 8 hours, and the whole thing weighs 50 g.
One genuinely useful tip from the spec sheet: bone conduction lets you hear your surroundings, but if the pool is loud, plugging your ears with earplugs improves the sound. That's a small thing that makes a big difference to how these feel in a noisy indoor pool.
Who should skip it? If you mostly want headphones for running with your phone in your pocket, streaming Spotify and taking calls, this isn't the tool. It's an MP3-first, water-first device.
Side-by-Side: Which Should You Choose?
• Best for swimming → Pmjebe Bone Conduction Swimming. IPX8 depth waterproofing and a built-in 8GB player are the only combination that works underwater.
• Best for battery life → shokz OpenRun Pro at 10 hours versus 8 hours, plus a 5-minute quick charge worth up to 1.5 hours.
• Best for taking calls → shokz OpenRun Pro. It's a Bluetooth headset with a remote volume control; the Pmjebe can't hold a Bluetooth signal in water.
• Best for leaving your phone behind → Pmjebe. 8GB of onboard storage and drag-and-drop file transfer mean no phone needed at all.
• Best for multi-sport wet use → Pmjebe. Swimming, diving, surfing and skiing are all named as intended uses.
• Best for lighter wear → shokz OpenRun Pro at 29 g versus 50 g — a real difference over a long run.
• Best for lossless file formats → Pmjebe, which supports FLAC, WAV, WMA and MP3.
In my opinion these aren't really rivals — they're two answers to two different questions. If your training happens on pavement, trails or a bike, I'd buy the shokz OpenRun Pro: the lighter frame, longer battery, quick charge and Bluetooth calling make it the better daily headphone, and the renewed warranty is a trade-off I'd accept. If your training happens in a pool, I'd buy the Pmjebe Bone Conduction Swimming without hesitation, because bone conduction plus a built-in MP3 player is the only design that actually functions underwater. Buy the one that matches where you sweat.
how to bone conduction headphones work
A bone conduction headphone skips your eardrum and sends vibration through your cheekbones straight to the cochlea, the sound-sensing part of your inner ear. That's why both of these sit outside your ear canal — the shokz OpenRun Pro delivers audio through the cheekbone, and the Pmjebe S3 transmits through the cheekbones to the cochlea. Because your ear canal stays open, you keep hearing the world around you.
how to wear bone conduction headphones
You hang them on your head so the transducers rest against your cheekbones just in front of your ears, not inside them. The shokz OpenRun Pro uses a lightweight wraparound titanium frame that holds itself in place, while the Pmjebe S3 is described as a back-mounted, hanging, open-back design that sits close to the pinna. The Pmjebe can be worn together with a swim cap and goggles.
how to use bone conduction headphones
For the shokz OpenRun Pro, pair over Bluetooth, then use the on-headset volume control for music, calls and podcasts. For the Pmjebe S3, plug it into a PC or Mac and drag and drop your MP3, WAV, FLAC or WMA files into its 8GB of storage, then switch to MP3 mode before you get in the water — Bluetooth won't hold a signal underwater. Three large buttons and a shuffle mode let you change tracks mid-stroke.
how to bone conduction headphones for swimming
Pick a model with a genuine depth waterproof rating and onboard storage, because Bluetooth can't travel through water. The Pmjebe S3 carries an IPX8 rating and a built-in 8GB MP3 player for exactly this reason, and Pmjebe notes that earplugs improve the sound when your surroundings are noisy. The shokz OpenRun Pro has no such waterproof rating and no built-in memory, so I wouldn't take it into the pool.
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