【Lily LaBeau Archives】

It might be Lily LaBeau Archivesa little late to the party, but LG now has its own wireless earbuds. They're called Tone Free (the irony seems to be lost on LG), and yes, they're basically a copy of Apple's AirPods.

Given there are dozens of those around — nearly every major phone manufacturer, including Samsung, Huawei and Sony, has launched similar earbuds in the past year or two — it's cool to see LG bringing something new to the table.

The LG Tone Free earbuds are fully wireless earbuds with a portable charging/carrying case, which offers up to 21 hours of total playtime (the buds have a 6-hour battery life on their own). The case charges them pretty fast — LG says you'll get one hour of playtime from a five-minute charge.

Voice assistants are supported, with a choice of Google Assistant or Google Now on Android, and Siri on iOS.

The sound has been tuned together with hi-fi company Meridian Audio, though it's hard to tell how good these sound without testing them. On the input side, the Tone Free buds come with noise-reducing microphones.

LG Tone Free earbuds are water resistant up to IPX4 specifications — not good enough for swimming, but it's comforting to know that a few raindrops probably won't kill them.

All of this is standard fare in the world of wireless earbuds, but LG Tone Free earbuds do have one distinguishing feature: They kill bacteria. Their UVnano charging case does that via UV rays when the buds are charging, and LG says independent testing has shown the UV LED built into the case "reduces Staphylococcus aureus and Escherichia coli bacteria on tip of the earbud closest to the ear canal." Neat, I guess.

LG Tone Free are available on LG's website and with authorized dealers for $200.