Bose has bought Skullcandy, the Utah earbud brand best known in skateparks and on ski slopes. Bose announced the deal itself and didn't say what it paid.
Skullcandy keeps its name and runs as its own unit out of Park City, Utah, where its team already works. Its products will stay well below Bose prices, per Android Headlines, so a pair of Skullcandy earbuds won't suddenly cost what a pair of Bose ones does.
Under a licensing deal called Sound by Bose that started last year, Skullcandy was already putting Bose spatial audio and active noise cancelling into its own gear. That includes the Method 360 ANC earbuds and the Crusher 1080 ANC headphones. WIRED's testers found the Bose tuning gave Skullcandy's cheaper hardware a big lift in sound without pushing the price up. Now the company that supplied that tuning owns the brand.
Bose made its name with noise-cancelling headphones for business travelers, while Skullcandy grew up around board sports and street culture. Bose CEO Lila Snyder told WIRED that Skullcandy gives Bose a direct line to people its own gear misses: younger listeners who'd never spend $400 on a pair of travel headphones. Skullcandy CEO Brian Garofalow called the deal a win for fans, saying Bose engineering paired with Skullcandy's board sports roots will make budget gear sound better.
It's Bose's latest purchase in a busy few years. In 2024 it bought McIntosh and Sonus faber, two luxury audio makers, along with the tech firms StreamUnlimited and Firelight Technologies. It has also started a content studio, Bose Studios, and its own record label. McIntosh sits at the top of that range. Skullcandy now sits at the bottom.
If you own Skullcandy earbuds, nothing changes today, and the Method 360 ANC and Crusher 1080 ANC already carry Bose noise cancelling. For anyone shopping, the Skullcandy models with the Sound by Bose label are the way to get Bose noise cancelling without paying Bose prices, and that is now a Bose product line in its own right.