In 2020, Bose killed their smallest but most appreciated lines, the Sleepbuds. They were a hard sell — paying $250 for earbuds that don’t play music doesn’t make a lot of financial sense — but they were loved by those who used them. They are small, light, comfortable earbuds to be worn whilst you sleep, that play in-device nature sounds or white noise and block out the world around you. Given that so many people listen to AirPods to get to sleep, a pair designed to comfortably sit and stay in your ears through the night has a real appeal.

But ever since Bose killed the Sleepbuds, there hasn’t been a product that fills this niche. Some former Bose employees bought the “Sleepbuds” name and raised $10 million to make them under the new brand “Ozlo“, but early Kickstarter backers are only just receiving their units now, and the website only advertises them as pre-orders.

However, electronics giant Anker has released their own sleep earbuds, the Sleep A20, through their sub brand Soundcore, and not only are they better than the Sleepbuds ever were, they’re also $100 cheaper.

Unlike the Sleepbuds, the Sleep A20 can connect to your phone and play Bluetooth audio through them. Is the audio quality great? No. It’s fine for listening to podcasts late at night, but music quality is pretty mediocre, particularly compared to similarly priced earbuds.

However, these are not designed for ambient music listening, or even use when the sun is up. They are specifically designed for use getting you to sleep, and for that purpose, the Sleep A20 are unmatched.

They are small, soft to the touch, and comfortable in the ear — coming with a range of wing- and ear-tips — but despite their small size, still manage 14 hours battery life, and the charging case adds a further 76 hours to that.

Along with playing podcasts and other audio off your phone, they have a ‘sleep mode.’ With two taps on the earbud, they disconnect from your phone and play nature sounds or white-noise stored on the buds. You can configure this all through the included Soundcore app, which is very easy to use. I chose rain sounds, to last for 2 hours before turning off, and this is now my default for going to bed, at home and when travelling.

The only real problem I found with the buds is that their advertised noise cancelling is extremely underwhelming. I couldn’t tell the difference between their “noise cancelling” and the passive seal of a pair of earbuds without noise cancelling; so I wouldn’t recommend these for a flight.

Even so, I strongly recommend the Sleep A20. They’re comfortable, have great battery life, are easy to configure, and more importantly, have actively helped me sleep. Plus, it’s possible that the noise-cancellation improves with software updates.