Our guide to the best headphones DACs brings you devices that are designed to make it easy to massively improve the audio quality you get from devices such as your laptop, tablet or phone.
A DAC (otherwise known as a digital-to-analogue converter) transforms the digital music signal into something analogue that speakers can play. There's a DAC inside your phone and one in your laptop, but if you're looking to extract the best sound from your digital files you'll be amazed what a difference an external DAC can make.
The best headphone DACs are designed to plug straight into your computer or phone, and pump out excellent, amplified sound to the best wired headphones. You can get DACs that are designed for hi-fi systems, too, which require separate amplification – we're only looking at options here that can drive headphones easily, though they could all also connect to a hi-fi too (but they'll need at least a 3.5mm socket).
The best headphone DACs 2023
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The Chord Mojo was a firm favourite of ours, so it's no surprise to see the Chord Mojo 2 in our best DACs guide seven years later. It even picked up the T3 Awards for Best DAC 2022. The sequel picks up where the original left off, delivering a thrilling audio experience with all the connectivity you might want – although while there's USB-C here the actual charging happens via micro-USB. It delivers greater compatibility with wired headphones and will make your laptop or desktop or phone sound spectacular.
As we said in our Chord Mojo 2 review: "It has a sort of casual authority where dynamics are concerned that’s genuinely hair-raising. It can handle even the trickiest rhythms and tempos in an entirely naturalistic manner. It can peer deep into even the murkiest mixes and emerge with a stack of information, then lay it out in the most confident, believable manner."
Although the Chord Mojo 2 is a great desktop upgrade, it's also portableish. The battery is good for around eight hours between charges and unlike its predecessor it doesn't get alarmingly hot while you recharge it either.
It’s possible to buy a more affordable product from iFi and get a big helping of the sort of performance that’s available here, it’s true. But if wireless connectivity is as important as the wired equivalent, and if you’re in the happy position of being able to afford it, the Gryphon makes a huge amount of sonic sense.
As said in our review: "as a combination of functionality and performance, it’s hard to lay a glove on the iFi xDSD Gryphon. When the biggest gripe about a product concerns the nature of the little tell-tale LEDs that indicate what’s going on inside, you know you’re on to a winner." That's what makes it a 2023 T3 Awards winner.
It’s a measure of just how well the iFi Go Bar performs that it’s not only possible to overlook the size (both of the device itself and the price iFi wants for it) and its incredibly unhelpful user interface - it’s obligatory.
As we said in our iFi Go Bar review: "the effect the iFi Go Bar can have on the digital audio information stored (or accessed by) your smartphone or laptop is always significant and occasionally revelatory."
This is not so much the Swiss army knife of DACs as the entire shop that sells the Swiss army knives. The format support here is just ridiculous, stretching far beyond the wildest dream of even the most ardent audiophile, and is a key part of why this won Best DAC in the T3 Awards 2021 audio category.
Its twin ESS Sabre DACs (one to handle each stereo channel) support up to 32-bit/768kHz files and DSD512 over USB. And you thought 16-bit/192kHz was exciting…
Aside from the USB digital input, you've also got two optical and two coaxial, combined with both balanced and unbalanced outputs, so whatever connection you need is handled here.
That even includes for headphones, hence its high place on this list – a headphone amp is built in, and there's a 6.3mm 1/4in jack on the front too.
On top of all this is aptX Bluetooth for CD-quality streaming, though sadly no Wi-Fi support, and no USB-C. We can live without that, though (though we wish it came with a USB Type-B cable in the box, at least, since they're a lot rarer these days than they used to be).
Between the simply superb handling of the actual audio, the small size, and the fact that it's an audiophile's dream in terms of future-proofing, it's a top headphone DAC to buy as long as you don't need portability. Here's our full Cambridge Audio DACMagic 200M review, if you want to dig further into why it's so impressive.
This can be connected to your phone, laptop or any digital device with a USB or optical digital output, but it also has Bluetooth built in, so you can plug your headphones into it, and keep it totally separate from your phone. That means you can use your phone in the usual way when messaging, browsing and so on. It's portable, like the EarMen Sparrow above, though adding a load of extra features means it's a lot bulkier than that device, too.
A few years ago, hi-fi buffs would have been throwing up at the mention of Bluetooth as, clearly, Bluetooth is not a 'hi-fi' audio source. However, Bluetooth now seems to be acceptable in the hi-fi community, and most people will just listen to this and think, 'wow, my phone's music now sounds way, way better.
The Bluetooth stage employs the 'CD-quality' aptX and AAC codecs alongside more hi-fi-tastic wireless tech and a 'Cyberdrive' analogue headphone amp to get the most out of the connection. Those wanting better than CD quality sound will love the support for hi-res audio and MQA.
To be honest, I start to glaze over a bit when brands start going on about bit rates and 'balanced topology', but the iFi xDSD is without doubt a great sounding DAC/amp. It's made by hi-fi nuts, but people who aren't hi-fi nuts can fully get behind it.
With USB and mini optical digital inputs on the back you can use it with just about any other bit of kit you care to wire it to, as long as you have the right adaptors, and it does a stand-up job with them too. It's main purpose is clearly for mobile however – and that can include Astell & Kern-style digital audio players as much as smartphones, if that's your bag.
The addition of 'Xbass' and '3D' audio settings is probably a bit surplus to requirements – their effect is so subtle, it's barely there – but you can always just turn them off. The battery will last you up to 10 hours (realistically more like 6 when using Bluetooth), and they will be pleasurable hours, I assure you.
The original Zen DAC was a brilliant budget home and headphone DAC, and the second generation improves on it with a newer processor that's twice as fast and has four times the memory of the v1. It supports PCM up to 384kHz and DSD up to DSD256 and is also an MQA decoder, with full on-board MQA decoding. If you're a Tidal HiFi subscriber you'll be delighted by that.
The iFi Zen DAC V2 is very slightly more expensive than its predecessor but it's significantly better sounding: it delivers truly exceptional sound quality for a relatively low price. If you've already got the first-gen it isn't an essential upgrade, but if you're looking for a brilliant budget DAC you should definitely have a listen.
