I'm tempted to give these 3 stars, but aside from fit, they're better than that. I'll go into more detail but try to keep this at least slightly brief... For starters these sound quite good with a ton of mid-bass and lower-mid impact. These things can *thump*. Almost too much for me on some tracks. They are SEMI-open-back, at best. There is very little airiness to the sound here I'd say they block around 50-60% of ambient sound. The come across more like a closed-back to me. They are insanely efficient - driving them from a smartphone or from an onboard sound jack or USB dongle is plenty adequate. Very detailed highs though everything can be a bit veiled and even sound a touch "below water" on some tracks. There is a sort of sheen to these that is excellent at preventing any harshness or piercing qualities to the upper-mids and treble detail areas, but at a cost that to me is a bit, well, irritating though it isn't a sound deal-breaker. These have a sparkle and slam that's unlike anything else in my house EXCEPT (and this will sound odd) the Blon BL-03 IEMs - these Phoenix cans sound like the Bl-03's big brother to my ears. Obviously there are large differences but the overall signature and presentation is quite similar. But where I love the Blons, these Sivgas take it too far for me. This is a hugely FUN headphone, occasionally sibilant but rich and buttery while still retaining some (slightly muted) sparkle, but there is a narrowness to the soundstage (IEM-like) and a coloration to the signature that would prevent me from picking it up often; if I want "fun" I'd reach for my Fidelio X2HR. However, comparing between the X2HR and the Phoenix is incredibly difficult to me; they're too different, particularly in the soundstage. Though I mentioned these can be driven without an amp, the darkness or slight veil of the Phoenix combined with their impactfulness and also combined with the narrower soundstage is all more pronounced when driving these from a low-power sources which culminates in a slightly claustrophobic-feeling sound for me when listening at lower volumes. Adding power via an amp (any of the small portables I have actually) and turning it up a bit, that feeling goes away entirely. The sound noticeably opens up. On acoustic tracks the bass emphasis and narrower stage seems to interfere with the imaging, the low-end really coloring and bleeding somewhat to the other instruments. Not horribly, but noticeable to me.Moving on to the fit: this is where they fall apart for me. I too had fit issues like all reviewers here thus far have mentioned, but bending and repositioning never fixes it for me. The ear-cups/pads are small, but not "on-ear", and they are shallow so my ear is actually touching the inside of the cans (which I think is a big part of why they can sound so impactful). I think these could really shine with a larger band and slightly different yolk and some larger/deeper pads. I'm just not willing to go to those lengths with this set. My head is definitely on the larger side but certainly not huge (my cap size is 7 1/2 if that's helpful), but these just don't quite work on it. They are not UNcomfortable but an hour is the *max*. That said, the *quality* of the pads is very good, very soft protein leather at the outside, very soft & smooth fabric for the inner ring that makes contact, and incredibly supple memory foam within the pad (almost too soft due to the lack of thickness so they compress almost completely when on my head). Finally, due to the small size, the protein leather and the extremely "cushy" nature of the pads where so much of your ear is in contact with it, they can get very warm like a heated soft pillow. Were I too try and keep these I would *have* do a pad swap of some kind, regardless of how soft and comfy these stock ones feel at the onset. Your mileage may vary.For size comparisons, my photos show them next to Fidelio X2HR (complete with the cat hair they constantly collect and store), AKG K712 Pro, Koss KPH30i and Sony MDR-7506. They're most similar in size and fit to the Sonys but where the Sony are comfortable to me for hours on hours with plenty of adjustment left, these don't last an hour on my head. Overall I don't think I'll be holding onto these personally but I'm absolutely CERTAIN they will make a great many people incredibly happy, especially if the fit works for them and based simply on house these impact in the low end and sparkle in the highs. The Phoenix are quite good, if not for me, and I certainly preferred them over the Sivga P-II by a large margin.