Fiio is one of the best-known names in the Hi-Res audio scene, and the manufacturer is known for its value-oriented DACs and IEMs. We reviewed many of the brand’s recent launches over the past 12 months, including his fantastic BTR7 Bluetooth DAC, his high-end K9 Pro DAC, FA7S and FD3 IEMs, and several portable DACs.
Fiio also has a range of portable music players, including the latest in the series, the M11S. Think of these portable players as iPod derivatives, but for lossless music. Get all the features you need in one package. The M11S features a 5-inch screen with 720p resolution, is powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 660, and features dual Saber ES9038Q2M DACs and DSD256 that offer native 24-bit/384KHz playback. Along with MQA decoding.
The M11S connects via a single-ended 3.5mm port, with balanced 2.5mm and 4.4mm ports also available. Of particular interest here is that it also has Bluetooth and the M11S can transmit wirelessly via SBC, AAC, AptX, AptX HD, LDAC and LHDC. The best part is that it runs a tidy version of Android right out of the box and has full access to the Play Store so you can install your favorite streaming service without any hassle.
Before getting into the sound characteristics of the M11S, I would like to say a few words about the design of the M11S. Fiio said he overhauled the design language for 2022, aiming for a consistent aesthetic across its entire range. He knows it as soon as he uses the M11S. It has the same angular lines and rectangular sides and is similar to the K9 Pro in this regard other his Fiio products such as the Q7 and R7 share a similar aesthetic which is why Fiio designs across the portfolio Good to see the language unified.
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The design itself looks great, and the matte finish on the sides makes the M11S easy to hold and use. There’s a physical music play button on the right, a power button and loud rocker on the left, and his MicroSD slot for up to 2TB. This is very useful if you have a large offline music library and want to access it online. go. The ports are on the bottom, with a 3.5mm jack to the left of the USB-C port and balanced 2.5mm and 4.4m ports to the right.
A 5.0-inch screen feels small for something like the Galaxy S22 or a smaller phone like the ASUS Zenfone 9, but it’s the ideal size here. It doesn’t make the M11S unwieldy, and there’s plenty of screen real estate to browse your music library and control music playback. The M11S is pretty chunky at 18.5mm, but that’s due to the audio hardware and the massive 5300mAh battery under the hood. That said, it’s not too heavy at 271g and comes packaged with a clear case that protects the device in case of a fall.
The metal chassis is durable and built to last, and we’ve had the M11S for six months and found no issues with the build quality or tactile feel of the buttons. The screen isn’t particularly brilliant here, but it’s useful for your use case.
Coming to the port, the M11S can deliver 300mW at 16Ω through a 3.5mm jack, dropping to 200mW at 32Ω and 23mW at 300Ω. The balanced 2.5mm and 4.4mm ports have more power, up 670mW at 32Ω, 550mW at 16Ω, and 90mW at 300Ω. There’s plenty of headroom here to drive IEMs and full size headphones, and I haven’t run into any drawbacks with the audio equipment I have. You get two gain settings. Low gain settings were fine with most IEMs.
As for the sound itself, the M11S offers a dynamic signature with lots of character in the low end, vibrant mids with good timbre and excellent vocal clarity, and clean trebles with good sustain. The sound has plenty of layers and dynamism, the low-mids are wonderfully detailed, and it offers a clean low-end with presence.
The low noise floor means you won’t hear hiss even with sensitive IEMs, which wasn’t an issue in my testing.The M11S really shines when paired with the Audeze Euclid Now, IEMs can deliver a fully immersive, lifelike sound.
On the software side, the M11S features vanilla Android 10 with access to Google Mobile Services. This means you can get Play Store right out of the box and install all the streaming services you want. You can install anything else you want, but given the old hardware and limited memory, it’s better to use the M11S exclusively for music streaming.
Fiio has its own storefront where you can install things like Qobuz and Tidal, and Tidal is not officially listed in my country’s Play Store, so this worked for my use case. looks at the standard interface without any changes, and given that my daily driver has been running Android 13 for 4 months, the overview menu and notification pane designs feel outdated. You can
That said, there is a system-wide dark mode, and I didn’t notice any slowdowns while using the M11S. This is an achievement considering the hardware on offer, this player is powered by his Qualcomm’s 14nm Snapdragon 660 and the last phone I ran this platform on was Xiaomi’s Mi A2. It has 3GB of RAM and 32GB of internal storage, a poor combination for a 2023 phone, but it’s perfectly fine here.
Wi-Fi connectivity and AirPlay/DLNA streaming are also available, so if you’re like me and have your music library stored on your home NAS server, you can access your files directly. I use USB Audio Player Pro on my phone, and his built-in Fiio Music utility was great at playing music from his NAS. It has a great interface and handles media playback without issue.
With a 5300mAh battery under the hood, the M11S delivers over 15 hours of music playback. This should be more than enough for a weekly listening session.The only downside here is that it takes 3 hours to fully charge the battery. I use it, but again, the M11S is not a device that needs to be charged every day.
I use the K9 Pro in combination with the Focal Elex when I’m at my desk, but for most portable listening I used the M11S as my player of choice. It drives all the audio equipment in your home with little to no effort, produces balanced sound that makes IEMs like the Audeze Euclid shine, and has plenty of battery life.
Best of all, the M11S has been my go-to choice for the last six months because of its ease of use. I find it more convenient to use the M11S than pairing a Bluetooth DAC like the BTR7 with my phone to play music.
The main differentiator is that unlike my phone, the M11S has no false notifications so I can listen to music without distractions. Ultimately, that alone makes it a worthwhile recommendation.If you want a high-res music player that nails the basics and doesn’t get in the way, you’ll love what the M11S has to offer.
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With a robust feature set that includes balanced ports, wireless connectivity, a clean Android interface with access to all streaming services, and excellent sound quality, the Fiio M11S is the ideal Hi-Res music player.
