Schiit Unveils New Magni 3+ and Magni Heresy Headphone Amps

If you haven’t heard of them by now, then you don’t know Schiit. But you should, as Schiit has quickly become the pioneer of the $99 headphone amplifier over the past decade. Today, Schiit has announced the introduction of two new products: the Magni 3+ and Magni Heresy.

Both units can be thought of as a Magni 3 on steroids, each of which caters to a different, yet similar, audience.

The Magni 3+ looks quite similar to the lineup that you’re used to seeing – an all-metal design built in the USA with a premium feel and minimalist blueprint. It’s constructed with one goal in mind: drive everything.

And it does that quite well using Schiit’s existing feedback topology. Meaning that you’re getting an all-around amp that can drive things just that much better – hence the “+” designation issued by Schiit rather than a full product number step-up.

Colored in a beautiful new red and black design is the aptly named Magni Heresy. Schiit says that Heresy was built from the ground-up and ditches the existing mini-speaker amp design for a full op-amp design that favors filtering and precise measurements.

When we started developing an all-op-amp Magni, it was 100% counter to everything we’ve done […] So to us, an op-amp Magni was heresy. 

And the Heresy does precision quite well. Its op-amp focused design means that power supply related distortion is well suppressed and what you’re getting out of the business end is the pure unadulterated sound you’d expect to hear.

While it doesn’t drive as hard as the 3+, it does a job that most people will consider to be more than adequate on most headphones and IEMs, even those difficult to power.

What Schiit hasn’t told us about yet is that pretty little red and black Modi sitting underneath of the Magni. Perhaps some more news will appear on the front in the near future.

The Schiit Magni 3+ and Magni Heresy can be purchased today for $99 each on Schiit’s website and will begin shipping immediately.