Focal Shape Twin Dual 5 inch Powered Studio Monitor with Passive Radiators Reviews

I absolutely love these gd monitors. I use these at home and use ATC 25s + Urei 813s + Auratone Cubes at my day job and honestly I feel like I trust the Shape Twins more than those in terms of translation. This is the first time I've felt like what I'm hearing is exactly what's there, minus all that sub under 45hz. That being said - the clarity in the low end and the low mids you get with the 3 way crossover is astounding. IMO that's where you can really get burned on a mix and these give you all that info. When I switch to these from my T7Vs while working it's like all of a sudden I hear new notes in the song. My work has improved by about 30% since getting these and they really make music making so much more fluid and fun. They don't distort when turned up, don't fatigue my ears and have incredible detail without any hype or bias. What else could I ask for. I'll recommend these to everyone!

Over the past three years I have invested in equipment that will help me to create great recordings. I also built out a room that is as sonically neutral as I can get it to be. It finally dawned on me that the last missing link was improving my monitors. My previous monitors were JBL LSR4328s which include a room calibration function. Ben Robinson, my Sweetwater Sales Engineer, was invaluable in helping me to select the right monitors for my studio. After thoroughly discussing options from Genelec, Focal and ADAM, I decided on the Focal Twins. I am completely satisfied. As many have noted in previous reviews, breaking them in is very important. I know it is exciting to get new monitors and the tendency is to dig in right away. But, as Ben recommended, the break in period is critical to the overall performance of the monitors. Once you perform the break-in, you will be able to appreciate an enormous difference in imaging and frequency response across the entire spectrum. I have already remixed several of my songs as a result. Thanks to Ben for his patience and great advice!

Like the rest of us home studio guys, I went through a few different monitors trying to find "the ones". I was about to buy the presonus Eris Dual offering, but I decided to spend way more than I expected and picked up these Focals. I'm so glad I did, because they are just so enjoyable to mix on. Very tight and precise, albeit a little light on the bass (I'm going to add a sub soon). Of course your can spend a lot more or a lot less, but these really seem to hit the sweet spot of quality/cost. Sure, it isn't cheap, but if you're even semi serous about music, you need to really hear your mix, and these will get you there.

When I first powered them up and turned on a mix, I was not impressed. They hit me as muddy for the cost. The break in time is real. After 10/20 hours or so of playing they settled in. Very good representation of the musical frequency spectrum. Very detailed. Highs are there and articulate without being shrill or harsh. I'm coming from a pair of Mackie 824's and the difference is night and day. I'm going back into a number of mixes with much better results. Added a Sub6 to the system which integrated very nicely. Invested in Sonarworks reference 4 because the speakers are worth it. Ironed out a few room modes and increased the detail further.

Every time I hear my mixes or just any other music on these monitors, I am blown away by the details on the mid and high end , and also the stereo separation. I hear artifacts which I usually hear only on high end headphones. It just gives so much more confidence on the mixing decisions coz you can clearly hear "everything" that is in the mix. I used the Yamaha HS8 for a long time before I moved to this one.The price difference is worth the clarity these monitors bring in.

I love these monitors so much. I have owned them now for exactly 1 year and my mixes before them and now are night and day having learned these monitors in my room. I seriously love them so much and would highly recommend. The high end is so detailed, it exposes everything. I love these.

I bought a pair of Focal Shape Twin monitors based on several international reviews, and they have been the single most significant upgrade to my studio. They take a few weeks to fully break in, and over that time, develop the clarity and authority that makes Focal so well-reviewed. I have listened to my own recordings, as well as CDs that I have heard hundreds of times, and I hear new detail that was never apparent previously. The overall balance and voice of these monitors is incredible.

It should be noted that these monitors have side ports, and are not suitable for horizontal placement. You do need to allow some space on either side, so they're not ideal for a setup where you might have multiple monitors directly side by side. For the vast majority of studios these will be a great choice. I have compared them with the Adam A7X, which is a great monitor; in my opinion there is slightly more clarity in the Focals.

I've had these monitors in my studio for a few years now, and they continue to amaze me.

I bought these used outside of Sweetwater but I buy almost everything else here and wanted to leave a review.

Multiple times I had to check if I had my subwoofer bypassed as these things put out a shocking amount of bass. Clarity and depth of field are astounding

Amazing quality

I have owned these now for about a year, and they have really helped me become a better mixer. I have ran them with a sub, but the reality is you don't need to (unless you want to microscope on the low end). In fact, I wouldn't mix with a sub most of the time because these speakers will tell you exactly where you sit on the dreaded mid lows, and how it correlates to your mids. They don't "extend", but they don't need to to mix for a majority of consumer platforms. In fact, you will find that your mid-range will become a lot more evident with these speakers. Maybe just a very minor complaint is that the high end will not bark "hard" at you if its not right. You will know it once you acclimate to the speakers and if you want to accentuate the highs for extra measure you can, but this goes to the quality of the tweeter.

You will need to treat your room to really appreciate these speakers too. They have great power (to the point where I have to attenuate). The stereo imaging (front to back) is amazing, and daunting at times when you don't "get it right" (reference mixing). And if your mono doesn't sit right the stereo sides will overpower, and you won't be able to hear (the vocals, for example).

So if you want honest to God speakers that can be painfully obvious and you want the ability to mix a professional sounding masterpiece you don't need more than this. I'm never going to part with mine.

I got a set of these at the last gear fest (2019). I have had 3 different near field monitors and all were ok, but these blew those away. Of course they cost a lot more, but its like "you get what you pay for". I needed to upgrade monitors for my work, so it was a good investment. I am completely happy with them. There are probably better sounding monitors for cheaper, but at some point it comes down to what works in your space, and what do you trust. These sound great in my small room edit suite.

A story for you: My grandson is majoring in music composition for film and video at Liberty University. He is now a Junior after completing a summer internship at a well known studio in Los Angeles and has an excellent studio set up in his apartment, however he needed a better set of studio monitors to really craft his sound. I discussed this with my Sweetwater Sales Engineer, Brendan Murphy, and he suggested I give him my Adam 7 monitors, which I purchased 5 years ago (still in excellent shape) and try the Focal Shape Twin Dual 5" Studio Monitors. I was somewhat skeptical going from a 7" speakers to the twin 5" speakers, but I have always trusted Brendan's advice. Well, it turned out to be a win/win situation for me and my grandson. We are both very pleased with the outcome. My grandson is delighted with the Adam 7 monitors, and I am ecstatic with the sound, quality, and performance of the Focal Shape Twin Dual 5 monitors. I am so energized with the quality of the sound produced by my Pro Tools based studio setup that Brendan helped me design and build over the past 10+ years. These Focal monitors are a big part of that. Check them out, you won't regret it!

Absolutely blown away by these monitors.

The low-end detail and foundation is so articulate and clean, minimal ear fatigue as you can hear every single detail with no effort.

Had high-expectations, and still blew me away. If you're looking for that sweet spot in terms of quality and price, you can't beat these.

What are you waiting for, get excited about music again! These monitors bring out the details and immerse you so deeply, inspiration comes quickly!

If you are serious about your music then spend the extra money and purchase these monitors. These monitors show you how good/bad your mixes are. You will not regret it these bad boys have made my clients very happy.

I've been using Yamaha HS8's for the last few years, but had been contemplating Focal's for a while. I used the Alpha monitors at another studio and hated them, but after getting these up I can honestly say the price and handmade quality makes a difference. My best description is not that thee sound is better, but I can hear more detail and better imaging overall. After breaking them in, they really sound so smooth and true. They are seriously the perfect solution for a small room like mine.

I bought these back in April and wanted to live with them before writing a review.

My first impressions were great; they sounded full, with crisp high end detailed mids, and sufficient lows. I still feel that after 4 months of use. The tweeters on this thing are some of the best I've heard. They show what is going on without exaggerating it. The minute i turned them on i knew i could trust them.

The low and mid ranges of these speakers are also quite good. They go down to 40 Hz, but in my listening position its more like 45-50. I've noticed in my room, if i step back farther away from the speakers, the low end balances back out. I think this issue is due to my room treatment, not the speakers. Testing the frequency range with sine waves, i discovered the 40Hz floor is pretty much the floor. 35 hz and below is absolutely not there. I believe this is because of the passive radiators. From what I've been told, passive radiators help push out the low frequencies like a port would, but they also create a much sharper roll off than ports. Think 36db per octave as appose to 16db. If you do lots of film stuff and need 20-40 Hz, you likely will need a sub. If you just mix music, these have all that you should need.

These are not 'holy crap' speakers, that's not what they are meant to be. They sound amazing because they are extremely detailed. After listening to some music I know well on them, i was picking out things I hadn't noticed before. They also have very good low volume performance; the low end stays balanced even at low listening levels.

The reasons I give 4.5 instead of 5 stars are as follows. EQ Adjustments are Pots, and not stepped, which makes it hard to match levels between each speaker. The auto sleep function works well, but occasionally one pops on 1-3 seconds after the other one; a very minor nuisance. No volume control, which isn't an issue, but would be nice to have.

Overall i highly recommend these for any space, but especially smaller spaces. Lots of detail, great low volume performance, not harsh, and they don't lie to you about your mix.

Just got me a pair of lightly used FOCAL SHAPE TWINS and I can saythey sound nice but weird at the same time.

I would like to mention that if you use dual-monitoring setup side by side - you will not be able to have the TWINS play without having some soft of standing wave, because they have ports on both sides of each speaker. The bass is indeed very strong, I didn't need to turn my subwoofer on that I normally use with my passive KRK6000. Comparing these two speakers I can say that it isn't enough highs for my hearing and how I got used to mixing, this may result in overbrightening the mixes or masters. Maybe its just different. I can also say that I have listened to many different licenced CD releases that I keep in a folder as references, sorted by year the records have been released. And partially I would remix everything in terms of EQ. Im either not used to this kind of sound, or in fact the TWINS show more than the other speakers(?). I dont know. I have some sort of mid-range buildup that I dont like - I think its very important to place them at the proper width so that the M and the S soloed sound like one image, instead of being too cluttered in the center or too separated between the channels. Maybe it has to do with the internal crossovers, but IDK, maybe I need to use them longer to break-in. Its said it needs from 10hrs up to 2 weeks, depending on the frequency of use. The screw-in feet that are used in the bottom of each speaker kinda dont work well due to having pretty rigid rubber feet base, so the decoupling does't work too well. I unscrewed those out and placed each speaker on the thick AURALEX pads. The standby mode many people dislike I, in fact, like very much and have been wanting this feature like forever. Cosmetically these are fabolous. Very well built and sound great, with a wide stereo. I was able to hear a few new details of a very very familiar music material.

PROS: a) Build quality. b) Cosmetic aesthetics. c) Impressive bass.
CONS: a)Side ports make it almost impossible to put side by side with other monitors and unable to place horizontally. These ports play a great role in having a really powerful bass, like 8" speakers. b) A little weird for me in terms of the frequency response, as if there was some sort of lowmids buildup, but not on every music maerial. I assume I need to play these longer and play with mearurement mic to find the perfect position.