“A handy addition to your pedalboard if you're playing shows with poor monitoring”: Cloudvocal EverSync Wireless IEM review

As a live guitarist, using in-ear-monitors (IEMs) can be a total game-changer. When you’re no longer reliant on often poor stage monitoring, an in-ear monitoring system can unlock a much better performance for you and your bandmates, helping take your live sound to the next level. If you’re integrating electronic sounds alongside your guitar and amp then monitoring is that much more important, with the potential to make or break your live show.

Designed specifically for guitar players, the Cloudvocal EverSync Wireless IEM is a relatively affordable in-ear monitor system when compared to the offerings from some of the bigger names out there. In terms of guitarist-specific in-ear monitor systems, there isn’t much choice out there, particularly at this price point. It makes the EverSync quite a unique prospect in that regard, well worth some consideration if you don’t want to go the traditional route.

Taking everything out of the box I was taken aback at how light and small the receiver is. Easily small enough to fit in my averagely-sized hands, it’s made out of hard plastic and certainly feels sturdy enough to deal with regular live use. On the top, you get a 3.5mm output for your earphones, a pairing button, and a small volume knob. The side panel features a power button alongside a USB-C port for charging. Finally, a large button on the front panel acts as a limiter for the signal going to your in-ears.

The transmitter is a larger and heavier unit, very much stompbox-sized, albeit a lot slimmer in terms of thickness. On the front panel, there’s a small display, a rotary button for changing settings, and two buttons for selecting and changing channels. In terms of connectivity, you have a single 1/4-inch input on the right-hand side, with the left featuring an XLR DI out, and a 1/4-inch ‘thru’. The top panel features a second input stage, with both 1/4-inch and 3.5mm as well as a 9VDC power input and a USB-C for powering the device.

Looking at the specifications, the system runs on the 5.8GHz band which is unusual to see. At this price most IEMs I’ve come across operate on the 2.4GHz band, which is a nice choice to prevent it from interfering with your wireless guitar system. It also boasts a less than 5ms latency, which should mean a lag that’s unnoticeable to the human ear. You can also use up to four receivers with a single transmitter, great if you want to equip the whole band or just pair up with your drummer.

Getting everything out of the box and plugged in, I mounted the EverSync transmitter onto my pedalboard, feeding input 1 a signal that went via my pedalboard into an amp simulator, and plugging the ‘thru’ output into my studio monitors. . Next, I plugged in a looper pedal with pre-loaded beats and loops to jam along with into input 2, and got out my trusty Telecaster to start some drop-d riffing.

Pairing the receiver caused the first hiccup, but only because it wasn’t immediately clear that pairing had succeeded. Despite being connected the ‘pairing’ notification didn’t disappear from the screen on the transmitter, and it was only when I upped the volume that I realized everything was working perfectly. Hitting go on my looper I instantly got a signal and proceeded to start playing along.

The audio from the in-ears wasn’t spectacular, but it was certainly more than usable. The lack of true stereo hurts the quality a little but considering the price point, it’s definitely not a deal breaker for me. I played for a couple of hours and the receiver only dropped one of its battery light indicators, implying that the 8-hour battery life claim is a true one. I also tested the signal strength by wandering around my house while playing, finding no interference or signal drop occurring.

There’s a lot of potential for this unit if you’re a live guitarist thanks to the multiple setup options. You can receive two different signals thanks to the multiple inputs, for example, you could blend the front-of-house signal with a direct guitar tone, or hear your drummer’s sample pad if you’re all playing to a click track. There’s no XLR in, which could prove problematic for some use cases, say if you wanted to hear your vocals, although it’s rare you aren’t able to convert an XLR into a 1/4-inch jack input.