High End 2026: The Show Moves to Vienna

After more than two decades in Munich, High End moved to Vienna this year. The new home is the Austria Center Vienna, and the first edition ran from 4 to 7 June. The numbers were strong: 23,109 visitors from 104 countries, around 500 exhibitors and close to 1000 brands. Almost everyone I spoke to preferred the new venue to the old MOC. The rooms sounded better, the space was easier to walk, and even Saturday did not feel too packed. I am with them. Vienna felt like a proper new start, not a stopgap. The show comes back here from 6 to 9 May 2027.

I spent four days going room to room. Here is what stayed with me, starting with the two-channel systems.

Kharma

Kharma's flagship room was one of the strongest statements at the show. They ran the Enigma Veyron EV1D, their latest flagship, and the driver count alone is hard to believe. It is a four-way design with fourteen drivers per side, eight diamond tweeters set in a flower pattern, two midrange drivers, and four eleven-inch woofers, all in a heavily machined cabinet. They were driven by four Goldmund Telos 8800 mono amplifiers, outputting 2400 Watts into 4 Ohm each. It was one of the most expensive systems at the show at a total of around 2 Million euros, and it had the scale and control to match. Big, composed, and without any strain.

Goldmund

Goldmund had two spaces. One room played their Gaia active speakers, the brand's flagship: five stacked cabinets reaching 2.10m, eight drivers across a 5-way active DSP design, powered by eight channels of Telos amplification and Alize DAC circuitry for 2500 watts per channel, all fed wirelessly. The other space was laid out like an art gallery, with their older gear on show. The Gaia sounded amazing, clean and effortless, one of my favourite rooms. As always, the only catch with Goldmund is the price, around 725,000 euros for the pair.

Magico

Like every year, the magico room was a hit. They played the new S7, the top of their reworked S Series, in a deep red gloss that looked superb. It is a big sealed tower with five drivers, a diamond-coated beryllium tweeter taken from their M Series flagship, and three ten-inch woofers stacked to keep the bass clean. Pilium amps and Wadax sources drove them. The sound was controlled and effortless, nothing missing and nothing overdone. No big surprise, just very good, which is what I have come to expect from them.

Bowers & Wilkins

Bowers and Wilkins used Vienna to launch the new 801 D5, the fifth generation of the 800 Series Diamond, built for the brand's 60th anniversary: new cabinet bracing, a revised crossover, the same diamond dome tweeter the range has always used. The flagship 801 floorstanders run about 50,000 euros. To me they are still one of the most impressive speakers out there, full stop. It is a jack of all trades, the kind of speaker that does everything well without leaning too hard on any one strength.

Wilson Audio

The Wilson Audio booth was huge with a few amazing looking setups. The catch was that not many speakers were playing. Great to walk through, less to sit and hear. The star was the Autobiography, Daryl Wilson's own statement piece and Wilson's first entirely new flagship since founder David Wilson passed in 2018. It stands about two metres tall, a five-way design with eight drivers built specifically for it, including two new PentaMag midrange units, a rear-firing tweeter you can dial in for the room, and a bass port you can physically flip to fire forward or backward depending on how the speaker sits. It costs around 990,000 euros a pair. It really is more sculpture than speaker.

Avalon

The Avalon room was very unique. They showed the Saga Signature, a three-way design in Avalon's signature angled cabinet, with a diamond tweeter, a ceramic midrange and two big composite woofers. The electronics chain was serious: Doshi Audio's tube gear throughout, a Kalista digital front end, a Kuzma turntable, and even a reel-to-reel deck in the mix. Several outlets that covered the show picked this as one of the best rooms at the whole event. For me, they sounded good but just a touch too bright on some tracks. It is really the look that does not do it for me. But I understand why so many people loved it, and the craft alone makes it worth walking in for.

MBL

The MBL 101 X-Treme room was one of the best looking rooms in the building. This was the MKIII version of their big omnidirectional system, driven by a full stack of MBL electronics with their new N41 network player. Those Radialstrahler towers throw sound in every direction, and a lot of people think nothing else disappears quite like them. The room was huge and the scale was real. The sound was not for me though. Too bright for my ears. They will run you around 400,000 euros for a pair.

Cessaro

The Cessaro room did not work for me. They showed the Zeta, a giant five-way horn with ten drivers a side, including four powered subwoofers and TAD compression drivers up top. Alieno electronics drove it and a Döhmann turntable fed it, and it costs around 800,000 euros. Plenty of people enjoyed it, and on some tracks it wasn't bad. But for most of the music playing, the sound felt honky, sharp and bright, not something I wanted to sit with.

ESD Acoustic

ESD Acoustic and the Super Dragon gave me the best classical sound I have ever heard. This thing is a field-coil horn monster, 2.5 metres tall and well over a tonne per side, with ten field-coil drivers, carbon-fibre horns, and beryllium and titanium diaphragms. On orchestral music it was untouchable. It put the whole room inside the concert hall. On other genres it dropped to great but not the best I've heard. The base Dragon is already around a million dollars, and the custom Super Dragon they showed in Vienna was reported at over 3.6 million. Silly money, serious sound.

Børresen

Børresen had three separate rooms this year, all built on Audio Group Denmark's usual formula: their own speakers, run through Aavik electronics, everything designed in-house to work as one system. The first room paired the new A1 stand-mounts with a matching bass module, driven by Aavik's new U-301, an all-in-one streamer, DAC and amp in a single box. This was the best of the three to me. Already very punchy and fast, with real drive to it. The second room stepped up to the bigger M1, on a proper separate Aavik amp and DAC stack instead of the one-box unit. It was even faster and more resolving, but for my taste it went a bit too far. More exhausting to listen to than enjoyable. The third room had the C3 floorstander on one of Aavik's integrated amps. Whatever the room, one thing stayed the same. Fast, dynamic, very quick on transients, the kind of speed that makes most boxes sound slow.

Audiovector

The Audiovector room was a highlight for me. They used it to launch the new R5 Arreté, a floorstander that borrows technology straight from their flagship R10. It runs a new Air Motion Transformer tweeter. The room ran it off a CH Precision I1, an all in one streamer, DAC, phono stage and amp. It costs around 20,000 euros, serious money but modest next to most of what else was playing at this show. More than one outlet covering the event picked this exact room out as the best sound for the money of the whole week. The speakers are very dynamic with real punch, and they never turn harsh. That balance is hard to get right, and they got it.

Engström and Kroma

Engström and Kroma ran a few rooms together this year. One paired the bigger Kroma Callas with Engström's Lars Mono amps and Monica preamp. Another used the smaller Kroma Thais with the Engström's Arne integrated amplifier. The Engström tube amps look amazing in every room they turn up in, proper furniture-grade pieces. The Kroma speakers are really good too, just a tiny bit sharp on some tracks for my taste. Still very impressive setups across the board.

Gauder Akustik

The Gauder Akustik room was good. I cannot remember much detail, which probably tells you it did not stand out either way. They were playing their big Berlina RC-15 on a serious Acoustic Arts chain, in a dark room with almost theatrical lighting.

Canton

Canton had speakers that punch well above their price. They played the Reference Alpha 1, the flagship of their Reference line, a big three-way floorstander built around diamond-coated ceramic-tungsten cones, finished in colours that make it look more like furniture than a normal speaker. To me they sounded very balanced and natural, one of the speakers I enjoyed a lot at this show. At 60,000 euros, they are not cheap by any means, but next to the true flagship rooms at this show, it is one of the better value stories around.

Silent Pound

Silent Pound showed speakers that are genuinely different from almost everything else at the show. They are a small Lithuanian brand with one main idea: keep the way a speaker spreads sound the same at every frequency, instead of narrowing it at the top end like most speakers do. Their Challenger II, the flagship, splits that job in two. The bass comes from two 12-inch woofers with no box behind them, open on both sides. The top end comes from a horn-loaded compression driver flanked by two 6-inch mids, which holds its spread steady even as the pitch climbs. All of this so the sound barely shifts as you move around the room. It costs around 28,000 euros a pair. A small name doing something genuinely thought through, and it sounds really good.

Cambridge Audio

Cambridge Audio showed their new L/R M active speakers, priced at at around 1400 euros, and they were a real surprise. In the demo room people kept looking for the hidden subwoofer, and there wasn't one. They sound big and clean for their size. There are three models, from the little L/R S at under 500 euros up to the L/R X at around 2000 euros, and all of them stream on their own. Easy to recommend for someone who wants good sound without a rack of boxes. They also had their new Evo 300 streaming amp on show.

Aeon Core

The Dan Clark Audio Aeon Core was the closed-back that got me. It is their new, more affordable closed model, and the first Dan Clark headphone tuned to a revised Harman target worked out with Sean Olive. To me it is the best closed-back Dan Clark makes, and the tuning is far more natural than the rest of their closed line. It runs about 1000 euros, which for the sound is close to a steal. It sounds open and clear, with real body, and not much of that boxed-in feeling closed-backs often have.

Meze Arta

The Meze Arta was the headphone everyone was talking about, and it earned it. To me it felt like the original Empyrean, improved in every way. Meze built it on the Empyrean II platform and dropped in a new Rinaro driver, the MZ5 HΩ, which sits at 225 ohms and needs a proper amp to open up. It is open-back, hand-made in Romania, and priced at 6000 euros. The sound is warm and natural with a big, room-like stage. I liked it a lot.

Palma DHS-10

The Palma DHS-10 can switch between closed and open back. The whole coloured plate on each cup rotates about 14 degrees, which opens or closes the holes behind it. The tuning stays almost the same either way. I expected that kind of trick to sound bad. It did not. It sounded good and natural in both modes, closed and open, which almost never happens. It is a new set from the Spanish brand Palma, and it is not out yet. At the show they said it should land somewhere around 1500 to 1600 euros.

Zavalinka Records & Perun

Zavalinka Records on Revox is the demo I always look for. They play their own reel-to-reel recordings on Revox machines through Perun electrostatic headphones. The Perun sets are hand-made, named after the old Slavic god of thunder, and they are tuned beautifully for voices and acoustic music. Tape straight into electrostatics is a special sound. It is a highlight for me every year, and this year was no different.

Dynaudio

Dynaudio's new soundbar, the Opus One, looked great. It is a huge thing, 24 drivers and 1500 watts, and it costs around 13,000 euros. The body is machined aluminium wrapped in a soft fabric, with 72 small wooden fins on the front, handmade by the furniture maker Karimoku. They are motorised, and they move to show which listening mode is running, from pure stereo to full Atmos. There is even a mic in the remote to set it up for the room. Dynaudio put it in a space dressed like a jungle, with birdsong and plants, which was a lot of fun. Soundbars rarely win me over, and this one did not change that. Clean and quite full for what it is, but the surround illusion fell short. Same story as most bars.

Eversolo & Luxsin

Eversolo and Luxsin filled a room with new gear and easily had one of the most impressive stands at the show for the money. Eversolo alone brought eight new products. On the source side there was the T10, an upgrade to their already impressive T8 and noticeably bigger in size. The screen grows from six inches to eight point six, the network jumps from gigabit to two and a half gigabit ethernet, and the clock moves to an oven controlled design that can also sync to an external master clock instead of just running on its own. Like the T8 it is a dedicated streaming transport, built to feed an external DAC. It is priced at around 2180 euros and should land around July 2026. Alongside it was the second generation of their DMP-A8, now with a proper octa-core brain and, in the Master Edition, a CD player built into the top, both planned for later this year. The show units even had a glass panel on top showing off the board underneath, though that is just for the expo models for now. They also showed a new R2R ladder DAC called the DAC-R8, plus a separate master clock, the C10. On the amp side they showed three new units: the AMP-F8, a Class AB design, the AMP-F6, a smaller GaN Class D amp, and the SA200, a streaming integrated amplifier that handles everything in one box. None of these last few had a price or release date attached yet, they were there purely to show the direction the brand is heading in.

Luxsin, their sister brand, brought new units of their own, built around a fresh R2R module they call the BOGDAC R2R, including takes on the X8 and X9, plus a neat separates stack, the BD9 and BH9, with a detachable wireless volume knob you can carry around the room with you. I own the X9. The R2R version they had did sound better than mine, which is either exciting or annoying depending on how you look at it.

PMC Atmos System

PMC ran a full schedule of events throughout the show. They were celebrating 35 years, and built a fully working studio in their room, called PMC Studio Vienna, with a run of curated sessions through the day. Steve Genewick from Capitol Studios told stories behind famous recordings, there was a session on jazz recordings, Miles Showell talked through vinyl mastering, and there were separate Atmos sessions with Sohn and with the singer Dominique Fils-Aimé. I went for the Sohn one, called Sohn Spatial Craft. He was there in person, and he mixed one of his own tracks into Atmos live in the room, working through his own approach to spatial mixing as he went. Hearing a track rebuilt around you in real time, with the artist standing right there, is something I had not experienced before. Easily one of my favourite moments of the week.

Trinnov, dCS & Perlisten Atmos System

Trinnov, dCS and Perlisten ran a joint immersive room with a Grammy-winning producer, Justin Gray, hosting daily sessions built around his own high-resolution mixes. The system was a full 9.1.6 setup, Perlisten S5T speakers around the room and an S7C for the centre channel, run through Trinnov's new AltitudeCI processor and a 16-channel dCS DAC. It was built to be a serious reference room, not just an effects demo. The system itself is very impressive, and Justin Gray explaining the choices behind each mix added a lot. At times it was almost too much though. With that many channels going at once the sound got a bit disorienting, so much happening that it pulled focus away from the music itself.

Four days was enough to see everything, but not enough to really take my time in every room, and that says something about how much was packed into the Austria Center. The move from Munich was something a lot of people dreaded, but it paid off. Better rooms, better sound, and a bigger venue that is easy enough to navigate once you learn how the maze is built.

Speakers this year did not come down to one clear winner. The best rooms took completely different approaches: horns, electrostatics, boxes, active designs. None of them were more right than the others, and picking a favorite came down to taste more than price. The new headphone releases this year were really good ones and show in what direction the industry is moving.

The immersive push was hard to miss, from the PMC studio to the Trinnov room, and it is clearly where a chunk of the industry's attention is going right now. It will take a few more years and a few more shows to see whether that settles into something most listeners actually want at home, or stays a show curiosity.

Vienna earned its place. I am already looking forward to the 2027 edition.