Grado
Handcrafted in Brooklyn since 1953.
Grado Labs is a family-owned company in Brooklyn, New York, handcrafting headphones and phono cartridges for over 70 years. Their distinctive open-back design and warm, musical signature have earned a devoted following among audiophiles and music professionals worldwide.
Philosophy
Grado Labs has been building headphones and phono cartridges by hand in Brooklyn, New York since 1953 — four generations of the Grado family, the same building, the same values. Joseph Grado started with cartridges; his nephew John brought headphones. Today, John's sons carry the tradition forward. Every transducer is designed, assembled, and tested in Brooklyn before it leaves the workshop. No outsourcing, no compromises.
Products
Technologies
The innovations that make Grado products extraordinary.
Moving Iron Generator
A design no other manufacturer matches.
While most cartridges use moving magnets or moving coils, Grado's moving iron design moves a tiny iron element through a fixed magnetic and coil assembly. This produces a generator with very low moving mass — for fast transient response — combined with a high output voltage that drives any phono stage with ease. The result is a warm, detailed, and dynamically alive presentation.
4th-Generation X Drivers
More power. Less mass. More music.
Grado's 4th-generation X Drivers feature a more powerful magnetic circuit using rare-earth alloys, a voice coil with decreased effective mass using copper-plated aluminium, and a reconfigured 'de-stressed' diaphragm. Available in 44 mm (Prestige/Reference) and 50/52 mm (Statement/Signature) sizes, each driver is tuned for its specific housing material and matched to 0.05 dB per pair — improving efficiency, reducing distortion, and preserving the harmonic integrity of your music at every volume level.
Tonewood & Metal Housings
Every material has a voice.
Grado selects each housing material for its unique acoustic signature: cocobolo for vivid punch, Brazilian walnut for relaxed warmth, mahogany for tonal richness, maple for balanced clarity, hemp for smooth extension, and machined aluminium for surgical precision. Many models combine multiple woods — the RS1x uses maple, hemp, and cocobolo together — to create complex, layered acoustic characters that synthetic housings cannot replicate. Every housing is hand-shaped at the Brooklyn workshop.
Experience Grado
Visit our showroom for a personal demonstration of Grado's extraordinary products.
For complete specifications and technical details, visit the official Grado website.