STEREOPHILE'S 34TH ANNUAL PRODUCT OF THE YEAR 2025 AWARDS

Stereophile's Product of the Year Awards were first published in 1992.1 I decided at that time that, in contrast to other publications' awards schemes, we would keep the number of categories to a minimum.

- BY JOHN ATKINSON

That way, we would avoid what the late Art Dudley once described as the “every child in the class gets a prize” syndrome. This decision led to some interesting contests. In Loudspeakers, for example, high-value minimonitors would compete with cost-no-object floorstanders. In Analog Products, turntables would compete with tonearms, phono cartridges, and phono preamplifiers. And in Amplification, single-box integrated amplifiers would go up against separates and low-power tube designs would compete with high-power solid state behemoths. The exception would be the Budget Product of the Year, where we would recognize products from each category that offered the best sound for the buck, and the Overall Product of the Year, which was for the winner of all the winners.

As Stereophile Editor Jim Austin wrote in the introduction to the 2022 awards: “The resulting review documents what's almost certainly the most thorough evaluation that product will receive outside the manufacturer's development lab. ... That document, then—the review itself—is a product's best argument for winning an award—or against it if the review lacks enthusiasm.”2

TWO ROUNDS OF VOTING

As he had for the 2023 and 2024 Awards, Editor Jim asked me to organize the voting and prepare this feature. In September, I compiled and shared with Stereophile's audio-equipment reviewers a list of eligible products. Each reviewer was invited to nominate three products in each of seven categories: Amplification Component of the Year, Analog Source Component of the Year, Digital Source Component of the Year, Headphone Product of the Year, Accessory of the Year, Loudspeaker of the Year, and Budget Product of the Year. Reviewers were asked to award three points to their top choice, two points to their second choice, and one point to their third choice.3 The result of Round One was a list of Finalists comprised of the top vote-getters in each category.