Schiit Audio announced the Jotunheim 3 this week, a fresh redesign aimed at driving both stubborn headphones and delicate IEMs without making a squeak. The opening line on the company product page starts with a curious notion “Made for music…and measurements.”
The Schiit Jotunheim 3 introduces the company’s new Prime™ topology and the established Continuity A™ output stage— both new and old “brand” names that suggests serious proprietary engineering. The amp runs $499, or $649 if you add the Mesh™ DAC card and want to adjust EQ from your phone. So that’s a balanced, solid-state headphone amplifier or pre that can be upgraded to an “all-in-one”, if you prefer a digital source.
Jason Stoddard says that he has called the “Asgard X a ‘mini Mjolnir,’ and Valhalla 3 a ‘mini Folkvangr’, but this new Jotunheim is a mini nothin’, which is apparently a Nordic way of saying its place in the Schiit Audio food chain is plenty powerful (6 watts into 32 ohms) yet sophisticated enough for some of the more refined headphones in the market. The updates include more current, upgraded parts, a 4.4mm balanced jack, and the usual assortment of switches and connectors that tap into the headphone community’s needs and wants. We were also quite impressed with the “more current” design of the latest Aegier 2 power amplifiers in our full product review.
The optional Mesh DAC card adds Schiit’s custom filter, a parametric EQ via the Forkbeard app, and their latest Unison USB input—handy if you enjoy micro-managing settings as much as we do.
More info: Schiit Jotunheim 3
If you want to hear more from Jason himself, you can check out this interview with him from pt.AUDIO’s The Occasional Podcast last year. Jason goes into some of the more fine details about the capabilities and future of the Forkbeard technology.
Full press release:
“JOTUNHEIM 3 LAUNCHES
One Amp to Rule Them?
November 12, 2025, San Antonio, TX. Today, Schiit Audio introduced Jotunheim 3, an all-new design providing exceptionally high power for the hardest-to-drive headphones, an extremely low noise floor for IEMs, and the flexibility and control needed for both. Debuting Schiit’s fully discrete Prime™ topology with Continuity A™ output stage, the new Jotunheim 3 is the highest-performing Jotunheim ever, while delivering natural and dynamic sound. Jotunheim 3 is available as a standalone amp for $499 and as an all-in-one DAC/amp with the optional Mesh™ DAC card at $649.
“I’ve called Asgard X a ‘mini Mjolnir,’ and Valhalla 3 a ‘mini Folkvangr’, but this new Jotunheim is a mini nothin’,” said Jason Stoddard, Schiit Audio’s co-founder. “It delivers high power–6 watts into 32 ohms, 20 volts RMS into higher impedances–and yet has a vanishingly low noise floor though both the balanced and single-ended outputs in low gain mode. So you can really go from the hardest to drive stuff out there to IEMs.”
Jotunheim 3 is much more than an update to the 6-year-old Jotunheim 2:
It debuts Prime™, our highly refined, fully discrete, current-feedback topology, which provides exceptional measured performance with only 10dB of overall feedback. It also ensures that the single-ended outputs are as noise-free and high-performance as the balanced outputs, so owners have great flexibility to drive almost anything.
Jot 3 also uses our new Continuity A output stage, running about 2x more current than any previous Jotunheim. This means it stays in Class A much more of the time than the previous design.
We’ve also added a balanced 4.4mm jack, in addition to the traditional 1/4″ single-ended and Neutrik 4-pin balanced connectors.
At the same time, we’ve increased parts quality overall, including high-performance MELF resistors, silicon and film capacitors, in addition to Jotunheim’s traditional RK27114 Alps Blue Velvet potentiometer, Neutrik connectors, and sealed precision relay switching.
Jotunheim 3 is available Mesh DAC card with Forkbeard, which brings additional versatility. Mesh combines Schiit’s unique time- and frequency-domain optimized digital filter with a standard delta-sigma modulator, for exceptional performance from an affordable DAC. Forkbeard enables app-based control of a 3-band parametric EQ, balance, volume, Loudness, NOS mode, and phase inversion. The Mesh DAC card also includes Schiit’s new high-rate Unison 384 USB input.
Continuity A solves the problem of NPN and PNP device mismatch in complementary Class A designs, by running NPN and PNP devices at the same current at the same time on both positive and negative rails. This approach, together with a massively overbuilt parallel architecture—Jotunheim 3 has 12 individual 3A transistors in its output stage—delivers very high performance.
Jotunheim 3 also has the distinction of being the first product made 100% on Schiit’s in-house SMD line in Corpus Christi. Schiit’s wholly-owned, captive robotic assembly line gives the company greater control of its production, higher quality and exceptional flexibility for the future.
Jotunheim 3 is available now at Schiit.com.”