XLR cables, worth buying higher end?

I have been completely satisfied with balanced interconnects made with Mogami W2549 cable and Neutrik XLR connectors. These can be made up for you by many pro audio shops. Last time I looked, a pair would be considerably less than $100. You might even get both pair for that.

I had mine made up by ProAudioLA.
I compared them to some expensive name-brand cables with glowing reviews. To do that, I ran single-blind comparisons with four friends, each separately. We all found the expensive cables to be noticeably more colored.

@jumia --

Any diff between microphone and interconnect xlr cables?

What people use for interconnects is usually mic cable. It’s optimized for transmitting low-level signals faithfully.

Mogami W2549 is shielded twisted pair (STP) -- the usual config for mic cables. Mogami W2534 is a star-quad configuration -- useful where there is a lot of interference, as it rejects noise even better.

BOTH are SHIELDED, as they should be.

I’ve tried both. The STP is very, very slightly more extended in the high end. I would recommend that unless you are in a situation with a lot of EMI/RFI.