AirPods Pro 2: Five New Features and Improvements to Expect

[MrRom92]

I’m all for giving people the option. I’ve just never seen any evidence that anyone can actually discern a difference with lossless formats. I do understand that when music is remastered for lossless they often clean things up and improve mix, but that would be available for lossless or lossy.

I’m sorry, but there is no such thing as “remastered for lossless”
The audio in any professional studio setting is always lossless. No matter whether it is being mastered the first time around or all over again. And it goes out in a lossless form either on CD/DVD/Blu Ray, or on higher quality streaming/download providers.

It only ever gets compressed and downgraded to lossy formats for online distribution on services that are stuck in the standards of 2003, when broadband internet speeds were not common and lossy compression was a necessity.

Device audio also gets encoded with a lossy compressor with Bluetooth headphones (AAC in the case of AirPods) because Bluetooth simply lacks the bandwidth to transmit the audio at its original quality. It has to be degraded or the whole system would fall apart. Bluetooth was only ever intended to be a dictation quality standard, we are now trying to force a 25 year old communications protocol to do things it was never designed to.


As for people being able to discern the difference; listening is a skill. Once you know what to listen for, you can’t “unhear” it. Many people can’t even distinguish between entirely different mixes or masterings of a recording, let alone the same exact audio file put through both lossy and lossless encoders. Good listeners can hear it, do hear it, and tend to not like it.

If the technology can support lossless, why should we even need to keep lossy encoders around? We should be pushing to maintain performance wherever possible, not degrade it just because some tin ears won’t be able to tell the difference.

 

[Aston441]

Feel like AirPods Pro will soon reach IPad like territory where it becomes hard to improve on them given they are so good and nobody has a reason to upgrade.

Get back to me when Apple decides to spend more than a penny on the microphones 😂

 

[danmaldesign]

Beats Fit Pro has pretty much obliterated AirPods in terms of sound quality…remember that? Sound quality? THE driving factor behind a pair of earphones. Miss me with all of the other nonsense.

 

[svish]

Better battery life will be welcome. It will also be good if it comes out in multiple colours.

 

[ofarlig]

I just hope they improve sound quality, the AirPods Pro are so far behind competitors when it coms to sound quality it is laughable. Sure they work for some YouTube videos but I don't reach for them when listening to music.

 

[ThailandToo]

I am not so sure I want another pair of AirPods Pro. Yes, they're small, and small is good, but the real ability to eliminate noises via AirPods Max or in my case Sony XM4 is just worth the carry. I would still bring my AirPods 3, as those have been my favorite AirPods thus far. I just don't care for the jamming rubber tips into my ears. It doesn't feel good and isn't as comfortable as AirPods 3 or over ear Sony XM4 headphones.

It would be nice to see progress, but at this point they really need to up the design to enable a more comfortable fit for me to want to buy them. If they could replace my Sony XM4's that would be amazing.

 

[ThailandToo]

Why buy it when you can wirelessly charge the case.

I don't think wireless charging as they call it or MagSafe/Qi is really a benefit other than easier to set it on a charger than plug in a cable? Neither one is difficult. Then you add the advantage. of not losing 30% of the power and increase heat unnecessarily. I will take USB C over wireless.

 

[Dredd67]

In my case, I don't want new features, just a reliable experience.
I like the AirPods Pro for what they are, but :
- while secure in my ears, after a while they rotate slowly out of their original position and I lose sound quality, sound isolation and finally lose them completely.
- battery is a mess: at some point when my AirPods have still battery but the case doesn't, if I put them back in, the car sucks the energy and they end up dead in a minute.
- battery is a mess 2 : sometimes only one of the two is charged. Why ?
- Bluetooth is a mess : auto selecting the device is never working as expected. That's a tendency in todays tech: trying to do something smart, but failing miserably. I want my tech to make things easier and predictable, not harder and random. AKA I prefer to work a little more than having to redo everything after my stupid secretary botched the job.

Now if AirPods Pro 2 could get me that i would be happy. I don't expect miracles in noise canceling whith in-ear buds, comparing these with XM4 is just unrealistic, half of the canceling comes from the over the ear design.

 

[Kissmo1980]

I had Regular AP and I bought APP.
I love and hate them at the same time.

Simple to pair, sound great.
Downside: battery health over time, always one pod ends up not pairing and having to reset them, the contacts to charge the pods start to degrade no matter how much you clean and maintain.

They can add tons of sensors but since I am a sweaty type of person, as long as they keep sliding out when exercising (especially during bench press) I ain’t going to buy a new model for sure.

 

[contacos]

One product I’ll never buy without AppleCare+ ever again. They are convenient but so fragile

 

[fockx]

All I really want is reliability so I don't have to exchange one or both of the AirPods every 6 months.

 

[akrabatic]

I'll wait for the USB-C case. I know that the case can do wireless charging, but I'm all in on USB-C when travelling and don't appreciate the anomaly of lightning.

The sooner iPhone and AirPods move to USB-C, then better, as far as I'm concerned.

 

[Pillbory]

This opinion is only wrong because you can't hear the difference on a £10,000 studio mastering system either. No one has EVER passed a blind test yet no matter what the equipment is. It's hilarious seeing the average joe claim they've got ears better than the worlds mix engineers though.

Exactly this Danny. It comes down to how good your ears are, and the majority of us are lacking. I would also apply this to a lot of other world scenarios. Wine for instance, my tastebuds are non-existent, there isn't a chance in hell I can tell the difference between wines, they just taste like wine. I accept there is a small minority (wine tasters) who can tell the nuances in flavour, but the amount of 'sheep' who will nod their head in agreeing with the the Pro's just to be liked. I always relate the 'Emperors New Clothes' children story. Don't get me started on Guitar 'tone woods'!!!

 

[Cel186]

It's all about the colors for me. Give me these guys in black or maybe in grey please.

 

[iBug2]

How is lossless possible if it's still going to be bluetooth? Not enough bandwidth for ALAC. Not that I care, I have never passed a blind test between 256kbit AAC and ALAC. They are identical to my ears. I can only differentiate 128kbit AAC and ALAC and we don't have 128kbit anymore anyway.

 

[Vasilisxd]

Well the sound on AirPods Pro is terrible, I used Samsung buds 2 and the difference was chaotic. They must improve on sound.

 

[iSayuSay]

Beats Fit Pro has pretty much obliterated AirPods in terms of sound quality…remember that? Sound quality? THE driving factor behind a pair of earphones. Miss me with all of the other nonsense.

Yep I agree, but the Fit Pro lacks the wireless (and MagSafe) charging case, which for some people can be important, more so when many iPhone users invested heavily on MagSafe charger and accessories. The BFP could easily feels like the missing link in the ecosystem.

 

[chriswhv6]

Been looking to pick up a pair of AirPods (never owned any before) but which you do guys recommend is the best use when it comes to for just general outdoor walking?
The normal AirPods or the Pro version?

 

[NightFox]

AirPods Pro can already be tracked via the Find My app on an iPhone...

I think you need to caveat that statement. Proper Find My functionality would be one of the key drivers for me to upgrade so I can ditch the effective but bulky and ugly Spigen AirPods/AirTag case I currently use. If I rely on the built-in Find My, my AirPods are apparently still 50 miles away at Manchester Airport from 5 days ago, whereas their AirTag correctly tells me they're in my bag in the corner of my office.

The current Find My implementation on AirPods is about as useful as when someone 'helpfully' asks where you last had something that you've lost.

 

[ofarlig]

Been looking to pick up a pair of AirPods (never owned any before) but which you do guys recommend is the best use when it comes to for just general outdoor walking?
The normal AirPods or the Pro version?

I would say it depends on your ears, I cannot wear the normal AirPods at all since they don't stay in my ear if I move the slightest, I also don't like non sealed in-ears and I want noise cancellation in all my headphones so for me AirPods Pro is the only option. On the flip side I have friends that cannot wear the AirPods Pro because they won't fit properly in their ears that prefer the regular AirPods.

 

[dannys1]

Okay, sure. Let’s do that. That’s still not really a compelling argument for why I should be passing all device audio through an additional layer of lossy transcoding though.
A 1980’s Sony discman was able to provide lossless 16/44.1 audio over whatever headphones you wanted, even cheap little earbuds if that’s what you plugged in.

1. Excellent, let me know when you're ready to prove you can't hear the difference.
For now you can take these tests and post your results

Is your audio system really ready for lossless?

Do an ABX test in your browser, and see if you can tell the difference between lossless and lossy audio

abx.digitalfeed.net

2. A Sony discman couldn't supply audio to whatever headphones you wanted, the amp only drove low impedence headphones and back then the quality of all low impendence headphones were terrible. It wasn't until the 2000's that high quality in ear monitors were normal and available to buy (for about twice the price of a Sony Discman) - those IEM's would sound better listening to a 128kbps MP3 than any 80's headphones with a CD would.

 

[Tozovac]

Feel like AirPods Pro will soon reach IPad like territory where it becomes hard to improve on them given they are so good and nobody has a reason to upgrade.

Being Apple, once that occurs, start expecting some change for the sake of change with a whiff of minimalism. Expect “improvements” like innovating down to one AirPod instead of two, or removing a charging port, or the introduction of the AirPods mini, whatever that’ll be.

 

[kerr]

I struggle to understand the need for an AirPods Pro 2 release. I love mine but the rumored improvements seem very underwhelming. That said, to those that don’t own them, I strongly recommend you buy them if and when they’re released.

 

[ApplesAreSweet&Sour]

Feel like AirPods Pro will soon reach IPad like territory where it becomes hard to improve on them given they are so good and nobody has a reason to upgrade.

I get where you're going. But there's no good analogy between AirPods and most other Apple products as next to no other product gets updated as infrequently as AirPods.

Additionally, there's still no option to fix broken or worn out AirPods. Your only options are warranty or AppleCare, depending on where you live.

And without those many owners will justify getting a new pair 1.5-3 years in, or sooner(depending on usage). And that pair is most likely going to be the latest and greatest of what Apple has to offer even if it's not anything significantly better over the older model.

By design, AirPods will always be extremely popular simply because of how fast they are "consumed" and thrown away.

 

[ApplesAreSweet&Sour]

I struggle to understand the need for an AirPods Pro 2 release. I love mine but the rumored improvements seem very underwhelming. That said, to those that don’t own them, I strongly recommend you buy them if and when they’re released.

The replacement program that still has Apple replacing APPs in droves is reason enough to do a new version.

Personally, I went through three pairs and had them all replaced under the program before selling them second hand and settling for AP3.

I prefer (working) APP over AP3 but won't accept having to go through the replacement process every 4-6 months in perpetuity even if it means new AirPods for free. It's too much of a hassle.

I'm hoping a new iteration could at the very least just fix whatever is causing so many issues for APP.