I think there's some confusion. here... I'm not talking about direct knockoffs that are essentially counterfeit Airpods. I'm referring to the many, many other brands out there that produce quality wireless earbuds. but that's beside the point. Your family member bought one set of non Airpods, and without knowing what he got there's no way to know if he got crap or not.
Do you feel the Anker's Soundcore true wireless earbuds are one of these "quality" ones you speak of? I previously bought a pair of Anker Soudcore True Wireless headphones as a comparison point to Apple's AirPods. They seemingly address 3 major criticisms against AirPods: 1) They were half the price 2)They were black and 3)They were in-ear sealed
But, the two very quickly differentiate and not in the Soundcore's favor. And it starts with switching them between connected devices. You may poo-poo AirPods ease of moving between Apple devices, but please enlighten me: Tell me about or show me any other Bluetooth "buds", "headphones", or headsets that can effortlessly be swapped between your phone, tablet, laptop, desktop, TV, or Watch devices. The Soundcore allowed you to pair them by bluetooth to multiple other devices, but unless the last device they were used with isn't around or isn't powered off - its been a huge hassle to swap. You have to find the device disconnect them and turn off bluetooth on the device they were connected to. Otherwise they'll stay connected to the old device and not connect to the device you want them to. So hassle / limitation #1.
Next, with the Anker Soundcore only the right earpiece can be used independently. The left will not function with out the right. The Airpods instead function independently of each other. You can use the left or the right airpod individually. So hassle / limitation #2.
The usable range for the Soundcore away from your device paired device is way smaller. Hassle / limitation #3.
Then, when you step too far away, the Soundcore loose connection, and then step back (returning in rage) -- The Anker Soundcore don't reconnect well, if at all. And you lose the left earpiece. To reconnect the left, you have to either redock both earpiece or on the connected device entirely disconnect and reconnect them (but it didn't always work, necessitating redocking both). Hassle / limitation #4.
No auto-pause on the Soundcore when either the left or right "pod" is taken out of the ear. Hassle / limitation #5.
Another large criticism against the AirPods are how they are limited to a single doubletap on either "pod" to start/stop, skip next, skip previous, or summon Siri. And only get to choose two of those. So, again, 3rd party engineers that aren't limited like Apple to the rescue again, right? Well, the Soundcore have no effective usable on earpiece operation. The Anker soundcore instructions say I can tap or touch or swipe or something to pause music, skip track (back or forward), or raise and lower volume it, but it never worked for me. Maybe mine were defective. Hassle / limitation #6
Now, sound wise they Soundcore were much better since they were in-ear sealed vs Airpods on-ear open design. So finally a win for the Soundcore.
That said, for the above reasons: They were no competitor. I could have paid $130 - $160 for the Jabra True Wireless earbuds - But I though we supposed to be able to get functionally equivalent or superior true wireless 'buds' or 'pods' or earphones for half the price, which the Jabra are not.
