When Apple announced the iPhone 7 without a headphone jack back in September, Jony Ive — the Chief Design Officer at Apple — introduced to us the AirPods, a set of wireless earbuds that will herald the beginning of wireless technologies from Apple. Three months later — after a few setbacks and delays — they’re finally here. a pair. Apple’s approach in delivering a wireless ecosystem is finally here.
Let’s start by looking at the design, which is obvious to any Apple user. They are identical to Apple’s wired EarPods, minus the cord of course. The AirPods come housed in a nice magnetic flip-case which is also used for charging them when not in use. The AirPods switch on and connect to your phone automatically without the need to go into any menu. This simple pairing process is further augmented by iCloud, allowing the AirPods to pair with all your iCloud-connected devices you own (which is mind blowing). This “magic”, as Apple calls it, is achieved thanks to the the W1 chip powering the AirPods. The W1 chip is a solid performer when it comes to fast pairing, and maintains a solid connection with really low latency compared to your traditional Bluetooth-enabled wireless earphones. On the back of the charging case, there’s a round white button that allows pairing with other devices like Android phones by pressing and holding for few seconds. The AirPods slip into and out of the case, and are also magnetic, which eliminates the probability of fall out (and it’s fun to play with the be honest).
Once in ear, the AirPods sit very comfortably (at least for me they did), are very light, and most importantly, seem to stay in place even when I tried to run (but hey, I rarely run, so….). I think Apple did the right choice by keeping the EarPods design; they worked perfectly for me in the past, and I’m glad to see the AirPods carry that tradition forward, although not everyone might agree to this statement.
At the far end of the AirPods, there’s a microphone, which allows you to make voice calls and control virtually everything, from increasing the volume to skipping tracks by double-taping on one AirPod and activating Siri. I honestly found this a little bit annoying just for the fact that it took time to execute the command: Double Tap – wait for music to pause – ask Siri to increase volume – resume. I simply rather increase the volume through the good old volume rockers on the phone (if its within reach of course). Of course all this can be changed by going to Settings > Bluetooth, and then press the (i) to change the double-tap command to Play/Pause or completely disabling it.
The auto-pause feature, which is possible thanks to the accelerometers and other sensors, determine when the buds or in or out of your ear. The music pauses when you take one out of your ear and resumes when you put it back in. Unfortunately, this feature doesn’t work on Macs.
In terms of sound quality, the AirPods are great, and definitely better and louder than EarPods. They reproduce music amazingly good and nearly match my Bose headphones but with a little less bass. They are also loud enough to eliminate most of the surrounding noise. When it comes to phone call quality, the AirPods do a great job as well, I tried them during a regular workday — where I tend to do a lot of calls — and the sound was great. Additionally, people on the other end said that heard me loud and clear when I asked, primarily due to the noise reduction feature.
On the battery front, my experience with the AirPods nearly matched Apple’s claim that they last 5 hours (the case also carries 24 hours of recharge power). Best of all, 15 minutes of charging can generate three hours of battery life.
Bottom line, these are one of the best wireless earbuds we’ve tried so far and deserve a recommendation for sure. They pack everything from a stable wireless connection and range of superb features that put them ahead of the other players in the market. The ease of connectivity, fast iCloud wide sync and automatic pause are powerful features shaping the future of Apple’s wireless products.
