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Comment by pwthornton | Hacker News Reader

If Apple does in fact release AirPower, and it works well, I'll probably upgrade to these. A better charging situation is one of the things that could improve the AirPods.

Just today my AirPods case wasn't charging because lint got into my lightning port. I didn't realize the case wasn't charging until I realized my AirPods were low on power despite me charging the case a lot the last few days. Inductive charging is a lot more durable in a lot of ways.

I take my AirPods everywhere with me. They fit perfectly into a pair of jeans. They are one of Apple's best products in years.

I find myself listening to way more audiobooks and podcasts because of this. If I have a minutes to burn, I can just pull them out and listen. Also, AirPods are great for phone calls. I use them for almost every phone call, and having them always on me has changed how I interact with computing devices. If the Apple Watch ever really gets full featured (with more robust cellular features in particular), I could see myself often just having a Watch and AirPods with me, while leaving my phone behind.

The other things I would like to see Apple do are: Official water resistance ratings to better work for athletics and in the rain; and the ability to have different tips on them to increase fit for more people and to provide the option of sealing out outside noise.

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I honestly can't say I understand the draw to drop significant money on a new set of headphones that need to be charged at least as often as a my phone, and can't be charged while being used.

I've had the same set of high quality in-ear wired headphones for the last 5 years or longer and have zero issues with them (I just replace the foam every so often for about $5). What is the improvement I am missing here?

It would take a significant amount of charging inconvenience to get me to go back to wired earbuds instead of wireless. I can't speak for others, but for me wireless AirPods were a really dramatic improvement in the experience of listening to music outside of my home office. Almost revolutionary, if I can risk being a bit overzealous in my praise.

For me, switching to bluetooth earbuds (PowerBeats) was a game changer. Switching to AirPods was a level above that. I wear them for most of the day and don't really have an issue with having them be charged.

I pop them in their case when I take a break or go for lunch and then charge the case itself now and then and things work out just fine. The charging is very fast.

True wireless headphones for me is a big improvement. It’s just so darn convenient. Also, during the year I’ve had mine I’ve never found myself in a situation where I’ve had to use them while charging. Having one more thing to keep charged is of course a downside, but when compared to the convenience they bring it’s a small one.

Not having a cable dangling on your body.

Not needing to have your phone on your body constantly.

Source: Wife owns AirPods and I use them from time to time. For me these two points are HUGE plus points. But I won’t buy them as i find them too expensive and don’t listen to audio often enough (wired or wireless) on my phone anyway.

Being wireless is just that good. Especially when exercising or otherwise out-and-about.

The charging is not nearly that obnoxious, I've gone through a wide range of wireless sets and they've all had multi-day charges.

Personally I have a nice set of IEMs for longer, sitting use cases and otherwise use a cheap (~$20) wireless set; so that when it inevitably breaks/gets lost/battery wears down after a ~year, it's negligible to just replace it.

Also, nowadays, wireless headphones have surprisingly good audio; especially if you're just listening to podcasts.

How about getting a pair of BeatsX earbuds, cut those crappy units off and make what's left a Bluetooth adapter with MMCX connectors that are compatible with your IEMs. Seems to have the best of the both worlds.

This works quite well, but I still often use my airpods instead of my shures because the airpods don’t block out all the sounds around me.

Being able to connect to multiple devices at once, not having a chord get in the way or getting tangled while in pocket (happened to me a lot while exercising), not being tethered to a device (not a big deal with a phone, but it can be annoying when you are using a laptop or desktop), some headphones overlay external noises over your music (anti-noise canceling?) so you can be more aware of your surroundings/people talking to you.

These are just a few I thought of off the top of my head, but they may not be worth the price tag for everyone.

I will never go back to wired headphones, especially on the go.

After experiencing AirPods, I will pay any amount of $ to replace them if they ever get lost. They really are that good and they’re probably the best purchase I’ve made in years.

If you go to the gym at all, they’ll be a game changer.

Let me put it this way - sometimes I completely forget they’re even in my ear.

I’m with you but got AirPods as a gift and did not return them.

Pretty much all BT solutions are a pain pairing wise and sound lag wise.

Apple’s are very well designed, a luxury object. Almost no lag with sound. Very good phone call experience. Sound is mediocre but always available.

Still, they are disposable by design and I find it repulsive that we have normalized the pollution associated with buying this product. I won’t be buying another pair and will be pressing Apple to establish a recycling program.

My etimotic headphones sound great and have a long life.

https://www.apple.com/shop/trade-in

They have a broad recycling program already in place.

Thank you, this helps.

It is a trade off and not for everybody. But for me I value my time and comfort of not having to untangle / untie the stupid pieces of Earpod wire every time I want to use it.

I do agree charging it hurts.

How many meetings do you do on your phone? The people at my company that have them and love them have daily phone meetings. Keeping your hands free while talking and moving around is the critical feature that people seem to love.

I think the confusion on charging comes in with the case - you "charge" the airpods by keeping them together in the case. You charge the case by plugging it in. The case has about 24 hours of battery, so I charge the case about once every two weeks with around 2 hours a day of conference calls/podcast listening. I generally hate having a wire attached from my laptop to my ears because it inevitably will get snagged at least once a week.

Also for my use case (calls) you can charge while listening by using only one bud at a time.

I have many pairs of headphones, wired and wireless, but I just ordered a new set of AirPods because they are simply the most convenient headphone I've ever used (Presuming you use primarily Apple products.) Far from the best sounding - but I've found for a general use headphone they are more than adequate.

> I generally hate having a wire attached from my laptop to my ears because it inevitably will get snagged at least once a week.

I actually finally understand why some people may want wireless now, thank you. Personally somehow I never get my earbud cable snagged, even when snowboarding or climbing. However that tangled mess of wires when i take it out of my pocket...

What about having to have your phone in your pocket and a wire coming out of it into your ears? I've always found that annoying and usually wind up running the wire up inside my shirt so that it's not moving around or getting caught on things. I've never liked having phone holder armbands.

I absolutely loathe working out with wired headphones. Even with them inside my shirt occasionally I'd wind up with enough slack to get them caught on something. Usually when I'm bench pressing or working with free weights.

On the flip side, before BT5 and my S10 I had nothing but problems with all of my wireless headphones constantly skipping. I've actually posted here before that my $200 Jabra 65ts on my S8 would skip just walking to work to the point I'd run wired on my "commute." My S10 solved that, thankfully.

With that said I still refuse to buy a phone without a headphone jack (I'm on an S10 now). I have 2 sets of great (Jabra 65t Elites and Galaxy s10 buds) wireless but if I'm just taking the dogs for a quick walk I throw in whatever wired buds are laying around nearby. Or I'm at someones house/pool and just want a quick way to plug into their speakers.

It really is genius that you charge the holder which charges the buds, though, as opposed to charging the headphones. I can run them (not airpods) down and toss them in the charger for 20 minutes and get a few more hours of listening. Helps battery anxiety quite a bit.

> What about having to have your phone in your pocket and a wire coming out of it into your ears? I've always found that annoying and usually wind up running the wire up inside my shirt so that it's not moving around or getting caught on things

Again it's never been a problem for me however upon further thought I usually put my phone in my bra when doing something physical so it's not a surprise there not an issue.

Now don't get me started on no headphone jack... i have an iphone and I irks me to now end that they removed it for honestly no good reason imho. I only put up with it because it's only occasionally a problem for me as i can charge up the phone pretty quick with my ankor and I prefer iphones for other reasons but man, i would buy the new iphone tomorrow if it had the jack.

> and can't be charged while being used

I'll just address this point, because it is categorically incorrect and something many people misunderstood when they were first released.

There are two of them. You can use them independently from one another. When you hear the "low battery" tone, it's trivial to remove one and continue to use the other. By the time the tone plays again in the one you continued to use (signaling critically low battery), you just swap which earbud is in the case. The one that was in the case will be almost fully charged at this point.

The effect is that you can pretty much use them indefinitely without a full interruption. And using only one at a time is mostly unnoticeable.

That's all well and good if using one were the same as using two. Of course, it isn't...

It helps in a pinch if you’re on a really long conference call and the batteries start to run low. I’ll pop one briefly back in the case to top it off and not have to miss anything said.

Sure, it's a fine workaround for a dying pair, but the GP said:

>I'll just address this point, because it is categorically incorrect and something many people misunderstood when they were first released

GP said they "can't be charged while being used". Which is categorically incorrect. They can, and on the scale of Things That Are a Big Deal, it's an 0.3 out of 10.

They can't both be used, and c'mon; is this really a debate? You cannot use _both_ of them and charge them at the same time. The best experience comes from using _both_ of them simultaneously. So, it's a workaround. It's fine, it's whatever, but it's also silly to get haughty about it as if there were no impact whatsoever.

I really wish I could put myself into the shoes of people who think that fifteen minutes of using only one earbud is a big deal, but I honestly just can't.

To me, that blows big holes in the argument that Airpods are better than wired earphones. It's compromises up and down the chart with the sole benefit being wirelessness? Are people nowadays really that rich that they can dump 150 USD EVERY two to three years just to get rid of a wire?!

Also, I just can't fathom people's willingness to let so much tech into their lives. Laptops, tablets, smartphones, smartwatches, airpods... all of which need to be constantly charged, and replaced once their batteries die, because they cannot be swapped out, meaning the rest of the apparatus lies impotent in a dumpster for a thousand years or more, never to biodegrade... it's depressing and wearisome to picture.

> It's compromises up and down the chart

What compromises?

They're literally always on my person. At all times. Without even having to think about it, because they just come along with my phone and keys whenever they change pockets.

I can wear them all day and basically forget they're there, even when pausing audio to have conversations with people physically in front of me.

For phone calls, they're measurably more convenient since I can just leave my phone on my desk and continue whatever it was I was previously doing.

The "compromises" I have to make, on the other hand are completely insignificant. Sometimes I have to take one earbud out. Sometimes the case is low on battery so I plug it in at the nearest cable on my desk or nightstand. The audio quality is perfectly fine, I have never noticed a difference unless I was explicitly trying to look for one.

> Are people nowadays really that rich that they can dump 150 USD EVERY two to three years just to get rid of a wire?!

Why do you seem to believe that these will only last two or three years? Mine are 2.5 years in and I can't say I've noticed any kind of battery degradation. Surely they won't continue to last indefinitely, but every other wired headphone I've used has had the wire fray sooner or later anyway.

> Also, I just can't fathom people's willingness to let so much tech into their lives.

I can't reply to the other comment you made, but I find it telling that you've decided that you get to be the gatekeeper for what is "too much tech" and what's not. From that comment, "Every person deserves... a laptop... and a smartphone". And headphones too, apparently. But wireless headphones are where we as a society should draw the line?

Somehow I don't think I'd be surprised to find you having this same conversation ten years ago deriding how rich people must be to afford a $1,000 cell phone every few years, when flip phones are just as good and aren't full of compromises like software keyboards.

My wired phones are also on my person. At all times. Without even having to think about it. I can also wear them all day and forget they're there. Actually even better because foam is softer than the hard plastic of the airpods.

The compromises are that you have to charge them all the time. You cannot wear them constantly on an 8 hour flight. One-size-fits-most. They come packaged with an expiry date. Yours are going fine, but on balance, I'd say a careful user could make wired, QUALITY, earphones last longer than Airpods. The audio quality, despite you confident proclamations, isn't even in the vicinity of wired stuff you can get for that price range.

Guilty as charged about being a self-annointed gatekeeper. I'm driven to a low-level despair at our relentless forward march towards a scorched planet. Nevertheless, to conclude the argument, yeah, wireless throwaway airpods and home theaters ARE perhaps where we should draw the line. Where would you draw the line? Or do you think it's all dandy even if we never draw the line?

As to your last point, you're probably right. I have in all seriousness considered moving back to a flip phone. Since I don't have any social media, all that smartphones give me is access to boarding passes for flights, and GPS. But meanwhile, I turn it off at night and make the battery last two to three days between charges.

That we can’t all have home theaters (weird example) and wireless earphones does not mean no one should.

People collect cars, watches, shoes, expensive clothing. On the extreme end there's figurines, paintings, antiques -- at least the former items have utility, the latter are mere articles for signalling to others.

Does it really blow your mind that the ability to move freely without being tethered to a phone is a selling point? I can give an example where it really helps for me: I'm a nudist.

But even when clothed I like walking around able to take a call or listen to music without snagging a cable on one of the many protrusions in this world like door handles, kitchen cupboard handles etc which can also lead to an expensive phone launching from my pocket onto the floor.

If you're worried about pollution, Airpods should be on the low end of the concerns list.

Off topic but any good resources you know of for those interested in nudism? You rarely come across someone who will talk or even admit to it so sorry if that is out of line asking.

/r/nudism on Reddit is ok, not ground-breaking but it's a nexus to other resources as well being a place for general discussion.

Does Apple not recycle their devices anymore? You’re drawing the line in the wrong place. Phones and laptops really can’t get much better, so your other comment makes sense and we should hang onto those for as long as possible. But you know what? Headphones aren’t, and Bluetooth needed to be saved because pairing sucks.

Are you sure $150 every 2-3 years actually sounds like a lot of money to you? Especially on something as important as listening to audio? I don't even think you believe this. My headphones last longer than that, but that's irrelevant to my counterargument.

Show me your receipts and I'll find things I "can't fathom" and all sorts of environmentally questionable decisions. You clearly are willing enough to let technology into your life yet care so little about the environment to post here on your high tech device, to use your own argument. You would lose the game you started very quickly.

Perhaps I would. I have terrible gear acquisiton syndrome when it comes to music and also outdoors-gear. In my defense, though, both of those hobbies tend to have BIFL gear. Guitars and tents last a long time.

>Are people nowadays really that rich that they can dump 150 USD EVERY two to three years just to get rid of a wire?!

Surely you know where you are posting? Fuck yeah there’s a plenty of people here that can afford to throw away 150 USD several times a day.

Your point that you can use one while charging the other was valid and helpful.

But saying "I'll just address this point, because it is categorically incorrect" was unnecessarily aggressive. With that opening, I think people expected a solution with no caveats.

From that opening I just expected that the idea that you had to use two would be a frustratingly widespread misconception and completely wrong. Given that I had that misconception, that the UX implies that it’s the case (remove one and it stops playing music), and it is apparently completely wrong, I’d say the parent was pretty spot on.

I've got an easy fix for you, just buy two pairs, and charge the pair that you're not using!

Given zero interest rates, and the fact that AirPods used half as much will last twice as many days, the two-pair implementation is financially equivalent to the one-pair implementation.

Having to occasionally charge a pair of headphones, and not being able to charge while in use, is easily worth the trade off of being wireless. I would never go back to wired headphones, regardless of quality/price/features

These get charged way less than your phone. The case has about 24-hours worth of charge in it. I’m much more likely to have my phone low on charge than my AirPods. Wireless case charging will make it so that my case is almost always well charged.

This, for sure, but also the AirPod case can be charged whenever, whereas you usually want to charge your phone at night.

I’m struggling to find words to explain what I mean ... there’s rarely a time when I realise I need to charge my AirPods and it’s an inconvenience, whereas the phone always seems to run low at just the wrong time. I dunno.

Plus, you can have the AirPods in your ears, listening to a thing, while the case charges. This takes nothing away from your experience. You can use your iPhone while it charges, but that’s a PITA because now you’re tethered to a wall.

TL;DR: charging them isn’t an issue that should prevent you from buying them. They’re amazing.

Plus (and this isn't unique to AirPods) the lower charge the AirPods are the faster they recharge. As long as you keep the case charged you can drop the pods in for a couple-few minutes while you give your ears a break and you'll get a decent playback duration when you come back.

> What is the improvement I am missing here?

I think what you are missing is that different people value things differently. These don't make sense for you? That's fine, don't buy them. They don't make sense for me either, so I don't buy them.

However, I can understand how it would make sense for someone else. Arguing the money aspect doesn't make sense because we never know a person's income, expenses and savings. $200 for one person is nothing, while it can be the difference between making rent for another.

Arguing sound quality doesn't make sense either, because despite all of the numbers that people throw around, people perceive and enjoy sound differently. It isn't objective, its subjective.

Same thing with the presence of wires. I would have liked these (or, more likely, a larger set of wireless cans) when I lived in Japan and commuted by train daily. Now that I commute by car, my headphone use is limited to netflix in bed and when I'm playing guitar. Wireless doesn't do anything for me in those situations.

Long story short, different strokes for different folks.

Like you, I haven't chosen to get them for myself, but I got them for my wife who loves them. Reasons: I have pockets big enough to always be holding my phone, and I can just run a wire up from my pocket under my shirt and into my ears. No snags. She doesn't have such pockets and wouldn't wire herself in any case. She cares about fashion. I'm a programmer. I care about more important stuff like compilers and her. We'll leave it at that.

I have a headphone jack in my phone. She doesn't, so wireless is mandatory for her. It's just a question of lower quality, big, and clunky, or these. Now that I got these for her, the lower-quality option is forever off the table.

She can cruise around the kitchen cooking while "watching" a video that's playing on a laptop on the counter. I did that using my MacBook Pro's built-in speakers, which eventually blew out both speakers. My phone-in-the-pocket, wired solution limits me to audio-only.

So, yes, there are reasons, and whether they matter depends on the person.

Basically every generation of phones' regressions are based on looking at what Apple manages to get away with, and copying it. Even if I would never buy their junk myself (or encourage anyone else to), it's basically impossible to get away from their aftershocks.

Unremovable batteries? Apple got away with it from the start. Hell, they even managed to get people to pay ridiculous markups to replace them after it was discovered that they tampered with device performance.

Unremovable storage? Just look at what Apple manages to charge for storage upgrades!

Dropping the headphone jack? iPhone 7 got away with it, and drove the sale of plenty of adapters.

USB-C? Well, if Apple could get people to buy new Lightning devices and chargers...

These are standard "features" now. Every phone has this now. There are no other options for me to "vote for" with my wallet anymore, even though I always did when the I had the option to. There is no way for me, as a single consumer, to get away from this bullshit.

Fashion doesn't spring up from thin air. It's crafted by people. With agendas. And accessories to sell.

Hell, nobody seemed happy about any of these changes when they were introduced. But the manufacturers had the pockets to outlast the outrage. And eventually, fashion changed.

And, just maybe, ask why on earth a whole industry exists around fake pockets, and what accessories they exist to sell.

I feel what you're saying. I myself am very disappointed (not to say displeased) with late Apple products and I'm currently in the process of moving away from macOS and iOS. But I'll stick to my AirPods.

They are _the_only_ wireless earbuds on the market that you don't push inside your ear canals, and I absolutely abhor the in-canal ones. They also look nice, work great, I wear them for hours almost every day. Even put them on for quick calls. Probably one of the best technology products I've ever owned.

How about arguing for the environmental cost of our throwaway culture?

Airpods have a MUCH higher environmental impact than ordinary earphones. A lot of tech is crammed into these things, all of which uses energy, resources, distilled water and so on to produce.

I have a pair of Shure earphones that have "just worked" for going onto three years now. I had to change NOTHING on them, and they've never complained. I've worn them for 2+ hours Every. Single. Day. during that time period.

People are reporting rubbish battery lives on the Apple subreddit already, with several of them desperately hoping for new ones so they can mindlessly continue upgrading without stopping to consider where that tech ends up.

> I have a pair of Shure earphones that have "just worked" for going onto three years now. I had to change NOTHING on them, and they've never complained. I've worn them for 2+ hours Every. Single. Day. during that time period.

And I have a pair of Airpods that have "just worked" for I guess about two and a half years now. I've had to change NOTHING on them, and they've never complained. I've worn them for 2+ hours (almost) Every. Single. Day. during that time period.

> People are reporting rubbish battery lives on the Apple subreddit already

People are going to report a litany of problems with every new product. There is zero reason to believe that battery life on these new AirPods should be, outside of defective devices, any less than the previous model.

Let's come back to this thread in two more years and continue this chat. Are you in good faith arguing that airpods and quality earphones will last the same amount of time and have the same environmental impact? It's one thing to have wanton disregard for the environment and say "Fuck climate change, convenience rulez", but a whole another thing to try to convince yourself that there IS no difference between the two choices.

Also, to preempt any exhortations of slippery slope fallacies, I'd say every person deserves a good laptop that they take care of, and a smartphone that they try to get to last as long as possible. That's where we draw the line. Every gadget beyond that should cause a serious examination of how necessary it is in one's life, and whether it is a want or a need. Airpods would fail catastrophically for almost everyone in such a sytem.

How many monitors do people deserve? Is anyone allowed to have a car? What about food processors? Are wifi routers okay, I mean wired ethernet worked just fine for decades.

Seriously. At least be consistent. If you're living off your own land, growing your own tomatoes and dreadlocks, and own zero technology, I'd understand and probably agree with you as you rant about the selfish decadence of humanity over the fire pit.

But these comments here are basically the height of virtue signaling and weird oneupmanship. The fact that they are posting on HN about it on their high-tech device is hilarious.

For example, they brag about their save-the-world low-fi headphones without realizing the irony of also owning the high-tech landfilling gadget they plug them into.

Why does the conversation always devolve into "go live in a cave"? Surely you must agree that there is a spectrum of possibilities, and the further along it one can be the better? Eating mostly vegetarian food, driving as little as possible, owning as little tech as possible, having as few children as one can. These would have seemed to me to be relatively uncontroversial opinions.

The implications of all these comments seems to be that it's perfectly OK to buy Airpods every two to three years for decades to come, because there are other avenues in which we are also fucking the environment.

Two monitors, unless you're working at a NASA control center. No cars for journeys under five miles, unless you have disabilities. Food processors and wifi routers are OK, because they both are closer to BIFL compared to airpods. Wired ethernet IS better if you've got a desktop.

Anything else?

i would wager that your argument is a rounding error compared to laptops, phones, and tvs... are airpods less environmentally friendly than regular headphones? sure, but let’s tackle things that actually matter before nitpicking. my airpods are devices that i’ve had longer than many of my other electronics purchases, and they’re certainly a quality of life improvement

Fair enough, but I'm already trying to tackle the other things: travelling by train when possible, /r/nocar, biking everywhere, making my phones and laptops last as long as I can, no children, eating mostly vegetarian (not that difficult when you're Indian).

The environmental Argument is interesting as I am thinking about getting AirPods precisely because Im sick of throwing away my regular in Ears because the headphone jacks keep breaking when I carry them crumbled in my jeans. (I hate having them tangle around while not in use). As an earlier poster pointed out: It all depends on your use case and preferences.

Shure, and many other good companies, make earphones with removable cables. These MMCX cables can be bought relatively cheaply (decent ones on Amazon france seem to be about EUR 15 onwards). Even better, the ones that come with the earphones are burly as fuck, and as I said, mine have lasted three years with no damage or loose soldering to report.

I did a review of Shure in ear monitors. They sent me their entire product lineup, though I only reviewed two of their products. The highest priced monitor had a cable break 2 years later, with only minimal use in that period. They had/have outstanding customer support for this class of monitor, and replaced it for free. Cable broke 6 months later. They would have replaced that too, but I didn't pay for the monitors, and felt like it was right to push it. These are the type of in ear monitors musicians use on stage during performances, and easily run of $1k. They sounded fantastic, but they were as reliable as Apple's $30 corded airbuds.

Don't know what to tell you, except my experience didn't match yours. The only special thing I do to care for them is to fold them in figure-of-eights so that there isn't much stress on the cables when stowed. They've gotten caught in doorknobs etc. during my time of owning them, but still going strong.

Following the same line of argument, why are we even discussing this stuff on the internet, using devices that consume electricity, going through servers that likely consume tons of power... when we could all meet in a field and talk?

Honestly, this sort of attitude is why I just struggle to trust any “green” activism, despite fundamentally being a leftie. You are happy to live in a cave, fine, do that; but myself, I like my tech and I want to keep going forward.

What is your brilliant solution then? It's rather simple. There are billions of us on the planet. You cannot have them all live the standard American lifestyle full of chromecasts and Apple Homepods and use-and-dispose Airpods.

The best that I can think of is minimizing my impact. This heavily involves minimal tech.

We had the same arguments for decades, and we are still here. Whenever we hit a snag, like oil or food running out, we think of solutions, like changing energy sources to renewables or improving agricultural efficiency. Progress is made by unreasonable people.

As I said, you're free to do as you please, and I'm free to say that I'll do differently.

Good luck with the Shures continuing to last. I absolutely love my Shures, but I’ve gone through ~4 pairs in the last 12 years, and I don’t think I’m particularly hard on them. It’s a bit better now that they have replaceable cables, but even after that change, I’ve had at least one socket fail on them on the earbud side.

Dunno if you've used them but you might find this insight helpful if you're ever keen on them in the future,

I find the sound quality argument hillarious. They barely block any outoutside noise, which is great for the commuter use case. You want to hear traffic and train/bus stop announcements.

They're perfect for that use case.

They're not meant for sound quality but they aren't nearly as bad as people would think by how much this is brought up.

If you want quality / noise cancelling on your commute go for Sony mx3's.

Why is charging while using a feature even worth mentioning? AirPods gain 3 hours of battery life (listening time) with 15 minutes of charging in the case, vs. 5 hours of total battery life between charges. That's very little difference, and if you're doing something important where interruptions are unacceptable (like a phone/video call), you can always charge one AirPod at a time in the case (they both have microphones). In practice I just don't find it hard to believe that very many people would ever need or even use the "charge while using" feature.

I love my AirPods. I am in full panic mode when I realize that I forgot them at home (happens rarely). They are the best Apple products in years. Why? Because they simply work, seamlessly. Product development in perfection.

Can’t be charged while being used? Who cares? They last long enough. 1 out of 50 times I wear them they run out of battery. Charging them takes 5 minutes, so it’s not a big deal.

Also, the whole point is that they’re wireless. If you don’t care about this specific feature it’s no wonder you don’t see them as an improvement.

"They are the best Apple products in years. Why? Because they simply work, seamlessly. Product development in perfection."

I can't remember ever trying to use headphones/earphones and not have them "just work."

Wireless ones? Really?

The improvement they're buying isn't to their listening experience.

> I honestly can't say I understand the draw to drop significant money on a new set of headphones that need to be charged at least as often as a my phone, and can't be charged while being used.

Maybe if you are using them 24/7. The battery in the case can charge the airpods batteries several times.

Not even if you are using them 24/7, since that would drain your phone battery. That is one downside, though — that your phone battery drains more quickly with wireless headphones. I've noticed this on my 7 Plus for sure.

Freedom of movement more than anything. I bought a pair and they sounded about as mediocre as the wired apple earbuds. I loved the freedom it provided. I don't know how many times I flung my phone or macbook to the ground because I was wired.

I had to return them because one of my ears isn't a good fit. One earpod stuck out almost 45 degrees out of my ears and loosen over prolonged use.

My first pair of Airpods, even after 2 years, still worked for hours on a charge. And of course “charging” just means putting them in your pocket. I just wish I had waited to run them through the laundry until today. I bought a new pair just recently.

I can carry AirPods always in pocket and easily pop them to ear before answering call. I did not like wired ones, because wire would get tangled with keys etc. Is this worth the price? For me yes, but certainly not for everybody.

I charge my AirPods case probably less often than every month. With heavier usage that might be weekly. (The AirPods themselves are recharged by the case, which is where they go when they're not in my ears anyway.)

Literally the only significant attraction is not having the wire. Ever since wireless headphones started to actually work reliably, I've used them exclusively (big over-the-ear ones for music, airpods for things like calls or online meetings).

For me it was all about the fucking tangle. I don't care much about having the cable on while I am using them. But having to do that stupid devil-horns-figure-eight winding technique to avoid the cable getting tangled into a knot, every single time I want to put the headphones into my pocket, which I do several times a day... ugh.

For me, going back to wired headphones would be like going back to getting on the train by going up to a vending machine, putting coins into it, pushing buttons, waiting for it to emit a paper ticket, and then getting on the train.

It's only a difference of a few seconds, usually, but it something I do over and over and over and over, so that's why it's worth it to me.

(I dropped significant money on a new iphone as soon as it finally got train-pass functionality here in Japan, too.)

+1 and mini-jack headsets doesn't need an additional power plants. Think about it when in the next keynote they'll say how "green" and "clean" they are ...

>that need to be charged at least as often as a my phone

That's not true at all with AirPods. I use them nearly every day and I haven't had to charge them in almost 2 full weeks since charge while in the case and 5 minutes of charge lasts a few hours.

They're seriously awesome. I never would have purchased them myself or asked for them for the price they're asking but I got them as a gift and I think they're amazing.

You need to charge them roughly a magnitude less than your phone. That's once a week or more if you charge your phone everyday because your usage of your phone is supposed to directly correlate with your usage of the airpods.

So, unless you use your wired headphones on other devices, it's not a good comparison.

I love the Apple wired earphones that come with the phone. However, if you travel a lot or move around, the wires tend to tangle and when you need the headset in the split of a second they don't work. It's not a critical use case but the more you travel, the more you move around, the tangled headphones start annoying you more and more. You'll reach a point at which $150 or $200 doesn't seem like a big deal to get rid of this annoyance.

If you fly a lot, then you'll really appreciate over the ear headphones, preferably the noise cancelling ones. That being said, these wireless over the ear phones are too bulky to use in day to day life such as commute etc. So now you end up owning one pair of wireless noise cancelling headphones for flying, air pods for your day-day commute. You see where I am going with this .. welcome to capltalism :)

some people are more susceptible to marketing tactics.

I don't own any, but I do have a 3rd party wireless headset. For me, ditching the cable means avoiding the inexplicable and over-the-top rage I experience when wired earphones/headphones get suddenly yanked on the occasion they catch on something. Once in a while I'll meet somebody else that has this type of reaction. It's weird.

My experience differs from yours. I find the lightning port to be considerably robust. I drop my AirPods case fairly regularly and keep it in my jean pocket on work days (though I find myself not using them all too much). I charge my pods maybe once a week and don't have battery life problems. If the AirPods were only chargeable inductively, they would (presumably) take considerably longer to charge and thus impact my experience.

The new case supports both, and it would be unwise to get rid of charging via a cable. It works great in a car or on the go.

But I would do inductive 99% of the time, most likely at night while I sleep.

>and the ability to have different tips on them to increase fit for more people and to provide the option of sealing out outside noise.

This is the single biggest reason why I won't upgrade to the AirPods. For me, the AirPods simply fall out of my ears. That's why I stick with the Etymotic Ear Phonnes: https://www.etymotic.com/consumer/earphones.html

For whatever reason, that flanged shape fits my ears so perfectly well and blocks out all other noises that I don't see myself using any other Ear Phones for a long while. If AirPods provided the option of a flange shape like the Etymotics, then I'd be compelled to buy an AirPod.

Finally getting the podcasts app on my watch was one of the things I was most excited about with the latest WatchOS

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