Sony WH-1000XM4s will set you back $350 and these are favourite NC headphones for many.
The AirPods Max have some clear advantages over those: 9 microphones, huge suite of positioning sensors including gyroscope and accelerometer etc. Presumably the sound quality and NC will be at least as good as Sony's, and the software, UX and "build quality" significantly better.
I was willing to give Apple a chance last year and got AirPods Pro, but they proved abysmal in terms of everything—comfort for wearing long term, isolation, sound quality, going out of sync with each other, and a while ago one of them started to emit loud noise randomly. It’s likely that some of those issues are related to my unit and individual fit, but I’m back to Shure SE215/SE425 and their black foam tips (which achieve very similar overall attenuation without active NC[0]) as my go-to in-ear headphones.
For over-the-ears I have fairly old (and virtually unbreakable) Sony WH-1000XM3; when their battery goes I would love to give Apple another chance but the price tag makes it hard to justify.
IMO to any audiophile/sound engineer familiar with the brands mentioned by eertami the price of Apple’s new AirPods would indeed appear outlandish.
[0] Measurably so: https://www.rtings.com/headphones/reviews/apple/airpods-pro-... vs. https://www.rtings.com/headphones/reviews/shure/se215#compar...
The comfort is unmatched, however, and battery life is still fantastic on them despite very heavy use. Not sure I can imagine that battery ever dying!
I've been toying with the idea of buying XM4s but I'm tempted by Apple's. I guess I'll give them a try and can always return them if the comfort etc isn't as good as Sony's.
The only feature I find worth considering AirPods Max for is, unexpectedly, the 5.1/7.1 sound. If it is truly done properly (which I doubt, but promo materials hint at something there) then I have to admit, I don’t have the room for a proper setup like that, so this could be an accessible way to try working with surround sound.
Suspiciously, nothing is known about the codec and connectivity in general. If new AirPods are limited to kbps-starved AAC/SBC, like AirPods Pro, that’d be very frustrating. I know, diminishing returns, but I don’t want yet another sound reproduction system “optimized” for streaming at Apple Music bitrates (especially if it’s 7.1). Sony’s LDAC aside, something approaching 600 kbps like aptX—or, absent that, at least an external audio in!—could make the price almost seem acceptable.
Contact Apple, they'll replace them for you. My new pair have been fine... so far.
Don't get me wrong, Apple is OK at consumer audio. The Homepod is nice, so are the APPs. Even Beats aren't too bad nowadays. But they haven't released consistently better audio products than Audeze, Sennheiser, Sony, M&D, or even Bose--their closest comparison, since both Apple and Bose lean hard on DSPs for their SQ.
I suspect the second version of these headphones will be pretty excellent. Apple does learn from its mistakes, whatever they'll end up being. Trick is Bose and Sony will have learned from their mistakes too. It'll be interesting to see if Apple ends up being able to compete on audio, not just style.