AirPods Pro even more magical

I always knew the AirPods would be popular, even if I also knew everyone who wore them looked like a goober.

 

I always knew the AirPods would be popular, even if I also knew everyone who wore them looked like a goober. There was something special about them, and I’m definitely not talking about the sound quality. Anyone who bought a pair would quickly learn and appreciate the magic of how easily the AirPods worked with your iPhone.

The relationship between AirPods on your phone was seamless, easy and fun. It felt like magic, ­especially compared with how complicated and finicky other Blue­tooth earbuds could be. It’s that magic that turns a gadget from something you like to something you love, and from something that you use maybe once every so often to every single day, and maybe for most of the day.

The AirPods Pro retain that magic, and add a bevy of new features including Active Noise Cancelling and — in a welcome bonus — the shorter stems make you look less like a goober.

The first thing anyone notices about the AirPods, for better or worse, is how they look. The original AirPods made such a splash because of their distinctive white stems, which are now so familiar that jewellery makers are even making look-alike earrings. Other earbuds fit neatly and discreetly in your ear, but the original AirPods made sure everyone who saw you knew exactly what earbuds you were using.

The AirPods Pro retain their magic.

That is still the case with the AirPods Pro, but to a far lesser extent. Technology has a tendency to shrink over time and, in the three years since Apple first released its AirPods, the company has found a way to pack more tech into a smaller package.

The AirPods Pro have shorter stems than their predecessor, and therefore are much more subtle. They still look unmistakably like AirPods. The stems themselves are useful, too. “Clicking” them pauses the music or changes track.

The main other reason you’d purchase AirPods, and I think this is far more important than their looks, is the sound. And the good news is that AirPods Pro sound great, and I couldn’t say that about the originals.

The tight seal that is formed means the sound is natural, and bassy when needed, and Apple says extra technology including in-built microphones and what it calls Adaptive EQ (which “automatically tunes the low and mid-frequencies of the music to the shape of an individual’s ear”) mean the new earbuds consistently sound good.

Unlike the AirPods before them, the Pros are sweatproof, too, making them great gym buddies. The biggest change of perhaps the whole device is the addition of active noise cancellation, meaning you can walk past a worksite, or just a noisy co-worker, and the sound is effectively blocked.

As with most things Apple, it just works, and is an extremely welcome addition and not just for those who like to get lost in their music.

Switching to “transparency mode”, in which you can hear the world around you, is as easy as pressing and holding the AirPods’ stem until you hear a chime.

As with most things Apple, AirPods just work.

Other headphones sound better, of course. My over-ear phone headphones that I use from Focal, while not exactly portable, are still my day-to-day headphones that I use while working, while my Sennheiser Momentum on-ear headphones will remain my go-to for long flights and commutes for the foreseeable future.

But for everything else — working out, heading in to the city for a few hours, or idly reading the newspaper by the couch — the AirPods Pro fit the bill. They’re just easy to get out and start using, and sound as good as you’d expect from $399 earbuds.

The “magic” I spoke about earlier is real. Pairing the AirPods Pro is as easy as taking them out of the box, opening the charging case next to your iPhone or Apple Watch and tapping “connect”.

They then pair not just with your iPhone, but all of the Apple devices you’ve signed into your iCloud account.

There’s also a “fit test”, which uses the earbuds’ microphones to test whether you’ve got the right sized seal on for your ears.

The AirPods Pro also work well with Android — you’ll just lose minor features like the fit test, audio sharing and, of course, Siri.