AirPods Pro

AirPods Pro - FULL Review (after 1+ month of use)

These are the brand new AirPods Pro and you’ve probably heard all about them by now, some of you have even heard them in person.

When buying a pair of new headphones, I believe that there are six major things you need to consider:

  1. Sound Quality

  2. Comfortability

  3. Battery Life

  4. Special Features

  5. Design

  6. Value

I’ve been using the AirPods Pro’s since they came out on October the 30th, so well over a month now, and I’m finally ready to give you guys my full in-depth review on Apple’s highest end first party headphones.

Spoiler, they’re the best headphones I’ve ever used!

SOUND QUALITY

First off I have to say, I am not an audiofile person myself. In terms of overhead “pro” headphones that I’ve used, I’ve used the Audiotechnica M70X’s which are studio monitors, the Audiotechnica M50X’s, and the Beats Solo 2’s. I, of course, have used countless in-ear headphones, from Apple’s original EarPods, to the new EarPods, to the Lightning EarPods, to AirPods, Samsung headphones, HTC headphones, Jaybird X3’s and a few more. So I’ve used a fair amount of headphones, but not as many as possible some of you guys. Just wanted to give you a bit of a background as to where I’m coming from in terms of the sound quality.

So how is the Sound Quality on the AirPods Pro’s? Well, they’re good. They’re not the best sounding truly wireless headphones on the market, the Sony ones are better and there’s a few other better options in terms of the sound quality, but they’re still very good.

When I compared the new AirPods to the originals I certainly felt that the new ones had much richer mids and definitely more bass than the originals. It’s kinda like the difference between the 2019 15” MacBook Pro and the new 16” MacBook Pro, where you can just hear more with the new 16”’s speakers, so that’s great!

The addition of the rubber seals means that sound is less likely to escape

The addition of the rubber seals means that sound is less likely to escape

But what makes the AirPods Pro sound even better now is the fact that they’re now finally in-ear headphones. They now have a rubber seal, which is something that you can find on pretty much any other pair of headphones on the market right now, which helps seal the sound coming from the AirPods, so that pretty much no sound escapes. You can pretty much say goodbye to people around you hearing everything that you listen to, at least on medium volume. But, this seal also improves the sound quality simply by the fact that less sound escapes from your ear.

More about that eartip once I get to the comfortability section of the video, but there is one more feature that improves the sound quality, and that is the Active Noise Cancellation. So like I said before, the ear tips help to prevent sound escaping from your ear, but at the same time they also help prevent external ambient sound from entering your ear. Overall, they do offer a passive noise cancellation on their own, but Apple’s added Active Noise Cancellation makes it even better. The way it works is that the AirPods Pro now have an outward facing microphone which is this long black grill on the stem which picks up all the ambient noise around you and then the AirPods themselves emit a counter noise of opposite frequency that cancels out the background noise.

I wasn’t sure how well this would work when I heard about it, but it works much better than I expected. If you’re in a place where there’s a lot of the same consistent noise, such as on a bus, a train, a plane, it’s very easy for the AirPods Pro to cancel out that background noise, since it can predict the pattern that’s coming up next. However, when it comes to cancelling out voices or unexpected sounds that don’t have a pattern, you’ll still be able to hear them, just not as loud. But I can definitely say that when I’m waking on the street and I have my AirPods Pro in, with Noise Cancelling on, it just immerses me so much in the music or the podcast that I’m listening to. It’s a world apart from the regular AirPods and even when I’m outdoors it sounds like I’m still in my bedroom with zero background noise.

The three new modes for the AirPods Pro allow you to control how much noise cancellation you want to have

The three new modes for the AirPods Pro allow you to control how much noise cancellation you want to have

Now, some of you might be like, “oh, well , we actually preferred the regular AirPods, since you can still hear your surroundings, rather than being cut out from the world entirely”, and I agree, I’m actually like that as well. But the good news is that you can still do that. You can actually turn off Noise Cancelling mode and just have the passive noise cancelling, but if that’s not enough and you want that regular AirPods open back feel to them, you can actually enable a third mode called Transparency Mode. What this does is that it uses the external microphones I talked about before, to literally let background audio in this time, so that you can hear everything that’s happening around you. To be fair, it’s pretty amazing! It’s not as open backed as the regular AirPods were, but it’s very close. My slight issue with it is that you can hear some distortion since the sound is picked up by the microphone rather than your ear, so you do feel like a cyborg in a way.

But to give you an example of how useful Transparency Mode is, I was able to go into a store, order some food and speak to the store assistant without even removing my AirPods Pro. I had them in my ear and I just held the side button which switches between Noise Cancelling and Transparency mode, and I was easily able to hear what the other person was saying, and when the conversation was done, I just re-enabled Noise Cancelling and boom, I was in my own world again. It was just amazing, this is something we do not have on any other headphones on the market right now, and it’s actually my favourite feature in a product of this year.

COMFORTABILITY

So as important as sound quality is, if a pair of in-ear headphones are not comfortable to wear they are near useless. So how comfy are the AirPods Pro?

Well, surprisingly, they’re more comfortable than the original AirPods, thanks to the silicone eartips. With these they just float in your ears so nicely, and they also fit so much better than the regular AirPods did, so that’s great!

Now when you open up the box you actually get three different pair of eartips; small, medium and large, with the medium ones pre-installed. This is something that you get with pretty much every single pair of in-ear headphones, but what’s unique about Apple’s eartips is that they have a brand new attaching mechanism. This means that they are extremely difficult to remove, to the point where I actually though that I was going to break them, but they are extremely easy to put back on, as they just click in place. The downside of this first party fitting mechanism is that you have to use Apple’s own eartips, which are good, but I would’ve loved to have the option to test some foam eartips as well, that expand in your ear and provide and even better seal. I’m pretty sure that third party manufactures will start selling those at some point, but until then you have to stick to Apple’s own eartips.

The Ear Tip Test lets you know if the tips you have attached are the right ones for your ears

The Ear Tip Test lets you know if the tips you have attached are the right ones for your ears

Now, when you buy any other in-ear headphones, you need to try multiple eartips for each of your ears and see which ones fit best, which is fine. But the AirPods Pro have this really amazing feature where, they will emit some sound and tell you in the setup process itself, if you have a good fit or not. This is thanks to the external microphone which is able to pick up the amount of sound that escapes from your ear and if that amount exceeds a certain level, it will tell you to change the eartip. Nice!

Also, one of the main complaints that some people had with in-ear headphones is that some of them isolate so well, that they create this pressure in your ear canal and they actually hurt. But, I’m glad to say that the AirPods Pro do not have this issues, and that’s because the top grill is actually an air vent that helps equalise the pressure. I have to say, it’s not as good as not having overheads that don’t go in your ear, or even the regular AirPods, as you’ll still feel a bit of pressure but nowhere near as much as you would with any other in-ear headphones. So I really do like that.

So overall, they’re definitely more comfortable than the original AirPods, just with a tiny bit more air pressure, especially when Active Noise Cancelling is enabled.

 

BATTERY LIFE

Ok, pretty good so far! Great sound quality, great comfortability so now, how’s the battery life?

Well, it’s similar to the regular AirPods, as in we get 24 hours with the charging case on both, but the battery life on the AirPods themselves is a bit different. So rather than five hours like we get with the regular AirPods, we get four and a half hours with the AirPods Pro. But this is actually with Noise Cancelling turned on. If you turn it off, you would get five hours, which is the same as before. However, we do get up to three and a half hours of talk time compared to three hours on the regular AirPods, so talk time has actually been improved.

But I do have two small complaints in terms of the battery life. The first one being that they still have a lightning port, and I do get why, because the iPhone 11 Pro’s still have a lightning port. But the MacBook’s have USB C, the iPad Pro also has USB C, and USB C isn’t even the future anymore, it’s the present! If Apple does finally switch to USB C next year, the AirPods Pro would be the only one that would be left behind. So, that’s quite inconvenient.

Also, whilst they do support wireless charging, which is great, the iPhone 11 Pro max does not support reverse wireless charging like the Samsung Galaxy S and Note series, or Huawei phones do, meaning that you cannot charge them from the back of the iPhone, like you can with Samsung’s Galaxy Buds or even the AirPods Pro, if you do have a Samsung phone. But that is more of a complaint towards the iPhone 11 Pro’s, not necessarily the AirPods Pro themselves.

 

SPECIAL FEATURES

Now, what special features do the AirPods Pro have that make them stand out from the competition, I hear you ask?

Well, aside from things such as the Transparency mode and the vent and the EarTip test, which are all unique to the AirPods Pro, we do get quite a few new special features.

First, they’re sweat and water resistant now with an IPX4 rating. Unfortunately, this means that you can’t swim with them in, but if you’re outdoors running and it’s raining these would last fine, whereas the previous AirPods might have broken. Also if you do go to the gym, these are now even better thanks to the sweat resistance and the added rubber seals, which make them stay in place unlike the original AirPods.

Secondly, we have the Hey Siri support. This is something that the AirPods 2 came with, which were introduced back in March 2019. But it’s pretty awesome being able to just say the Siri command and play any song that you want, read messages, news, do anything that you would do with Siri on your iPhone, without having to take your phone out of the pocket. This is extremely useful when you’re running outdoors.

The small indentation seen here is the new control button for the AirPods Pro

The small indentation seen here is the new control button for the AirPods Pro

Thirdly, you do have a brand new control button. So before, with the regular AirPods, you had to double tap on the stem in order for the accelerometer to detect the tap, which was quite bad because most of the times it didn’t work. With the AirPods Pro, we have a long button which you have to physically hold and then press. Then if you press it once you play or pause a song, if you press it twice you swipe forward, press it three times to skip backwards and then you press and hold to switch between Active Noise Cancelling and Transparency Mode. Also, something quite cool is that when you tap on the control button, you can feel and hear it click but it doesn’t move at all. Instead, the AirPods Pro create this sound that mimics a click.

Overall, it’s definitely an improved control system over the original AirPods, but I would’ve loved to see a volume control. You see, every time I need to change the volume, I have to either take my phone out to do it, or ask Siri which is awkward if you’re in a public space, or use the Apple Watch which does work very well but you need to have an Apple Watch as well in that case.

Then finally, what I consider to be the best special feature about the AirPods Pro is the Apple ecosystem. You just open up the lid and they instantly connect to your iPhone, and then you can easily switch to using them on your iPad, your Mac, your Apple Watch, your Apple TV, pretty much any Apple product and that’s just amazing! Now, I have had issues in terms of connecting to my Mac, which is something that I’ve had issues with with the previous AirPods as well. So while iOS connection is very smooth, connecting and switching to a Mac still has some occasional glitches. You can indeed connect them to any other non-Apple product as well, Android phones, Windows laptop and any other smartTV that has Bluetooth.

However, I would say to not buy these if you don’t have a least one Apple product you plan on using them with, because outside of the Apple ecosystem, the volume is extremely low on these for some reason, and the equaliser is all gone so they don’t sound as good. Noise Cancelling does work but you lose many of the Apple functionality like auto-play and pause when you put them in your ears and take them out.

DESIGN

Now, if a pair of headphones has nailed all of these categories, which the AirPods Pro have, then the last thing aside from the value that I care about, is the design.

A design comparison between the AirPods Pro (Left) and the original AirPods (Right)

A design comparison between the AirPods Pro (Left) and the original AirPods (Right)

Well, first off these are very different from the original AirPods design wise. They’re now short and fat, compared to long and thin, but they still have the same AirPods look where they just look odd and unlike anything else on the market right now. This means that they will definitely stand out in public, if that’s what you’re after. I personally don’t think they look bad, just unusual.

The same goes for the case itself, it’s short and fat compared to long and thin like the previous one was. It is noticeably wider, but at the same time it now opens horizontally, rather than vertically. So, if you put both of them side by side, vertically, there isn’t that much of a difference between the two. The Pro case is thicker and taller but it still fits in my pocket so I’m fine with that. It’s still noticeably smaller than any other wireless headphones case on the market, including the Galaxy Buds which already has one of the smallest cases.

They come in the same glossy white plastic, but personally I would’ve loved to see these in matte black. I’m guessing Apple is keeping that for a special edition or something, so that they can sell more but until then we only have white.

 

VALUE

Then last, but not least, the value, are the AirPods Pro worth it? Well, at $250/£250 in the UK they are quite expensive. They are a very similar price to the Sony WF-1000XM3, which do sound better, but have a gigantic case which isn’t pocketable by any means. But if you have an Android phone then get the Sony’s and not the AirPods.

Otherwise, they’re a very good pair of headphones, definitely the best option for any Apple user. But if you already have a pair of AirPods, unless you have the 1st gen and the battery life is really bad, I wouldn’t suggest upgrading to the Pro’s.

But if you do have the original AirPods or a different pair of headphones and you plan on getting the AirPods Pro, you won’t be disappointed in any way.

AirPods Pro - Unboxing, Noise Cancelling, Sound Test & More!

Yesterday we put out our 20 things you didn’t know article and video, explaining all the things you may not have known about the latest addition to the AirPods line-up, and today we have the AirPods Pro in the studio!

So grab those snacks and drinks and check out my live reaction and unboxing in the video above and have a read of three things I wanted to try out first on the AirPods Pro!

COMFORTABILITY

First things first, you can definitely feel them in your ears, so they’re nothing like Apple mentioned where you wouldn’t even notice them thanks to the new vent. You’ll definitely notice them right away, I can tell you that. 

Between the AirPods and the AirPods Pro, the Pros are a bit more comfortable, but that’s mainly because of the smaller size, so you don’t really feel the long foot touching your ear. Also, since they do have the rubber seals, they do secure far better than the regular AirPods do.

By taking the Ear Tip test you can see if you have the right rubber seal in

By taking the Ear Tip test you can see if you have the right rubber seal in

Inside the box you get three sizes of rubber seals; small, medium and large, but they all come with the medium ones pre-installed. I found that the medium ones work best for me, but here’s a Pro tip, once you pair the AirPods with your iPhone you can go into the bluetooth settings and then tap on the i icon, of your AirPods Pro’s and then you get into a menu which allows you to do an Ear Tip Fit Test so you can get the right size. What this does is that it will play a sound and the outwards facing microphone will read how much of that sound escapes from your ear. And if that’s too much, it will give you a message that you need to try a different size ear tip. 

I haven’t seen any other earphones that can do this, so props to Apple for implementing such a system.
Speaking of system, there’s a weird proprietary system of mounting the rubber ear tips. To remove them you have to pull really hard to the point where you think you’re about to break them. However, putting them on is very easy as they just click into place. 

 

ACTIVE NOISE CANCELLATION

So the biggest new feature that you get with the AirPods Pro’s is of course, noise cancellation. Now this is done both passive and well as actively. It’s done passive via the silicone ear tips that I mentioned before and then actively in a pretty smart way. The three microphones detect the background noise and then the AirPods themselves emit a sound of an opposite frequency in order to eliminate that background noise.

And it actually works extremely well, at least for in-ear earbuds. I mean they’re not as good as actual over the head noise cancelling headphones would be, but still I was very impressed with how well this worked. 

If you go to your volume option, with the AirPods Pro in, you will get the options to switch between the three options.

If you go to your volume option, with the AirPods Pro in, you will get the options to switch between the three options.

Now if you force touch on the Volume bar on your iPhone once they’ve been paired, you can switch between these three modes; Noise Cancellation, then Off and then Transparency mode. Think of this as the level of background noise that’s removed. So when transparency mode is on, the microphones will actually transmit the audio from the outside, back into your ears, in order to re-create that feeling of open-back headphones that the original AirPods had. And it’s not quite the same thing but it’s still pretty impressive. It’s in between in-ear headphones and the original AirPods. Then the off mode, is very similar to regular in-ear headphones where the seal is created by the silicone ear tips and then finally noise cancellation is the one where the AirPods will try to remove as much background noise as they can.

Now, when noise cancelling is on, they do give you that feeling of having a lot of air pressure inside your ears. Basically the same feeling that you get when you’re in a plane. But once I disable noise cancelling or turn on Transparency mode, that feeling is pretty much entirely gone. So I do find them a bit uncomfortable because of this feeling when I’m using noise cancellation, guess it will just take me a while getting use to it.

You also have that pressure sensitive button which is really cool! You see, it’s not really a physical button, it’s just a capacitive touch pad. However when you press it the AirPods Pro’s will actually make this clicking sound to give you the impression that it actually clicks!

And from there you have the three commands that I’ve mentioned before; tap once to pause, double tap to skip to the next song and triple tap to go to the previous song. And if you hold that bar, you can switch between the Noise Cancelling Mode and the Transparency mode, and you can also add an Off mode by going into the bluetooth menu options. 

You can even ask Siri to turn on an off Noise Cancelling or Transparency Mode, so that works as well, alongside the ability to invoke Siri by saying the ‘Hey Siri’ command.

 

SOUND QUALITY

Finally, when it comes to the actual sound quality, it’s pretty good! It’s much better than the original AirPods, the bass is stronger, the voice is clearer.

But the original AirPods weren’t that well known for their sound quality anyway. So if those were a 6/10, these are probably about a 9. They’re a noticeable upgrade, but that’s mostly due to the noise cancellation which removes all the background noise so that you can focus on your music. So that’s pretty much what makes them sound so much better than the original AirPods did.

There is no real point in getting the AirPods Pro if you have an Android device as the sound quality is much poorer

There is no real point in getting the AirPods Pro if you have an Android device as the sound quality is much poorer

And as a conclusion, I love them. It’s pretty amazing having active noise cancelling earbuds that are this small. The Sony ones are very good as well, but the charging case is just gigantic. 

Also, if you have an Android phone just forget about getting these because the volume would be unbearably low. 

Other than that, they’re great and a huge step up from the original AirPods. But are they £250 / $250 good? Not fully sure just yet, a few more days of testing and I will have a verdict for you.