Some people are more inclined towards open-ear design earbuds, and the AirPods has gotten a major overhaul in terms of audio quality and options, and design. In this piece, we are going to bring you through the main features of the AirPods 4 and AirPods 4 with ANC. It’s definitely time for an upgrade to AirPods 4 or AirPods 4 with ANC if you’re still using the previous generation AirPods.
Overall Look & Feel
The first thing that caught my attention, was how compact the new AirPods 4 feels. The charging case fits snugly into my pocket without me even noticing it much, and the AirPods 4 felt more finessed. If I may be ever so honest, the new AirPods 4 is cute-sized, and there’d be no excuse to not use it.
Charging Case
AirPods 4 is housed in an all-new USB-C charging case, and this makes it easy to adopt into one’s current ecosystem of Apple devices. Being 10% smaller than the previous generation, AirPods 4 is compact enough to be slipped into a pocket.
A major redesign to the AirPods 4 means there is no longer a back button – instead, all you have to do to reset your AirPods is to triple tap the front of the case near the LED. Same goes for pairing the AirPods, just double tap the front of the case to do so.
The LED indicator is now only visible when the lid is open.
Improved Comfort
This has got to be one of the things that took me by surprise when I tried the AirPods 4 on. The AirPods 4 and AirPods 4 with Active Noise Cancellation (ANC) both come with the same open ear design that some adore, but with a much slimmer AirPod width and refined angle of the contour to perfectly fit into the ears. I went for a jog with the AirPods 4 with ANC and was pleasantly surprised at how well the fit was.
Force Sensor Upgrades
Now, you would be able to press the force sensor on the stem of the AirPods to control certain settings. Press the force sensor once to play or pause audio, double-press it to skip forward, and triple-press to skip back.
Audio Quality
With ANC coming to the AirPods 4 for the first time, even with the open-ear design, you’d barely be able to hear any environmental noise around you if you have the AirPods 4 with ANC. With the H2 chip, the same ultra-low noise microphones on the AirPods Pro 2 is available on the AirPods 4 with ANC. This amps up the listening experience by a ton, and ANC will predominantly help to reduce low-frequency environmental noise such as the humdrum of airplane engines, HVACs, or even city traffic.
Transparency and Adaptive modes are also now available on the AirPods 4.
Siri
You can now tap on Siri by simply nodding or shaking your head to respond to it. This is incredibly useful in daily interactions with Siri, and you will find yourself using this more than you’d think. Nod or shake your head when prompted by Siri to answer or dismiss a call, message, or even notifications.
Voice Isolation
Advanced machine learning runs in tandem on the H2 chip and the source device (such as your iPhone, iPad, and Mac) to power Voice Isolation on AirPods 4. Voice Isolation essentially has the ability to isolate and enhance your voice by removing significant background noise around you, so that whoever you talk to while on the AirPods 4 will always hear you loud and clear.
All-Day Battery Life
With all the amazing upgrades to the AirPods 4 lineup, battery life has also gotten better. AirPods 4 now gives you up to 5 hours of listening time on a single charge, and up to 30 hours with the Charging Case. Don’t worry about losing valuable listening time during the day. Simply pop the AirPods into the Charging Case for just 5 minutes for a quick hour’s boost of listening time.
AirPods 4 with ANC delivery up to 4 hours of listening time in ANC, and up to 20 hours with the Wireless Charging Case. AirPods 4 with ANC supports additional charging options, including Qi wireless and Apple Watch chargers, and comes with a speaker in the Charging Case should you ever misplace your AirPods.
Price & Availability
AirPods 4 retails at S$199 and AirPods 4 with ANC retails at S$249.
Both AirPods 4 and AirPods 4 with ANC are now available on Apple and in Apple Stores.
