PSA: AirPods seemingly don’t fall out like EarPods; work with older devices

With Apple’s shiny new AirPods appearing to have exactly the same size and shape as EarPods – noted for the frequency with which they fall out of people’s ears – there has been concern that the same would be true of AirPods.

Weight (negligible) of the cord sure but what about offset by battery, electronics, etc inside the AirPods. https://t.co/zlhnDtbF2l

— Seth Weintraub (@llsethj) September 9, 2016

While a falling EarPod is annoying, falling AirPods could quickly get expensive.

But some early reports suggest that they don’t suffer the same issue. Despite being visually identical, Apple appears to have applied some magic to them to ensure they stay put. Sound isolation also seems to have been improved.

Not only did I dance, I headbanged. I shook my head side to side, I tossed my hair, I jogged in place, and I looked silly doing all of it. The AirPods stayed put, and they stayed loud. The music (more Sia, naturally) sounded full and lush and I couldn’t hear a single word anyone around me was saying, as if I was completely sealed off in a bubble of rock and roll. Pretty impressive.

If the worst does happen, it seems Apple will sell you a single replacement, at an as-yet undisclosed cost.

Some have also been assuming that the AirPods only work with an iPhone 7, but as Daring Fireball notes, they do support standard Bluetooth pairing as well as Apple’s new W1 standard.