Product1 publisher2 min readPublished
Apple drops the $50 upcharge for noise cancellation in its entry AirPods
The $129 AirPods 5 now includes active noise cancellation at the price the ANC-free AirPods 4 held, and the wireless-charging version costs $149, thirty dollars under the AirPods 4 with ANC. The 50 percent improvement figure is Apple's own.
The Product Desk · Product desk
What happened
- The AirPods 5 with Wireless Charging Case costs $149, which Gizmodo's review calls a $30 price drop against the AirPods 4 with ANC.
- That $149 version adds a case that charges wirelessly and has a speaker for Find My, plus swipe volume controls on the stems and an extra hour of battery life.
- Apple says both AirPods 5 models deliver up to 50% better noise cancellation than the AirPods 4 with ANC.
- The new buds are rated IP57 for dust, sweat and water resistance, up from IP54 on the AirPods 4.
Compiled by The Product DeskSomething wrong?How this is made
Why it matters
- cost Noise cancellation used to cost $50 extra at the bottom of Apple's lineup, and Apple has given up the simplest upsell it had at that tier.
- decision A team standardising on earbuds now picks between $129 and $149 on charging convenience and stem controls, and the harder call becomes whether an open fit handles the noise its people sit in.
- constraint Noise cancellation at $129 arrives in the same open-fit shell, so anyone who needs jet engines or subway rumble gone at low listening volume is still shopping the in-ear Pro line.
Gizmodo's reviewer slept through most of a 4 hour 44 minute flight from San Francisco to New York in a middle-row seat and woke to the captain's landing announcement and a tone warning that the battery was under 10 percent [11]. The buds "mostly drowned out the loud jet engines as I slept scrunched up in my middle-row seat," he wrote [12].
Construction crews jackhammering down the block from the office were still audible with ANC on [8]. Subway rumble came down only slightly against the AirPods 4 with ANC [9].
Gizmodo puts the $149 model $30 below the AirPods 4 with ANC [3], so that older bud sold at $179 [4]. The AirPods 4 without ANC sold at $129, which is what the base AirPods 5 costs with ANC included [1]. Noise cancellation used to add $50 at the entry tier of Apple's own lineup [5].
What the reviewer actually grabs is worth more than the feature list. He alternates between AirPods Pro 3 and AirPods 4 with ANC, taking the Pro 3 on long flights and the subway for the in-ear tips and stronger noise blocking, and the AirPods 4 with ANC for running when he wants less pressure in his ears [13]. He said he did no scientific testing of the improvement and judged it by swapping between the two pairs [7].
The review does not name or price a competing earbud [17], so it does not tell you what $129 with ANC does to the rest of the category. Inside Apple's line, the cheapest bud now carries the feature that cost $179 a generation ago [4].
Before a bulk order, the two things worth pinning down are the sound you need removed and the volume you would have to play at to remove it. Gizmodo's marker for an open office is half volume: below 50 percent the reviewer could still hear coworkers on mechanical keyboards, and above it he mostly could not [10]. The AirPods 5 have the same shape and the same weight as the AirPods 4, and Gizmodo wrote that if the AirPods 4 did not fit your ears well, these will not either [14].
What to watch
- Independent attenuation measurements by frequency, which the Gizmodo review did not attempt, against Apple's up-to-50% claim.
- Whether Apple keeps any AirPods below $129 or lets the ANC model be the floor of the line.
- Whether rival open-fit ANC earbuds move under $129, a comparison this review does not make.