My Favorite AirPods Are Cheaper During Amazon’s Big Spring Sale
As someone who is fully committed to the Apple ecosystem, I obviously prefer AirPods. But it’s not just that I’m a fan (though I’m definitely one): AirPods, especially the AirPods Pro 2 , are fantastic headphones for many reasons. And while they’re usually a little pricey, Amazon is currently selling them for a very reasonable $170, down from $249.99 during the Big Spring Salo.
Apple may give the “Pro” moniker to most product categories these days, but the AirPods Pro at least have plenty of features to live up to the name. They may not be for “professionals,” but you get features not found in other AirPods models.
First, the AirPods Pro have excellent noise cancellation. Although, to be honest, the in-ear seal of the silicone tips blocks out so much background noise that I almost never turn on noise cancellation. In fact, because the sealing is so good, you also get a Transparency mode, an option that amplifies the sounds around you so you can be aware of your surroundings or even have a conversation with the headphones.
Speaking of conversations, one great feature exclusive to the second-gen Pro is conversation tracking: when you start talking while listening to something, your AirPods will lower the volume and amplify the voices of the people you’re talking to. When everyone stops talking, your AirPods will return to normal. This is cool. Another automatic feature is ” Adaptive Audio ” (formerly “Adaptive Transparency”), which can reduce any sound above 85 dB while maintaining the normal volume of other sounds. So you can follow a conversation or even watch a TV show with AirPods, but if an ambulance passes you, its sirens will seem to be a tolerable 85 dB. You’d think you’d get these two features on the AirPods Max, Apple’s flagship in-ear headphones, but that’s not the case: you need the second-generation Pros for that.
Like all AirPods, the Pro easily switches between all your connected Apple devices. You can watch a video on your Mac, then answer a call on your iPhone and start chatting through AirPods. If you have an Apple TV, you can also switch to your AirPods, which I often do since I prefer that experience over my soundbar.
While all of these features are amazing, what really matters to me is the sound quality: the Pros sound amazing, especially for such low-profile headphones. And since they block out most of the sound themselves, I feel like I can judge the quality of the music I’m listening to in a variety of situations. I used to pause the music on my old AirPods whenever a loud truck or bus passed me while walking. This is not a problem for professionals.
Plus, now that they’re FDA approved , you can evenuse these AirPods as hearing aids . Not a bad deal for $169.
Other Great Prime Day Deals on AirPods
That’s not to say the other AirPods are a bad choice: If you don’t like the Pro’s sealed design, you may prefer the more traditional fit of the AirPods 4 . They retail for $150 in the spring sale, or $100 if you choose the non-noise canceling version. There’s also a discount on USB-C AirPods Max , which have dropped from $549 to $480. I love my AirPods Max, but they’re hard to recommend at their ridiculously expensive MSRP. They’re easier to swallow now, especially since they just got lossless audio over a wired connection.
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