AirPods 3 could offer noise cancellation − but we’re less sure about its release date
Apple’s AirPods 2 were only announced a month ago, but we’ve already seen conflicting reports about their successors. The latest claims that the AirPods 3 will be released at the end of this year.
Seeing as previous reports have led us to believe that Apple was planning to release them in 2020, we’re taking this with a big pinch of salt.
Read more: Best wireless earbuds
The latest report comes from DigiTimes (via 9to5Mac). Citing “industry sources”, it claims that Apple wants to release the next generation of AirPods before the turn of the year, in order to prevent big-name rivals from eroding its market share.
Samsung and Huawei already have their answers to AirPods, in the Samsung Galaxy Buds and Huawei Freelace, and Amazon and Microsoft are believed to be preparing their own AirPods rivals too.
However, as mentioned above, Apple has only just released the AirPods 2. Surely they’ll be given more than nine months at the top of Apple’s tree.
What’s more, Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman recently reported that the AirPods 3 were originally supposed to launch this year, but will probably be pushed back to 2020, since the current latest version of AirPods were originally meant to come out in 2018, but pushed back to March 2019.
These AirPods were initially planned to go on sale last year. They’re also working on a future version with noise-cancellation and water resistance. Those were planned for later this year, but would now imagine that’s for 2020.
— Mark Gurman (@markgurman) March 20, 2019
One thing the two reports can agree on, however, is that the AirPods 3 will offer noise cancellation. If this was the case, a redesign could also be in the offing, since the AirPods in their current form aren’t even good at noise isolation.
Gurman has also claimed that they’ll offer water resistance.
Read more: Best wireless headphones
DigiTimes’ report adds that Taiwan’s Inventec will be the primary AirPods 3 manufacturer, but China’s Luxshare Precision will help out too.
What are you hoping to see from the AirPods 3? Let us know on Twitter @TrustedReviews.
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Editorial independence
Editorial independence means being able to give an unbiased verdict about a product or company, with the avoidance of conflicts of interest. To ensure this is possible, every member of the editorial staff follows a clear code of conduct.
Professional conduct
We also expect our journalists to follow clear ethical standards in their work. Our staff members must strive for honesty and accuracy in everything they do. We follow the IPSO Editors’ code of practice to underpin these standards.