Review of Apple AirPods Pro 2

Although not on their own initiative, Apple has begun equipping its devices with a USB Type C port — the new iPhone 15 features this port. However, they decided not to wait for the new generation of wireless headphones — USB-C appeared in the updated version of the Apple AirPods Pro 2, which were announced in the fall of the year before last. Otherwise, the headset remained virtually the same, but a couple of interesting points did emerge — we will talk about that later. In any case, the launch of the new modification is a great reason to recall the existence of the TWS headset AirPods Pro 2 and subject it to detailed testing.

Technical Specifications

Packaging and Completeness

The AirPods Pro 2 are delivered in a white box with a removable lid, which features an image of the device — this is all as usual for Apple.

The package includes the headset in a charging case, documentation, interchangeable silicone tips, and a 1-meter USB-C to USB-C cable. The cable deserves a special mention: it has a fabric covering instead of “biodegradable rubber” — there is hope that this will positively affect its lifespan. Additionally, the fabric feels somewhat nicer to the touch.

The set includes four silicone tips, allowing users with both very small and large ears to find a comfortable fit. Medium (M) tips are installed by default, while the others (XS, S, and L) come in a convenient cardboard holder. They are made of pleasant soft silicone and are equipped with a built-in mesh that prevents the earbud’s sound tube from getting dirty.

Design and Construction

The color of AirPods is always the same — white, and nothing has changed here. For those who crave other colors, there are numerous cases available. The headphones are made in the format that has become classic precisely because of the first AirPods, which is “rounded part plus stem.”

The plastic is glossy again and extremely susceptible to stains from fingerprints. But let’s not lose hope — after all, the cable covering has been changed to a more durable and pleasant-to-use one, and the USB-C port has appeared in the device one way or another. Maybe we will eventually see less stain-prone plastic. On the side, there is a loop for a lanyard.

Recently, various original shapes of cases have become fashionable — like those resembling sea pebbles or even lipstick. All of this is certainly very fun and amusing, but in terms of comfort for everyday use, nothing has been invented that is better than a compact rectangular parallelepiped with rounded corners — this is precisely the shape we see year after year in various AirPods. The case can be conveniently carried even in the small pocket of jeans originally intended for a watch.

In the center of the front panel of the case, there is a small LED indicator for charging and the headset’s status, as well as a small indentation that makes it easier to open the lid. There are some doubts about the necessity of the latter: the lid opens perfectly with a finger of the same hand that holds the case. So it serves more of a decorative function.

On the back panel, we see the standard inscription “designed in California – made in China.” Below it is a barely noticeable button that allows you to manually activate the pairing mode. The hinge, which facilitates the movement of the lid, is made of metal.

The lid opens with a pleasant slight resistance, there is a damper that engages somewhere halfway, providing reliable fixation in both positions.

The earbuds are held in place by magnetic mounts. Inside the slots, spring-loaded contacts for charging are visible.

Additional fixation is provided by indentations in the lid, where you can find the logos of certification systems.

At the bottom of the case, we see the main “culprit of the celebration” — the USB Type C port. Nearby are the speaker holes, which allow the case to produce sounds indicating various actions or helping to locate it.

The earbuds are also made of glossy white plastic, with a touch-sensitive area on the side of the “stems,” highlighted by a small indentation — we will return to this.

The microphones of the active noise-canceling system are located on the outer side of the stems at the top — their presence is emphasized with a contrasting black mesh.

The length of the stems is not very great — only 15 mm from the base of the round part. Therefore, they will not cause any discomfort.

On the inner side of the stems, there are markings for the right and left earbuds, but it’s traditionally easier to orient by the shape of the body.

When viewed from above and below, it is clear that their rounded part has a rather complex shape designed to provide maximum support on the bowl of the outer ear.

In the first AirPods Pro, the wear sensor and the internal microphone for noise cancellation were placed close together, while in the second version, each has its own “window.”

When worn, the microphone is oriented slightly upwards and to the side — an interesting choice, as manufacturers often prefer to direct it into the inner cavity of the ear shell.

The sound tube has an average length and is not designed for very deep insertion into the ear canal, which positively affects the comfort of wearing the headset.

Lastly, let’s go over all the significant elements of the earbuds once more. At the end of the stem, there are contacts for charging.

There, you can also see a small hole covered with a mesh from the inside. Apparently, a microphone for voice communication is hidden behind it.

One of the microphones of the active noise cancellation system is located behind the black mesh on the outer side of the housing.

The second noise cancellation microphone is located closer to the upper surface of the rounded part and is also protected by a black mesh.

The wearing sensor is located on the inner part of the housing. The manufacturer notes that it is “tuned to detect human skin,” but during testing, we had no problem “fooling” it with the help of a silicone model of the ear shell used in the setup.

The removable tips are held in place by small protrusions at the end of the sound tube. They are removed with significant effort, raising concerns about damaging the soft silicone, but in the end, everything goes smoothly. Putting them back on is, accordingly, a bit tricky, but possible — fortunately, you don’t need to do this every day.

The opening of the sound tube is covered with a mesh that prevents contaminants from entering. If necessary, it will not be difficult to clean, but considering the presence of its own mesh on the silicone tips, this will not need to be done often.

Connection

We will test the AirPods Pro 2 with a device running iOS. The headphones are capable of working with Android, but most of the important features will be unavailable — from wearing sensors to battery level indication. On the internet, you can find quite a few instructions that allow you to bypass some of the restrictions, but all of them imply either the installation of extremely controversial software or the preliminary connection of the headphones to a device with iOS. At the same time, the result obtained is unlikely to be worth the effort spent — the user experience will still be fundamentally different.

Apple devices are good precisely because of their deep integration into the manufacturer’s own ecosystem; it makes no sense to “pull” them out of it. The choice of headphones that work well with Android in the considered price segment is extremely large, and among them are options that do not lag behind AirPods Pro 2 in sound quality, noise cancellation efficiency, and even seating comfort—there’s always the opportunity to find something to your taste. Nevertheless, we note that if desired, AirPods can be connected to most devices. To do this, you need to open the lid and press the pairing button on the back panel, then use the corresponding menu of the smartphone.

If we are using a device running iOS, everything happens as simply as possible. We open the lid of the headphone case — almost immediately we see a notification suggesting pairing. We follow the visual instructions — connect, and the whole process takes less than a minute.

Next comes a multitude of “pop-up” windows offering to get acquainted with the main functions and set up a whole range of parameters – you can do it right away or a little later by using the corresponding menu.

If you do everything at once, you will need an additional 10 minutes, most of which will be spent turning your head in front of the camera to configure the “personal spatial audio.”

The setup ends here; we still need to talk about the supported codecs. We traditionally obtained the complete list using the Bluetooth Tweaker utility.

There are two codecs – SBC and AAC. The maximum Bitpool parameter for SBC is set at 53, which is even slightly above the value specified in the recommended High-Quality profile. The bitrate for AAC, which will be used for receiving audio from iOS devices, is limited to a maximum of 256 Kbps, meaning the codec will operate at the peak of its capabilities.

Some semblance of multipoint support is only available within the Apple ecosystem — for example, you cannot connect headphones simultaneously to an iPhone and a PC running Windows. During testing, we did not encounter any delays or “desynchronizations” of sound even while playing quite resource-intensive smartphone games.

Apple also announced the ability for the headset to receive and playback sound in lossless quality (20-bit/48 kHz), but this only works when connected to Apple Vision Pro via some “revolutionary wireless audio protocol,” the details of which are not disclosed. In general, for now, we are relying on the familiar AAC with a bitrate of 256 Kbps — overall, for fully wireless headsets, its capabilities are more than sufficient.

Controls and Software

As mentioned above, to use AirPods Pro with Apple devices, no special software installation is required; everything necessary is already included in iOS. When the case lid is opened, a pop-up window appears, showing the battery level of the case and the earbuds. All main actions with the headset can be performed through the module, which can be accessed from the “shade.” In particular, from it, the noise cancellation and “transparency” modes are configured. In the first case, the system suppresses surrounding sounds, while in the second, it transmits them to the headset speakers, allowing the user to hear an announcement, respond to a passerby’s question, and so on.

With iOS 17, a “adaptive audio” mode has also appeared, which automatically adjusts “sound transparency” and active noise cancellation depending on the surrounding sounds. The system determines what is happening around, allowing you to stay aware of your environment while removing various distracting noises — from office chatter to the hum of a vacuum cleaner. In practice, all this currently works not so impressively: the switching happens, but either with a significant delay or not at the right moment… The option is potentially useful, but it clearly requires refinement at this stage.

The conversation recognition function was not invented today; theoretically, it has its benefits — you start talking, and the system automatically lowers the volume in the headphones… But it does this not only during the conversation but also if you decide to hum along to your favorite tune or just say a “few kind words” while doing everyday tasks. Over time, this becomes annoying, and the function has to be turned off. However, if by nature you are a quiet person, you may not have this problem.

The “head tracking” feature is also hard to call absolutely necessary, but sometimes it comes in handy. For example, if you’ve decided to watch a movie on a tablet somewhere on a plane. Thanks to head position tracking, the sound source seems to stay in one place — it creates the impression that it’s the screen. It may seem like a strange little thing, but it unexpectedly makes it feel a bit cozier… And, of course, this function performs excellently during online calls somewhere on FaceTime — the conversation partner is always in their place.

As mentioned above, the control of the headset is done through a touch area on the surface of the ear cups, which is easily noticeable to the touch thanks to a small indentation.

All types of touches are well registered, and feedback is provided through pleasant clicks produced by the headphone speakers. Single and double taps, hold actions, and volume-changing “swipes” are supported:

• Single touch: control playback, answer calls, and mute the microphone
• Double touch: skip the track forward and end the call
• Triple touch: skip the track back
• Hold: switch between noise cancellation/transparency modes
• Swipes up and down: adjust the volume

Everything is logical and convenient. It would be perfect to assign track skipping to only a double touch depending on whether it is done on the right or left earphone. But it’s still not bad. The wear sensors respond quickly and always correctly: take any earphone out of your ear — playback pauses, put it back — it continues.

More various configuration options are gathered on the headset tab in the settings menu. You can set the device name, activate one of the noise-canceling modes. And even slightly modify the control profile, in particular — choose what a long press on the touch area will do. At the same time, the headset can distinguish the right earphone from the left — you can assign mode switching to one, and activation of the voice assistant Siri to the other, with which you can then change tracks or call someone… Although during testing, we found it easier and more convenient to do this with voice.

“Individual volume” potentially allows for less frequent interactions with the corresponding regulator — the system somewhat remembers user behavior and then adjusts the volume according to the surroundings. Perhaps, with a bit of persistence and consistent use of the feature, over time the recognition quality will improve, and it will become truly useful. However, during several days of testing, we found it much easier to use more familiar methods, of which there are plenty: buttons on the smartphone, swipes on the touch area of the headphones, voice commands…

On the other hand, the ability to react to loud sounds seemed potentially interesting, but we couldn’t achieve any somewhat acceptable results from it. For most of the testing, it simply didn’t work; the system did activate a couple of times, but each time it was somewhat untimely. The “conversation recognition” has already been mentioned — it will be useful, but only for the quiet ones.

As for “spatial audio,” things are quite ambiguous here. There is still a long way to go before the “wow effect” is achieved, despite various settings with the help of the camera and other types of “personalization.” Nevertheless, Apple Music has content adapted for this feature that sounds truly impressive—it’s definitely worth trying. A special section in the settings menu allows you to compare the sound in a “before and after” format.

“Spatial audio” can be turned off, although we didn’t find any particular reasons to do so. The device search feature works correctly—you can see the last location on the map, activate sound playback through the headphones or the case speaker, which helps to find them somewhere in a not very noisy room.

After connecting the headphones, the system periodically reminds you of various useful “features” that have appeared relatively recently. For example, we completely forgot to mention that with the update to iOS 17, there is now the possibility to turn off the headset microphone, which can be very useful during various online conferences.

Well, and finally, let’s mention the function for checking the correctness of the fit. It works exactly the same way as in dozens of other headphones: a pleasant melody is broadcasted through the speakers, which external microphones try to catch. If they succeed, it means the fit is weak, and the silicone tips are not sealing properly in the ear canal. And if they don’t — everything is fine. During testing, we intentionally loosened the attachment of one of the earbuds a bit — the system immediately noticed it. As soon as we adjusted it, the check results changed. So, the function does work and helps not only to correct the position of the headset but also to choose the appropriate silicone tips.

The AirPods Pro 2 have many useful and not-so-useful “features,” but there is at least one that is severely lacking — an equalizer. From the settings of the built-in “Music” app, you can activate some preset sound profile, but that’s it. You cannot create your own presets, plus if you decide to use some Spotify or “Yandex.Music,” you won’t even have the option to activate a preset.

It is clear that the developers clearly anticipated the use of the headset in conjunction with the Apple Music service, which is generally quite good and capable of meeting most music lovers’ needs. However, it would be great to see a sound customization option in an expensive flagship headset with the “Pro” designation in its name, and not just a set of presets without clear descriptions and editing capabilities, but a full ten-band equalizer.

Operation

We traditionally start the discussion about the operation of the headphones with the comfort of wearing and the reliability of the fit. From this point of view, the Apple AirPods Pro 2 are clearly among the best that we have had the opportunity to test. Thanks to the thoughtful shape of the inner side of the rounded part, they fit excellently in the ear canal, staying in place even during intense physical activity. Moreover, the fit is also comfortable; after a couple of hours of wearing, the ears do not get tired. Of course, this is all individual and depends on the shape of the ear canal, but feedback from other owners of AirPods Pro 2 confirms our impressions.

The fresh modification of the headset received IP54 protection instead of IPX4 as in the previous one. Of course, the emergence of the claimed level of dust protection cannot be called a significant step forward; you still cannot wash the headphones under the tap or submerge them in water. But still, the headset has become a little more reliable. In any case, it will perform excellently both during everyday use and during sports or other activities.

The noise cancellation system shows confidently average results — in some of the tested headsets it works somewhat more effectively, but the difference is not significant enough to warrant praising or criticizing the device. The peak efficiency traditionally occurs in the low-frequency range. At the same time, the “noise cancellation” apparently has some kind of default “dynamic mode” that is hidden from the user. At the moment of activation, the efficiency of noise cancellation seems quite low, but after a short pause it becomes higher. The familiar feeling of “pressure in the head,” which many users experience, appears not immediately, but after about an hour or two of using the Apple AirPods Pro 2 with “noise cancellation” activated. We’ve already mentioned the automatic mode switching above — overall, it works somehow, but for now, it’s easier to do everything manually.

Microphones for voice communication

Let’s take a look at the operation of the microphones for voice communication in the Apple AirPods Pro 2. To measure the frequency response of the microphones, we use a specially prepared room and a monitoring acoustic system that reproduces a sweep tone. Naturally, the frequency response of the speakers is far from uniform, so we first obtain its graph using a calibrated measurement microphone. The data obtained is then used to create a correction profile aimed at compensating for the acoustic characteristics. After that, the signal is recorded with the test subject in the same position as the measurement microphone previously occupied. The resulting graph is adjusted using the pre-created profile, and what we have left is the own frequency response of the tested microphone.

The voice of an adult man has a fundamental frequency ranging from 85 to 155 Hz, while that of a woman ranges from 165 to 255 Hz. However, for voice transmission, frequencies from 300 to 3400 Hz are typically used, which are even referred to as “voiced,” as it is in this range that the so-called formants responsible for speech intelligibility are located. Frequencies below this range are “cut off” not only or primarily due to the limitations of the transmission channel, but also because they contain various undesirable sounds: engine hum, low-frequency components of crowd noise, and so on.

In general, the microphone is tuned in a fairly logical manner. It is believed that the range from 300 to 500 Hz corresponds to the subjectively perceived quality of the voice, while from 600 Hz to 1 kHz — to the naturalness of its sound. So, the emphasis on these frequencies is quite understandable; however, too much boost in the 1 kHz range leads to a recognizable “telephone” coloration in the sound. Frequencies above 1.5 kHz up to 4 kHz account for only about 5% of the energy of the voice, but it is precisely these frequencies that are responsible for its intelligibility. So, it probably wasn’t worth pushing them down too much. Judging by the graph, we can expect a more or less natural and full-sounding voice, but at the same time not the clearest and somewhat booming.

Let’s test our assumption in practice. Below are two tracks. The first one features speech recorded with headset microphones. The second was recorded with a professional recorder located approximately at the same distance, which is known for its high recording quality, and is provided for comparison.

Our expectations have been met. Yes, the voice is a bit muffled and has lost some clarity, but it sounds full-bodied and more or less natural — much more pleasant than a whole range of previously tested headsets. The developers from Apple promised us a noise cancellation system during calls, so we will see how it performs. We will record a small excerpt with text reading again, but this time we will add background noise — we will turn on the sound of a lively street from the acoustics located not far from the recording place.

The performance of the “noise canceling” is not particularly impressive — it’s decent, but outside sounds are still occasionally audible, and the speech has lost a bit of its natural sound — there’s an added effect of “like coming through a tube.” We have already heard much more impressive performances of active noise cancellation systems during calls from several previously tested headsets.

Autonomy and Charging

The stated battery life of Apple AirPods Pro 2 from a single charge depends on the mode in which they are used:

• up to 5.5 hours (with ANC, transparency mode, and head tracking enabled).
• up to 6 hours (with ANC and transparency mode enabled).
• up to 7 hours (without ANC, transparency mode, or spatial audio function).

Very good performance — on par with the current flagships from other manufacturers. Let’s see how the headset performs in our tests. A safe sound pressure level for listening to music is considered to be 75 dB, but in practice, most listeners prefer a level of 90-100 dB. We stream white noise into the headphones, recording the SPL level around 95 dB, and immediately after starting playback, we begin recording the signal from the measurement bench — by the length of the resulting track, it’s easy to understand how long each of the headphones has been working.

We tested the autonomy of the AirPods Pro 2 in two working modes. Let’s call them “Everything On” and “Everything Off.” In the first, noise cancellation, head tracking, and spatial audio are all activated. In the second, all these modes are turned off, respectively. The earbuds discharge almost evenly—with a difference of no more than 10 minutes. Therefore, we will directly present the minimum values in the table. A very small number of listeners use the headsets in mono mode; most often, turning one of them off is a reason to put both back in the case for charging.

In some ages, the results of our testing almost completely matched those claimed by the manufacturer. Even 5 hours of work is enough to get to the office, go to a workout, and take a little walk. And this is if you don’t put the headphones in the case at all; if you remember to do this at least occasionally, the chances of being left without music and communication are minimal. Thanks to fast charging, after 5 minutes in the case, the headphones work for about an hour — we tested this twice. The case can fully charge the headset 3 times — accordingly, the user has at least 20 hours of battery life in reserve.

And of course, it’s very good that now Apple AirPods Pro 2 can be charged via the USB-C port, both from the charger and from the iPhone 15 — in the worst case, you can sacrifice its charge for the sake of continuing the headset’s operation. There is still no reverse wireless charging from the back panel of the iPhone.

However, it supports Qi and MagSafe wireless charging. When the charging starts, a cheerful “ding” is heard from the speaker inside the case, and an orange indicator lights up on the front panel. Using the included cable is not at all necessary — during testing, we repeatedly charged the headset with other cables that happened to be at hand.

Sound and Frequency Response Measurements

The Apple AirPods Pro 2 sounds balanced and very pleasant — on par with the best TWS headsets we tested. The bass is somewhat emphasized in accordance with current trends, but the midrange retains detail, while the high frequencies are well-defined and do not spoil the impression with typical issues. At the same time, the earbuds have their own character — for example, a slightly emphasized lower midrange enhances the subjectively perceived quality of vocals and makes the solos of instruments more “three-dimensional.” It’s important not to overdo such accents; otherwise, the sound will become tiring and unnatural — the creators of the AirPods Pro 2 have managed this quite well.

Well, let’s note once again that such nuances rather add a small “flavor” to the sound, while the overall headset presents the musical material pleasantly and balanced. Traditionally, we will illustrate the above with the help of frequency response graphs.

The frequency response graph is shown against the curve of IDF (IEM diffuse field compensation), provided by the manufacturer of the used stand. Its purpose is to help compensate for resonant phenomena in the simulated ear canal and the characteristics of the equipment, creating a “sound profile” that accurately illustrates how the sound of the headphones is perceived by the listener. It can be viewed as an adaptation for a specific device, analogous to the so-called “Harman curve,” created by the Harman International team under the guidance of Dr. Sean Olive. We will compensate the obtained frequency response graph according to the IDF curve.

In this form, the graph maximally illustrates subjective impressions from listening: a slightly “elevated” bass for greater sound effect, a small accent on the lower midrange, and a more or less “flat” midrange. Let’s immediately see how the activation of active noise cancellation affects the sound. Usually, “noise cancelers” lead to “dips” at the frequencies where they are effective themselves — Apple AirPods Pro 2 are no exception to the rule. Nothing good happens to the sound, but nothing completely terrible either — for the sake of getting rid of external noise, one can endure a slightly more hollow bass and a less pleasant midrange. However, in a quiet environment, it is still better to turn off the active noise cancellation right away.

In a recent conversation about Bluetooth codecs, we suggested that on devices running iOS and all other codecs, AAC works a bit differently. Let’s recall that contrary to popular belief, AAC does not belong to Apple. However, Apple owns the best encoder, Apple AAC, which ensures the full advantages of the codec and a stable level of sound quality. On devices running Android, at best, the Fraunhofer FDK AAC encoder is used, and at worst, there are other alternatives with rather questionable quality.

It’s time to test this. We will measure the frequency response of Apple AirPods Pro 2, using an iOS smartphone as the source of the test signal. After that, we will obtain another graph, but this time streaming the signal from an Android smartphone. It can be seen that the graphs differ quite noticeably, which is what needed to be proven.

As stated in the codec review, when streaming audio from an Android smartphone, frequencies above 16 kHz are cut off. However, when connecting to an iOS smartphone, this effect is not present. Overall, I wouldn’t want to draw too radical conclusions, but it turns out that using an Apple device makes the sound slightly higher quality.

There is no difference in sound between the Apple AirPods Pro 2 modifications with USB-C and Lightning. If Apple had made any attempts to improve the sound, we would definitely have learned about it from their announcements, then from advertising and marketing materials… This news would not have gone unnoticed. Additionally, colleagues have repeatedly compared the sound of the modifications — there are no differences. However, it will be interesting to compare the first and second versions — and that’s what we will do.

To be honest, we liked the first version almost more because of its more restrained and “crisp” bass, but it was let down slightly by the overly bright highs. The second one definitely sounds more impressive — you can’t take that away from it. And finally, we would like to note once again that the Apple AirPods Pro 2 are far from being the only well-sounding TWS earbuds. They strongly reminded us of our favorites, the Huawei FreeBuds Pro 2, created in collaboration with the French company Devialet.

The similarity is obvious, but the Huawei FreeBuds Pro 2 still impress with a slightly more detailed and “even” presentation of the mid frequencies and well-defined high-frequency register thanks to their dual-driver design. On the other hand, due to the appropriately placed accents, the AirPods Pro 2 sound more spacious and impressive. Plus, they have an “enhancer” that adds even more volume… Both devices deliver excellent sound quality for TWS headsets. And as always, the choice is a matter of personal taste.

Conclusions

Apple AirPods Pro 2 – undoubtedly an excellent headset, which no one particularly doubts. Good battery life, effective “noise cancellation”, high comfort and fit reliability, wonderful sound – everything is there, except that the microphones for voice calls and the noise cancellation system during calls could have been a bit better. However, there are other products in the considered price segment that can boast all of this. What makes Apple headphones really good is their excellent integration into the manufacturer’s “ecosystem”: everything works without unnecessary movements, it is set up from the smartphone menu… Even the well-known and widely used AAC codec “within the family” works a little differently and, let’s not hide it, better.

But at the same time, device owners without iOS have nothing to catch: the headset instantly “turns into a pumpkin,” losing most of its advantages. There is no reason to be upset here; you can always find something else — the choice is huge. On the other hand, for iOS device owners, the AirPods Pro 2 headset promises a lot of enjoyment from use, although a number of nuances will still have to be tolerated. For example, the strange tendency of developers towards various “features” with questionable usefulness and not always well-tuned performance: from all sorts of “sound enhancers” to dynamic volume adjustment.

As for the addition of the USB-C port to both Apple smartphones and headphones — hooray, it has happened. There isn’t much more to add; a universal charging port for all devices is convenient, reliable, and progressive. The other changes in the new version are hard to call significant: the announced level of dust protection has been added, high-quality sound has been announced, but only when working with Vision Pro… Otherwise, we are dealing with the same AirPods Pro 2. So, there’s little reason to rush to update from the Lightning version, but when buying new headphones, it’s clearly worth choosing the fresh modification.