A pair of premium over-ear headphones from Apple have been on the cards for some time now. Despite rumors of a delay into 2021 they are now official - meet the AirPods Max. Cutting straight to the chase here, US$ 549/€ 600-620/£ 549 of your hard-earned money get you Active Noise Cancellation (ANC), Adaptive EQ and high-fidelity special audio. All of this is backed-up by Apple’s own H1 chip for a premium wireless Bluetooth 5.0 audio experience. There is still a physical port on the headphones – a lightning one meant for charging the battery, said to be good for up to 20 hours on a single charge with either spatial audio or ANC enabled.
Continuing the physical tour of the
AirPods Max, Apple offers a pretty-nice mix of physical controls and advanced
sensors. A Digital Crown, inspired by the Apple Watch design, offers precise
volume controls, as well as the ability to play or pause audio, skip tracks,
answer or end phone calls, and activate Siri. These are activated by single,
double and triple taps or press and hold, which makes for one overloaded key.
There is also a dedicated Noise control
button which cab switch between ANC and Transparency mode. The latter is meant
to amplify the environment sound. Oddly enough, there seems to be no mention of
a “basic” audio mode beyond these two. Another notable omitted piece of info
relates to powering on and off the headset as there does not seem to be a
dedicated button for that.
Instead, Apple has equipped the AirPods
Max with optical and position sensors that can be used for wear detection among
other things. Simply lifting one ear cup from your ears pauses audio. Plus, the
AirPods Max also have plenty of data on the user’s head position, which is what
Apple leverages for its Spatial Audio and Adaptive EQ features. The AirPods Max
come with a total of nine microphones - six are used exclusively for the active
noise cancellation and one for voice pickup with two more serving double duty. Adaptive
EQ adjusts the sound in real time to the seal on the earcup, the audio source
and the ambient noise conditions.
Spatial Audio might already be familiar to
iPhone and iPad users. It promises an immersive theater-like experience by
virtually and dynamically placing sound sources in space. This is meant to work
with content recorded in 5.1, 7.1 and Dolby Atmos formats and uses the
gyroscope and accelerometer inside the AirPods Max, as well as a compatible
iPhone or iPad as an audio source.
Naturally, in order to get the full
seamless experience from the AirPods Max, you need to use them with an
existing, preferably current Apple device ecosystem. Officially, they require iOS
14.3, iPadOS 14.3, MacOS Big Sur 11.1, watchOS 7.2, tvOS 14.3 or later. That
way you can get things like seamless quick-pairing, automatic switching between
devices, audio sharing between two AirPods and always-on Siri capabilities. In
fact, the official specs don’t mention any compatibility with non-Apple
products. Given the H1 chip at the core of the AirPods Max, we wouldn’t rule
out some limited third-party support, though.
Physically, the AirPods Max have what
Apple calls “iconic design” and we tend to agree that the look clearly stands
out. Another description Cupertino uses is “custom acoustic design”. The
funky-looking breathable knit mesh headband is meant to distribute the
considerable 385g weight (for reference the Sony XM4 weigh 254g) over a larger
area and reduce the pressure you feel. Inside is a stainless steel frame that
is telescopic and allows the ear cups to independently pivot and rotate. A
folding mechanism is, however, a notable omission. You can only lay the cups
flat. Still Apple does provide a slim Smart Case in the box for carrying the
AirPods Max. Putting the headphones inside the case even automatically triggers
an ultralow power state.
Color options include space gray, silver,
sky blue, green and pink. Orders can be placed starting today and the first
orders will ship out on December 15. MSRP is US$ 549 in the US, € 600-629 in
continental Europe, £ 549 in the UK and INR 59,900 in India.
