Apple AirPods: iPhone Accessory Or The Next Big Thing?

guest · Jan 8, 2020

Apple AirPods: iPhone Accessory Or The Next Big Thing?
January 8, 2020
https://www.kevinrooke.com/post/apple-airpods-iphone-accessory-or-the-next-big-thing

In 2016, when Apple released their first ever wireless earbuds called AirPods, many thought of them as an add-on product that could boost Apple’s average iPhone sales price.
[...] but the magnitude of AirPods success has surpassed all expectations. Now it looks like AirPods could become much more than just an iPhone accessory.

[...] in 2018, AirPods sales began to quiet Apple bears. 35 million pairs were sold, still priced at $150. That gave Apple an additional $5.25 billion in revenue, then representing 2.4% of iPhone revenue.

And in 2019, Apple has pulled off yet another incredible year of AirPods sales. Apple sold an estimated 60 million units [...] Airpods revenue was $12 billion in 2019. That’s 4.5% of Apple’s iPhone revenue. Investors are paying attention now.
Click to expand...

AirPods Sales Growth And Potential
Except AirPods sales are growing at triple digit rates each year. In 2018, AirPods revenue grew 133% over 2017, and in 2019 AirPods revenue was up another 128% over 2018.

This is what AirPods revenue looks like compared to some of the world’s top tech companies. AirPods make as much money as Spotify, Twitter, Snap, and Shopify *combined*.
And considering their triple-digit growth two years in a row, I would be shocked if AirPods didn’t earn more money than Uber in 2020.
Click to expand...

2018: Apple sold 35 million AirPods in 2018, currently most popular 'hearable' brand
2019: Apple AirPods Shipments Expected to Double to 60 Million in 2019

guest · Jan 12, 2020

Apple's Stock Rose 86% in 2019 -- Partly Because Of AirPods
Why Apple Stock Soared 86.2% in 2019
January 12, 2020
https://www.fool.com/investing/2020/01/12/why-apple-stock-soared-862-in-2019.aspx

Shares of Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) gained 86.2% in 2019, according to data from S&P Global Market Intelligence .
iPhone Sales were down from 2018, but they still came in ahead of expectations, and the company's business was lifted by strong performance for its wearables segment. While the Apple Watch continued to gain traction and enjoy significant sales growth, the biggest story of the year for the company was the success of its AirPods.

However, explosive growth for AirPods, promising momentum for the Apple Watch, and the promise of a bigger tech and feature leap for the iPhone line in 2020 powered a great year for Apple stock. Toni Sacconaghi, an analyst at Bernstein Research, estimates that AirPod sales came in at roughly $6 billion in 2019 and nearly doubled compared to 2018. The Bernstein analyst projects that AirPod revenue will hit $15 billion in 2020.
Click to expand...

guest · Jan 16, 2020

Don’t believe everything you read about AirPod sales
January 16, 2020
https://thenextweb.com/plugged/2020/01/16/dont-believe-airpod-sales-analysis-analysts/

We can start this article with a fact: AirPods are incredibly popular. From there though, things start to get a little muddier.
It’s pretty standard for Apple to not disclose sales figures, which means analyst firms have a tough job tracking the company.

The report claims that Apple sold “nearly 60 million” AirPods in 2019, taking more than a 50 percent share of the global true wireless earbuds market, and raking in 71 percent of its revenue.
An article by the Yonahp News Agency gave some more specific figures on this. It stated that the Strategy Analytics report said Apple had sold precisely 58.7 million AirPods, giving it a 54.5 percent market share in 2019.

So far, so good, right?
AirPod sales might not be what they seem
Neil Cybart, an Apple analyst, covered AirPod sales in a piece on Above Avalon. In it, he states that in “FY2019 Apple sold 35 million pairs of AirPods” — a number he came to after going through Apple statements and commentary. To back this up further, Cybart draws a parallel between the sales of the first three years of the iPhone (“60 million“) and AirPods (“61 million“), the latter figure what other analysts are claiming Apple sold in 2019 alone.
Click to expand...

And the problem with this? Well, the public perception becomes that Apple is doing unbelievably well.
A danger here is that Apple investors and stockholders are either: a) being misled on the worth of their investment, or b) making a lot of money off misinformation.

Now, of course, the figures could be accurate, but that’s not the point here. The industry needs to do a better job at being critical of these stats, because what’s happening at the moment is exactly what Apple wants.
Basically, don’t believe everything you read about AirPod sales.
Click to expand...

guest · Apr 8, 2020

Apple is shipping single replacement AirPods with a new, unreleased firmware and people can't use them
AirPods need to run the same firmware as each other to function
April 8, 2020
https://www.imore.com/apple-shippin...-unreleased-firmware-and-people-cant-use-them

If you have a faulty AirPod and Apple sends you a new one out, cross your fingers. If the replacement ships with firmware 2D3 installed you're going to have a problem. That's because firmware 2D3 isn't public yet – preventing you from updating your existing AirPod to match.

And as it turns out, that's a problem as many people on Reddit and social media have found out. AirPods need to be running the same firmware in order to pair with each other, and because firmware 2D3 isn't available, updating to it is impossible.
That leaves one AirPod running an older version of the firmware and no way to sort the problem out. Not even if you reach out to Apple, as one Reddit user discovered.

From my research, this appears to mainly be impacting AirPods (2nd Generation) although there are sporadic reports of AirPods Pro earbuds also being received with firmware 2D3 installed. According to Apple, there doesn't seem to be a fix, either.
Click to expand...

There are multiple threads and reports of similar issues on Reddit, and I've heard from one person via Twitter who was told by Apple representatives that they'll need to wait for firmware 2D3 to be released. When that will be, nobody knows.
Firmware 2D3 started to appear on replacement AirPods within the last two weeks.
Click to expand...

guest · Apr 16, 2020

Apple AirPods Pro Replacement Ear Tips: Where And How To Buy
April 16, 2020
https://www.ibtimes.com/apple-airpods-pro-replacement-ear-tips-where-how-buy-2959750

The AirPods Pro uses removable in-ear tips that users can change to fit their ears. That said, it's easy to lose or misplace these tips because they're small. Those who lose their AirPods Pro ear tips shouldn't worry about that, however – there's a way to get replacements for them.

Apple is now selling replacement ear tips for the AirPods Pro directly via its website, Apple.com. MacRumors noted that these ear tips should be in stock in the company's own stores. All stores outside of Greater China, however, remain closed as of writing time.
Those who proceed to Apple's online store will be able to buy the ear tips in three different sizes –small, medium and large– in sets of two. That means users will need to buy a minimum of two pairs every time they make a purchase.

Apple is selling each set of two pairs for $7.95 in the U.S. MacRumors noted that prices for the same product in other countries could vary.
Click to expand...

Those who don't want to purchase two pairs of the same size can also purchase just one pair via Apple's support channels for cheaper. This is perfect for those who use two different-sized tips (small on the left and medium on the right, for example) to get a good fit. Here's how to buy replacement ear tips via support channels: [...]
Click to expand...

guest · May 10, 2020

The secrets behind the runaway success of Apple’s AirPods
The wireless headphones have been a surprise hit. Here’s how
May 9, 2020
https://www.wired.co.uk/article/apple-airpods-success

If you started a business in an ultra-competitive space in consumer tech, and within three years it was earning more revenue than AMD, Spotify, Twitter, Snap or Shopify, you'd justifiably be pleased with yourself.
Apple's wearables, home and accessories division has done just this, and you can bet that its collective corporate socks are rolling up and down in glee with every mention, internally and externally, of its favourite creation: AirPods.

The wireless earphones made the company an estimated $7.3 billion (£5.6 billion) in revenue in 2019, up from an estimated $3.3 billion in 2018 – a 121 per cent year-on-year increase.
AirPods were initially positioned modestly as an iPhone 7 and 7 Plus accessory, one that solved the thorny issue of dropping the headphone jack from the iPhone.
Click to expand...

There are a number of reasons for the popularity. Unusually for the Cupertino company, Apple came in with an aggressive price point for each version of the AirPods. Once it added key features such as noise-cancelling and wireless charging, the Pros became a yardstick in the wireless earphone category.
AirPods were also afforded a cultural thumbs-up via millennials and Gen Zers “AirPod flexing” in an unsubtle form of social signalling.

Interestingly, Apple has not retired the older AirPods with its Pros, but has created three clear versions of the accessory for different price brackets or users, encouraging converts to buy multiple pairs for different activities.
Click to expand...

hawki · Dec 8, 2020

"Techies Shudder at Massive Price Tag for Apple’s New AirPods Max Headphones: For $550, They’d Better ‘Literally Give You New Ears’..."

https://www.mediaite.com/news/techi...550-theyd-better-literally-give-you-new-ears/

"Apple announces $549 AirPods Max noise-canceling headphones..."

https://www.theverge.com/2020/12/8/21438042/apple-max-studio-noise-canceling-headphones-price-date

guest · Dec 18, 2020

iFixit shares AirPods Max teardown, says Apple’s headphones are hard to take apart
December 17, 2020
https://9to5mac.com/2020/12/17/ifix...ays-apples-headphones-are-hard-to-take-apart/

iFixit traditionally shares a teardown of every new Apple product, and it was no different this time with AirPods Max. While this is more like a first look at the headphone internals, iFixit said that the AirPods Max are not as easy to take apart as other over-ear headphones.

As we already know, AirPods Max come with two 40 mm dynamic drivers, two magnetic ear cushions, eight microphones for noise cancelation, and two H1 chips inside — one for each side of the headphone.
An X-ray of the AirPods Max revealed that Apple’s over-ear headphones have two battery cells, but both are in a single ear cup. iFixit noticed that there are some solder joints and wires near the batteries, but they still haven’t found the connectors to easily replace the batteries.
Click to expand...

You can see below the images showing the internal components of the AirPods Max [...]

Don’t worry, we’ll be back to give you the complete blow-by-blow and analysis of the disassembly later. For now, we’re just going to leave these here.
Click to expand...

iFixit: AirPods Max Teardown

guest · Dec 29, 2020

Apple AirPods Max now arrives in $108K ‘Pure Gold’ custom edition from Caviar
December 28, 2020
https://www.gizmochina.com/2020/12/29/apple-airpods-max-108k-pure-gold-edition-caviar/

The Russian luxury brand Caviar has just announced that it would be launching a custom edition of the AirPods Max. The company, known for making luxury variants of popular tech products, has just unveiled the ‘pure gold’ variant of the newly launched Apple hearables from the whopping price of 108,000 US Dollars.

According to a MacRumors report, the custom AirPods Max will launch sometime in the year 2021 and will arrive in two color options, namely white and black. Each color variant is offered “in a single piece worldwide.” This implies that the headphone will be made to order and could be an exclusive item. Looking at the design of the Caviar custom edition of the Apple AirPods Max, one can easily notice why the headphones are expensive with its gold plating.
Click to expand...

guest · Dec 29, 2020

Component leak suggests 'AirPods Pro 2' may come in two sizes
December 29, 2020
https://appleinsider.com/articles/20/12/29/part-leak-suggests-airpods-pro-2-may-come-in-two-sizes

Images showing various system-on-a-chip housings for an unreleased "AirPods Pro 2" have surfaced on Twitter, shared by someone generally known for accurate part leaks.

A Twitter user known as "Mr. White" with a decent leaking history has shared new part images for the "AirPods Pro 2." The images shown depict different sized SoC housing for the H1 processor which could indicate different sized earbuds in the future model. Mr. White mistakenly calls them W2 processors, however.

New AirPods Pro Mabey Two Sizes Still W2 Chips pic.twitter.com/R5MpzUrUlg
— Mrwhite (@laobaiTD) December 29, 2020
Click to expand...

f the "AirPods Pro 2" move to a stemless design, then there will be a need for different sized ear pieces in order to get the best fit for a user. This explains why there would be different sized SoC housings.
Click to expand...

guest · Jul 26, 2021

It looks like we finally know when Apple’s AirPods 3 will launch
July 23, 2021
https://bgr.com/tech/it-looks-like-we-finally-know-when-apples-airpods-3-will-launch/

After several false starts, it seems like we finally have a firm grasp on when we can expect to see the AirPods 3 release. While reputed analyst Ming-Chi Kuo previously said we can expect to see new AirPods during the first half of 2021, it appears that the release date has been pushed back ever so slightly. According to supply chain sources cited by Digitimes, Apple will release its next-gen pair of AirPods this coming September. Putting two and two together, AirPods 3 will likely be introduced alongside Apple’s iPhone 13.

It’s worth noting that Digitimes doesn’t always have a solid track record with respect to these types of Apple rumors. Still, the report aligns nicely with similar rumblings we’ve seen in recent weeks.
Click to expand...

guest · Jul 28, 2021

AirPods: Buy now or wait?
Apple's AirPods were last updates in March 2019.
July 28, 2021
https://www.macworld.com/article/351745/airpods-buy-or-wait-specs-price.html

We don’t have to explain why you might want AirPods. Apple’s take on true wireless earbuds revolutionized the market and have sold in massive numbers ever since.
The real question is, should you buy one now, or will you be disappointed when a new model is released in just a few weeks? Here’s what we know, and what we recommend.
Macworld recommends: WAIT
We’re at the point where the next-generation AirPods are likely coming in the next few months. If you buy AirPods now, they’ll be “obsolete” before they’re six months old. The new generation should be a bigger leap than the second-generation model was. This time we’re looking at a nice new design with welcome changes like shorter stems, and perhaps useful new features.

The smart money is on waiting to see what Apple announces, and what the price is, before deciding if the new models are worth it or the current 2nd-gen version on sale is a better buy.
Click to expand...

guest · Aug 20, 2021

Third generation AirPods now being manufactured
Expect to see a revamped version of the regular AirPods at this autumn's iPhone event.
August 19, 2021
https://www.macworld.co.uk/news/airpods-being-manufactured-3807641/

Production of the third generation AirPods has begun, which indicates they will launch relatively soon.

The production is taking place in China, rather than Vietnam, due to increased coronavirus cases there. According to a new report from Nikkei Asia. This may mean Apple will move production to other countries, or postponed it in the the future.
The new headphones will probably be launched at the iPhone event in September, although we could see them in October or November.
Click to expand...

The new AirPods are expected to adopt some features that previously only existed in the AirPods Pro, but they are not expected to offer support for transparency or active noise reduction.
Read the latest news about the new AirPods.
Click to expand...

guest · Aug 23, 2021

No new AirPods Pro before 2022
In a few weeks we might see a new AirPods, but they won't be the pro models...
August 23, 2021
https://www.macworld.co.uk/news/no-new-airpods-pro-3807662/

Apple's expected to launch the iPhone 13, Apple Watch Series 7 and new AirPods this autumn, but if you were hoping that the company would launch an update to the AirPods Pro you'll be disappointed.

In his latest newsletter Bloomberg's Mark Gurman makes it clear that he doesn't believe Apple has any update plans for the AirPods Pro this year: "I don't think that there will be a hardware update of the AirPods Pro before 2022," he says in the subscriber version of his Power On newsletter.
Click to expand...

guest · Nov 13, 2021

Rumor: AirPods Pro 2 to Launch in Third Quarter of 2022
November 12, 2021
https://www.macrumors.com/2021/11/12/airpods-pro-2-release-third-quarter-2022/

Apple will release second-generation AirPods Pro in the third quarter of 2022, according to a new rumor allegedly based on supply chain sources.

Apple is developing second-generation AirPods Pro to follow the AirPods 3, with the new high-end earbuds set to come out in 2022, according to well-connected Bloomberg reporter Mark Gurman and respected Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo. However, neither Gurman nor Kuo have offered a more specific launch window for the next-gen earbuds.
Click to expand...

The latest rumor comes from user @FronTron, who on Friday revised a previous claim made in June that "AirPods Pro 2" will be launched by the second quarter of next year "at least." The leaker now predicts Apple's second-generation AirPods Pro will arrive in Q3 2022. The third quarter traditionally encompasses a 92-day window between July 1 and September 30.
Click to expand...

guest · Aug 14, 2022

AirPods Pro 2: Five New Features and Improvements to Expect
August 14, 2022

Apple's second-generation AirPods Pro are finally nearing launch, with a release expected later this year. If you are considering upgrading to the new AirPods Pro once they are released, keep reading for a list of five new features to expect.
Click to expand...

imdb · Oct 8, 2022

With an in-ear design, AirPods Pro (gen 1 and 2) can become dirty more quickly than AirPods. But cleaning them is easy enough when you know what to avoid and what materials/tools are best. Read on for how to clean AirPods Pro and the charging case with step-by-step do’s and don’ts.
Click to expand...

Do’s and don’ts for cleaning your dirty AirPods Pro and charging case by Michael Potuck

Log in or Sign up

Apple AirPods: iPhone Accessory Or The Next Big Thing?

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

hawki Registered Member

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

imdb Registered Member

Log in or Sign up

Apple AirPods: iPhone Accessory Or The Next Big Thing?

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

hawki Registered Member

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

imdb Registered Member

Useful Searches