Apple isn’t done yet. After announcing seven new products in March – including the iPhone 17e, iPad Air, MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, MacBook Neo, Studio Display, and Studio Display XDR – the company has one more launch on the books in the coming weeks (as far as we know, at least).
AirPods Max 2 go up for pre-order on March 25, with availability beginning in early April. The updated over-ear headphones come in midnight, starlight, orange, purple, and blue – the same colors as the previous generation.
Powered by the H2 chip, the new model delivers up to 1.5x more effective active noise cancellation than the previous model, along with a new high dynamic range amplifier for cleaner audio. It’s worth noting that AirPods Max 2 also still support 24-bit, 48 kHz lossless audio over USB-C, which should be a boon for music creators working in Logic Pro and other production apps.
The H2 chip brings a raft of features previously exclusive to AirPods Pro 2/3 and AirPods 4, including Adaptive Audio, Conversation Awareness, Voice Isolation, Personalized Volume, and Live Translation. There’s also a new camera remote function that lets you snap photos or control video recording via the Digital Crown, plus studio-quality audio recording aimed at podcasters and content creators.
AirPods Max 2 start at $549, same as always. In fact, the H2 chip is really the only hardware change here, but it brings a surprising amount of new functionality to the over-ear form factor. Look out for the new headphones to drop next month.