New AirPod Pros, when? They may be months away from existence, but the documentation circulating through the U.S. patent offices reveals Apple is cooking something up for its high-end earbuds. And unlike the last major update, it’s not just swapping out the Lightning port for USB-C.
The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has granted Apple a patent. According to Patently Apple—a long-standing, legacy leaker—Apple filed a patent for possible future AirPods with “a texture exterior surface for input” and a “textured exterior surface” for controlling functions on another device. The textured exterior surface is multi-directional and can accept input commands, including swipe gestures. The controls would likely correspond to adjusting the volume, answering phone calls, stopping or starting a song, and all the other audio functions you’d want to cycle through without a display.
The patent also depicts a new vent for the AirPods Pro that helps minimize wind noise and determine whether the AirPod is adequately fit for active noise cancellation. It could be related to something the patent refers to as an “ear fitting process.” I wouldn’t be surprised if Apple leads out of the gate with new ANC calibration technology when it launches the AirPods Pro 3. It already showed us what it could do with the current generation AirPods Pro 2 when it added the Hearing Health feature alongside the launch of the iPhone 16.
There’s speculation that these new gestures and tactile parts of the AirPod Pros will help those users immersed in augmented reality (or maybe even reality reality). That’s because other rumors percolated about the AirPods Pro having cameras embedded inside for spatial awareness. It sparked off in a Bloomberg newsletter a few weeks ago after a mention of “camera-equipped AirPods” were on the way.
If you’d like to peruse the patent through the PDF, click here. It’s about 22 pages long and features interesting diagrams, like the one I embedded here. Most of the patent describes the technology that enables the calibration of in-ear headphones. But it’s also confirmation that it should be no surprise if Apple refreshes the AirPod Pros later this year. It is time.
