I have the AirPods 4 ANC, and the noise cancelling is blowing my mind

There’s no feeling quite like the anticipation of a new tech product that promises to do something pretty wildly different, and then having that anticipation paid off by the product actually delivering the goods. Such is the case with me and the new AirPods 4 ANC, and after having my hands on them and my ear canals around them for about 18 hours at this point, I’m still sitting here a bit shocked at how good they are.

ANC with no eartips

The key feature of these earbuds I’m still not seeing the appropriate buzz about around the web is the fact that they claim to provide ANC (active noise cancellation) without the need of intrusive silicon or rubber ear tips. I wrote about this the day Apple announced the AirPods 4 ANC, hoping that they could deliver, but being completely ready for them to fail.

Spoiler alert: they don’t fail. In fact, my expectations have already been exceeded with these new earbuds. The first time I squeezed that earbud and flipped on ANC, I honestly could not believe what I was hearing: or, what I wasn’t, I suppose.

Sure, the ANC isn’t quite as strong as the AirPods Pro, but I didn’t expect it to be this good. With a set of earbuds that I can just drop in my ear with no wiggling, no constant adjustment to feel the proper seal, and no sense that the eartips I chose aren’t quite right, I cannot believe they have this much ability to block out sound and noise.

Like other ANC earbuds or headphones, the really high pitches still get through and I expect nothing different. But general noise around the office like refrigerators, low conversations, the hum of traffic outside the window, etc. are all negated when I turn on ANC.

Even walking out on the sidewalk downtown with cars rolling by and the general din of traffic near and far, the AirPods 4 ANC knock all of that stuff down. Without music playing, it’s a simple calming quiet. With light music on, I’m in my own little world. And these earbuds are doing all this without the need of a sealing eartip!

Transparencey mode is next level

And because there is no real physical blocking in the ear canal, you can imagine how good the transparency mode is. When I stop the music, engage transparency mode, and take the AirPods 4 ANC in and out of my ears, there’s almost no difference in what I audibly take in.

This I expected, but its still a real treat. Don’t get me wrong, the transparency on both the iPods Pro and the Pixel Buds Pro have been superb, but this is on another level. When you mix in a well-crafted pass-through signal alongside actual ambient sounds that slip in around the earbuds anyway, you have a combination that is second to none when it comes to sounding like the earbuds aren’t in your ears at all.

The rest of the weekend will be spent seeing what I can and can’t get away with when paired up with my Pixel 9 Pro XL and also with a Chromebook. How will device switching be? What about some of the other features like Conversation Awareness or those head-nod options to dismiss calls? How’s gaming lag? I’d imagine we’ll see a mix of things that work well and things that don’t, but as long as I can use ANC, transparency, and keep them solidly connected, I’m all good.

The fit I’ve missed

This final part will be a bit subjective for sure, but I’ve talked about the fact that I’ve missed this style of earbud for quite some time. I find eartips to be fussy, generally uncomfortable for longer periods, and just a tad bit annoying. I’ve longed for the days where I could go back to my standard AirPods and somehow, magically get ANC, too.

And if you are like me and standard AirPods were a good fit for you back in the day (I never tried out the AirPods 2 or 3), be very glad. The AirPods 4 are just as comfortable for longer wearing sessions, and now you get all the extras you wanted all along. I have a trip coming up in a couple days where I’ll get to test these on the road and on a flight, so I’ll hold off on calling them my favorite earbuds ever. But I want to really bad.