I’m ordering the AirPods 4 ANC, and I blame this video for pushing me over the edge

For the third time this week, I find myself compelled to share about the AirPods 4 with ANC. You can read my initial reaction post or the one I wrote about these earbuds really upping the ante for the upcoming Google Pixel Buds Pro 2, but the gist is quite simple: what Apple somewhat-quietly debuted in these new open-ear earbuds is staggering if it really works, and it makes the AirPods 4 with ANC the earbuds of my dreams.

I’ve long worn AirPods and have been one of those people that find them quite comfortable. Sure, the initial models had ridiculously-long stems and look a bit silly in hindsight, but that doesn’t change the fact that I was able to wear them for hours on end with no real discomfort. Their openness made it so I could hear my surroundings and never have the plugged ear feeling, too. I always loved that.

But as ANC started becoming a reality in earbuds, I quickly realized I wanted this feature more so than the comfort of the standard AirPods. And even when I include Apple’s own AirPods Pro, I’ve cycled through countless silicone-tipped ANC earbuds over the years in search of something I could wear for long periods without needing to take breaks. Spoiler alert: that’s never happened for me.

And this week, along comes Apple without their general fanfare for such things, announcing the fact that they’ve achieved what I’ve long thought to be impossible: ANC in earbuds without the need of silicone tips or anything else protruding deep into your ear canal. And I was of course skeptical at first.

But then I saw a couple videos I shared in my post that made me mildly hopeful that they could actually deliver. Still, I hesitated. After all, I don’t need them, per se; I just really want to know whether or not they can do what Apple has promised and, if so, I really want that sort of earbud in my pocket moving forward.

The video that pushed me over the edge

And then last night, it happened: a video from Digital Trends pushed me past the breaking point, and I ordered the AirPods 4 with ANC for pickup at my local Best Buy store on Friday. What was in this particular video, you might ask? Well, Caleb Denison opens the video by addressing my exact skepticism, and though he’s a bit bound by embargos on what he can and can’t say, his infectious excitement tells me all I need to know about how well the AirPods 4 with ANC actually perform.

He doesn’t go too far into his own experience outside of a press-focused trial he had while at the launch event. Again, Caleb chooses his words wisely, but he’s also been using these earbuds since leaving Apple’s campus last week, and regardless of what he can or cannot actually say with his mouth, he’s saying plenty with his body language, excitement, and interest in these earbuds.

So, I did it. I bought them and I’ve gone from completely skeptical to slightly hopeful that the new AirPods 4 with ANC can actually deliver on some decent ANC (I don’t need it to be the best ever by any stretch) while giving me the hours-long in-ear comfort I’ve been missing since moving on from my original AirPods a few years back.

But I don’t want to downplay the arrival of the new Pixel Buds Pro 2 in a little over a week, either. Google went to great lengths to attempt to make the Pixel Buds Pro 2 wildly-comfortable for more people. And if that is true and they deliver something special on that end, the interoperability with the Google ecosystem I find myself in could eventually win out.

The truth is, I’ve never been this excited for two sets of earbuds to arrive. In the back of my mind, I’m temporarily giving the AirPods 4 the win already simply because I know how well that style of earbud fits me and I’m becoming convinced that the ANC provided is more than a gimmick. But I’m also aware that the Pixel Buds Pro were really good and had they been a bit more comfortable, I’d still be using them every day. Either way, it’s going to be a fun couple weeks in the earbud space for sure!