With Apple’s new $179 ANC AirPods 4, the Pixel Buds Pro 2 need to be really good

Yesterday, Apple introduced the world to the new AirPods 4 with ANC. After spending some time yesterday and this morning looking for reactions from those actually at the event, I’ve come away really, really wanting to try these earbuds out for myself. In 9 days I can go and get some, and that leaves me in a strange spot with Google’s updated Pixel Buds Pro 2 just around the corner as well.

I covered all of this in the post yesterday, but Apple’s quietly doing something quite profound with these new AirPods, and as I wrote the post about my initial excitement for them yesterday, there were no quality hands-on videos yet available with them. Today, however, I’ve watched a couple different videos where people actually tried them in-ear in the crowded sandbox area after the keynote, and the results seem to be quite good. Here are those videos for reference:

As you can see, even in the boisterous room surrounded by hundreds of people, it seems that the AirPods 4 are capable of providing some real ANC without needing to fully seal off your ear canal with a silicon tip.

Even more interesting is the fact that these new AirPods 4 w/ANC will come with all the stuff I’ve grown to love about the AirPods Pro. They have the tips that you squeeze to interact with them, Apple’s fantastic transparency mode, USB Type C and/or Qi wireless charging, and they have a tiny case to hold it all in.

For an Android user like myself, I’m unsure if the nod-to-accept a call will work or if the fun additions like conversational awareness will function without an iPhone on the other end, but I honestly never care much about any of that stuff. I have a few pillars for earbuds (fit/comfort, great ANC/transparency, latency/software, and a small case), and these new AirPods look to meet them all without going nuts on the price.

Where these become an issue for the Pixel Buds Pro 2

For me, at least, the promise of an open-ear earbud with ANC is a huge deal. I’ve grown accustomed to silicone tips in my ears and can wear the AirPods Pro for an hour or so before a bit of fatigue sets in. But I used to wear the older style, open-ear AirPods for hours on end with no issues whatsoever.

If I can get all the stuff I enjoy about the AirPods Pro in an open-ear design for $179, that’s insanely compelling and makes the extra $50 for Pixel Buds Pro 2 a pretty tough upsell. And that’s just blowing by the fact that it makes the $80 upsell to Apple’s own AirPods Pro 2 completely unrealistic for most people, too.

For this all to make sense – even for someone like me that is deep in the Google ecosystem – the Pixel Buds Pro 2 need to deliver on the comfort/fit side of things. I’m 100% positive the ANC and transparency on Google’s new buds will be great, and I’m betting the software integration and latency will be fantastic, too. But for many users like myself, the fit and ability to wear earbuds long-term makes a ton of difference.

It doesn’t matter how great they sound our how cool the features are if I can’t keep the new Pixel Buds Pro 2 in my ears for very long without high levels of discomfort. I’m hopeful that Google’s research into fit and comfort actually pay off this time around, but I have to hold out judgement until I actually try them out. For now, I’m sitting in my relatively-quiet office, enjoying the long wear-ability of my old AirPods Gen 1 (just for a reminder of how comfy they are for my ears), awaiting what is looking like a probable run-in with the latest version of those earbuds from Apple in about 9 days from now.