A new pair of noise cancelling earbuds is on the way, but the focus is on fitness and running as Beats revamps its Powerbeats for a new generation.
Runners, take your marks: you’re about to find a new pair of earphones on the way, handy if the current assortment isn’t grabbing you at all.
A different crowd entirely, earphones and earbuds made for fitness are typically built with stability in mind but can miss out on some of those niceties we’ve found in premium gear. Noise cancellation and spatial audio are two of the things missing in action on athletic earbuds, replaced with a more open sound and water resistance as being the main features people look for.
With the latest pair from Beats, however, you may not have to compromise, as the Apple-owned company looks to upgrade one if its most successful lines for the new year.
The latest generation of the sports and exercise focused “Powerbeats” range takes what worked in the last generation of truly wireless Powerbeats Pro and improves things even more, keeping the design but tweaking things further.
You’ll find the same ear hook style with in-earphone tip, but now it’s stronger and better made, with a nickel titanium alloy hook and a slightly lighter design. There’s still an IPX4 sweat and water resistant rating, but now the ear tips coming in five sizes and there’s more to the earphones.
Controls on each side are standard, complete with volume controls, but there’s now support for active noise cancellation in the Powerbeats Pro, as well as an optical heart-rate sensor on the ear worked on with the Apple Watch team.
Yes, these earphones will report on your heart, flashing over 100 times per second to track your heart rate, sending the data to your phone. If you have an Apple Watch, your watch will take point on the readings, but if you don’t or you have an Android phone, you’ll get heart rate technology from the Apple Watch in place in your ears.
This could be the closest an Android has been to supporting an Apple Watch. Kind of.
Sound is also an important part — these are earphones, after all — and you’ll find a dual-layer 9.5mm driver designed more like a loud speaker, as well as some changes to the way bass is vented and released.
Spatial audio complements the package, as does support for Find My on iPhone and Locate My Beats on Android. There’s even support for as much as 45 hours of battery life provided you go without noise cancellation, while ANC drops the battery life closer to 36 hours all up.
“Powerbeats Pro 2 is the most impressive product in Beats history — developed to withstand intense training sessions and equipped with our most innovative technology and powerful sound,” said Oliver Schusser, Vice President of Music, Sports, and Beats at Apple.
“Now with Heart Rate Monitoring for workouts, Active Noise Cancellation, and Transparency mode, Powerbeats Pro 2 sets a new standard in audio for fitness,” he said.
Perhaps one of the most interesting aspects of the Powerbeats Pro 2 is just how much this new model has in common with Apple’s AirPods Pro second-gen.
They both support active noise cancellation with the research and technology coming from Apple, and they both support personalised spatial audio with head-tracking, provided you’re listening to music on Apple Music on an iPhone.
In many ways, the Powerbeats Pro 2 sound like a generation of the AirPods Pro 2nd-gen focused on fitness and working out, much like how 2022’s Beats Fit Pro were a pair of AirPods Pro 1st-gen made for the fitness crowd. In that generation, Apple released the follow-up to the first AirPods Pro that same year, and given what’s happening here, we have to expect the same.
Three years later from the release of the AirPods Pro 2nd-gen, we’re betting that one of the reasons the Powerbeats Pro has so much in common with the AirPods Pro 2nd-gen is that there will be an AirPods Pro 3rd-gen sometime in 2025.
But that shouldn’t detract from what Beats is essentially offering, repackaging what worked in the AirPods Pro for a more fitness-focused design, complete with the bonus extra of a heart rate sensor, should you need it.
Australians can expect to find the Powerbeats Pro in stores shortly, arriving in four colours and priced at $399.95.
