AhaStyle earbuds for Apple AirPods.David Carnoy/CNETThere's plenty to like about: No wires to get tangled, automatic pairing with devices, good battery life and solid audio performance. But there are two things not to like. There's the premium price tag and the fact that they can fall out of your ears so easily. While there's not much we can do about the price, there is a low-cost solution to help keep the snug in your ears.AhaStyle packaging.Jason Hiner/CNETBased on a recommendation from CNET's (see Carnoy's ), for the past couple months I've been using a set of silicone earbud tips that slip over the AirPods. They have worked like a charm in keeping the AirPods from falling out. In fact, they now stay in my ears better than most of the wired earbuds I use.The silicone tips I got were the the. They cost less than $15 on Amazon and they come in two sizes, large and small.
Causes for Jaw and Ear Pain. The Temporomandibular joint disorders are a group of conditions that affect the relevant joint in the jaw area. They can lead to stiffness, headaches, jaw and ear pain, chewing and biting problems, clicking sounds and locked jaws. Apple’s one-size-fits-all AirPods design may work for most people, but if you have particularly large ears you may be struggling to keep your wireless earbuds secure. Don’t worry, you’re not.
Even though I'm not a large fellow, I found that the large ones fit better and stayed in my ears better. By default, the $15 will get you both a set of large and a set of small to try. But you can also choose to just get two small or two large pairs for the same price.
And they come in white or black. Note that the products discussed here are independently chosen by our editors. CNET may get a share of the revenue if you buy anything featured on our site.
The best part of earbud add-onsThe beauty of this solution is that it solves the main problem: Getting Apple's hard plastic earbuds to stay in your ears. For years, the wired headphones that Apple's included with the - technically called - have never fit well in my ears and would fall out at the slightest turn of my head or tension in the wires. I'm told that the problem has to do with the shape of the cartilage in my outer ear - the.The AirPods stayed in a little better by themselves, since there was no wires to tug on them. But adding the AhaStyle tips fixed the problem entirely, and I found them comfortable to wear.The surprising bonus was that the AhaStyle earbuds actually improved the sound of the AirPods.
As Carnoy wrote in his list of the, these silicone tips 'turn the 'open' AirPods into a noise-isolating design that helps keep ambient sound out and improves bass performance.' The worst part of earbud add-onsThe worst thing about using these add-on earbuds is that you have to take them off to charge the AirPods, which fit snugly into their charging chase. And then you have to slip the tips back on when you're ready to use the AirPods again.
AhaStyle includes a small silicone pouch to carry the tips. I carry both the AirPods in their case and this silicone pouch in my pocket. I found it to be a pain at first. But in terms of inconvenience, it's about the same as pulling my wired headphones out of my pocket and untangling them before sticking them in my ears.The other caveat is that I wouldn't recommend falling asleep with these in your ears if you're on a plane or a train or somewhere else in public. Even though the silicone tips keep the AirPods in your ears remarkably well, I've had times where I fell asleep during a flight and my head nodded toward my shoulder and an AirPod popped out. That left me looking through the folds of my clothes, my seat and on the floor for the missing AirPod.
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Since it, you have to be extra careful with these things. Alternatives to AhaStyle, and AirPodsJason Hiner/CNETWhile the AhaStyle EarHooks are the most popular option on Amazon, there are lots of alternatives - different designs for keeping the AirPods in your ears and lots of different colors.One of the more interesting alternatives is Insignia's ' that include three sets of earbud tips (small, medium and large), a set of silicone hooks that wrap around your ears to keep the AirPods in place and a silicone cord that you can use to attach to the AirPods and hang around your neck so you don't lose them. These have started getting popular. I recently saw several packages of the Insignia Accessories in a in an airport.There have occasionally been rumors that a future iteration of the AirPods will offer an in-ear version that's more like traditional earbuds. That would obviously make these silicone tips obsolete because that version of the AirPods would charge with the earbuds on. However, that seems increasingly unlikely as the AirPod design has become more and more iconic and Apple's Beats brand has released its own competitor, the, which feature earbuds and earhooks and have many of the same seamless connectivity benefits of the AirPods. Of course, at $250, the Powerbeats Pro are even more expensive than the AirPods.And, keep in mind that there are new solutions like the ($100) and ($130) that offer wireless versions of traditional earbuds.
Both are a better bargain than AirPods, but they also aren't as small and elegant as the AirPods and don't offer the automatic connectivity features for iPhone users.
AirPods: Your burning questions, answeredApple’s AirPods are up for pre-order and arriving in Apple Stores next week. I’ve got a set in hand, and rather than jumping straight to the review, I thought I’d answer some of the most common questions I’m seeing about Apple’s new wireless earbuds.Do they fit the same as Apple’s standard EarPods? Because those keep falling out of my ears.The main earbud portion of the AirPods seems to be identical in shape and size to the existing wired Apple EarPods. (The stem is bigger and thicker, owing to all the electronics that are packed within.) So they’ll probably fit your ears more or less the same as EarPods do.The big difference is in the lack of wires coming out of the bottom of the stems.
You may not notice the force that wires exert, constantly pulling against your ears and trying to coax those earbuds out of position, but compare the feeling of wearing EarPods to AirPods and you will realize that those wires really do have an impact. I never felt that EarPods were reliably seated in my ears, and they would often fall out; the AirPods stay in my ears even if I.
The only time I’ve had an AirPod fall out so far is when I took off my hoodie and the hood snagged on one of the AirPods, popping it out. The rest of the time, they’ve felt solid and secure in my ears without feeling weighty.Is there any way to stop it automatically playing music when you put it in your ear?This is actually a misunderstanding of how the AirPods work. When you connect and disconnect them, they’re basically emulating how wired headphones work with iOS devices. If you’re already playing audio when you connect them, that audio will start playing out of the AirPods. If you’re not playing audio, nothing happens.
Likewise, when you take the AirPods out of your ears or connect them to a different device, the audio stops playing just as sure as if you unplugged a set of headphones.The one exception is how the AirPods handle a situation where you take an AirPod out of your ear momentarily. When you do this, your device audio pauses temporarily. When you put the AirPod back in your ear, your device audio resumes. In this way, taking one AirPod out of an ear is an interface command—it’s literally the equivalent of tapping the play/pause button.Can you use them one at a time, with full functionality?I heard this question from several runners who are expecting to need to conserve battery power on long runs.
(The battery life is five hours, how long are you people running?!) The answer is yes: If you use a single AirPod, it will work just fine, and your iPhone will switch over to a mono mixdown so that you hear both sides of any stereo audio. It also means, as my pal Adam Engst pointed out, that you can run with one AirPod in and your other ear uncovered—which is smart if you’re running on roads and need to listen for traffic.Can you wear them a long time before your ears start to hurt?I got a lot of questions about the comfort of the AirPods, and there’s no good way to answer this question because everyone’s ears are shaped differently. The first time I went out with the AirPods, my right ear started to hurt after about half an hour.
I readjusted the earbud and it was more comfortable, and since then I’ve had no problems because I discovered the “right” way for the AirPods to sit in my ears. But I can make no promises — if you hate earbuds you may hate AirPods. They may be wireless marvels, but they’re still earbuds.What happens when you double-tap an AirPod?By default, this brings up Siri—on iOS and the Mac. But you can change your iOS settings to make this gesture instead equate to the play/pause button. To do so, go to the Bluetooth menu in Settings, tap the Info button next to your AirPods, and choose Play/Pause from the Double Tap On AirPods menu. From this menu you can also turn off the “ear detection” feature if you’d rather your device not react when you’re taking your AirPods in and out of your ears.If you pair AirPods with a Bluetooth-compatible device that hasn’t been designed to work specifically with the AirPods—I used an Android phone for my testing—they’ll still work, and the double-tap gesture generates a Play/Pause command.Can you voice-control AirPods when you don’t have an Internet connection?Nope, and this seems like a real oversight. Before there was Siri, there was Voice Control, which let you perform basic on-device functions like media playback without the use of the Internet.
Maybe Siri should be able to perform basic playback functions like volume control without an Internet connection?Can I have them?Sure. Get out your credit card and stop by your local Apple Store. But no, you can’t have mine.More questions? Tweet them @jsnell and I’ll try to answer, here or there. If you appreciate articles like this one, help us continue doing Six Colors (and get some fun benefits) by.