Apple didn’t so much raise the bar but throw it into orbit when they launched the AirPods Pro in 2019. The company’s long awaited attempt at noise cancelling turned out to be the best wireless earbuds you can buy. But as tends to be the case with Apple’s products, these buds are rather expensive.
The good news? Apple may be working on a new version called the AirPods Pro Lite, which has us wondering how the AirPods range is going to grow in the near future.
This comes from a report by DigiTimes (via MacRumors) that Apple is moving production of its new devices to Taiwan. This is at least in part a reaction to the problems that coronavirus is posing to its Chinese production partners. A supply chain split across different countries should help mitigate the problem.
Other products named in the report include the next Apple Watch (likely the Apple Watch 6), a new iPad and the next iMac. These are due for updates, but there’s no indication in the report that these have different models coming.
The name “AirPod [sic] Pro Lite” at least sounds like a new middle ground between the AirPods Pro and the standard Gen. 2 AirPods. This would be odd though, since there is only a $50 difference between the AirPods Pro and the AirPods with wireless charging case. Perhaps Apple is intending on renaming some of its existing products when the new generation arrives.
If that’s the case, we might expect them to appear at the rumored March event that will also unveil the iPhone 9 aka iPhone SE 2), the new mid-range smartphone that would pair nicely with some new cheaper earbuds. And there's always our roundup of the best fake AirPods if you're searching for a low-cost pair of look-a-likes.
