To clarify because this is confusing: The AirPods work as regular old BlueTooth earbuds on other devices already. This is an implementation of some of the extra features and interfaces that are integrated into Apple products.
How is it confusing? The top of the README explains it.
> LibrePods allows you to use AirPods features that are exclusive to Apple devices. It implements the proprietary protocol used to exchange data between AirPods and Apple devices
Airtags can be scanned with your non-Apple smartphone's NFC reader which gives you contact info for the owner.
Beyond that, all tracker devices are proprietary. The Tile/Chipolo network only works with Tile/Chipolo; Samsung's SmartTag only works with the SmartThings app which is exclusive to Samsung phones; etc.
There's very little point having a discussion about something where other people can't even be bothered to properly read the link that was submitted - and even more frustrating when that link was literally a README file.
Did the subheading "AirPods liberated from Apple's ecosystem." and the first line of body text "LibrePods allows you to use AirPods features that are exclusive to Apple devices." not provide the required context? Or at least strongly hint that there is context that iPhone-only AirPods users might not know - and for whom this project is probably irrelevant?
Apparently too many people on this forum of "clever" people think "exclusive" means the whole functionality of Airpods, including audio, is restricted to Apple devices...
A limitation that would make a lot of economic sense for Apple to do!
No, it did not. I found the link interesting like anything else open source. Will I use it? No. But I didn’t pick up on any of what you said. I thought they reverse engineered AirPods so they can work on Android, Linux etc
Not that they can already be used on other platforms as just Bluetooth devices (nor did I know that there were special Apple only features because it’s not widely known that those feature are Apple only)
Recently, for the first time in over 15 years here, I've wished often for a "block user" function, so I can gradually weed those zero-effort zero-contributing users out. (If I didn't read HN across 4 or 5 different devices, I'd probably write a browser extension to allow me to do that...)
I think I'd "behead" subthreads at posts by blocked users, so their posts and any replies under them get hidden for me. I'm happy enough to lose followup discussion and/or arguments against anything a user who I've caught out not reading the actual post and replying - and been annoyed enough at too add them to my blocklist. I _might_ miss some interesting discussion that way, but I'm fine with that to be the cost of me avoiding getting irritated by annoying posters.
(And the mood I'm in right now, I'd probably block top level posts by blocked users as well)
Edit: If it were me, it’d be cool as hell if you implemented a way to compare - like a toggle on/off - so you could see if there was anything worthwhile with just a skim!
But it is not me, and I still appreciate your sharing.
So far most of the "discussion" on this thread is why did he post this. He just posted what he thought others missed, if people find it useless it will further down the page. TLDR, I find the comments under that thread questioning why he posted even more pointless.
That's not why one buys the AirPods. These things go with me from the iPhone to Apple TV, to my MBP, to the Mini. There is better sound available for less, but the sound is the least of the story.
I know. That’s why I wrote the comment. I wasn’t responding to the repo, I was leaving some info for all of the other commenters who were confused about this.
If I remember right, there have been several Android applications that show the battery level of AirPods since at least 2021. For essential features in addition to being connected as an ordinary Bluetooth audio output and audio input device.
This project is great. Hopefully one day AirDrop is liberated too. https://github.com/seemoo-lab/opendrop looked promising, but it seems stale. maybe one day.
The AirPods already work outside of the Apple ecosystem. This is just someone building out interfaces for their extra features that are already integrated into Apple operating systems.
Be wary - I do not have an iPhone, and I once connected my AirPods to my wifes MacBook. They now chirp at me loudly every time I pick them up, automatically try to connect to her phone etc, and I cannot unregister them from her account. I want to add them to Find My - I cannot add them to Find My from my MacBook, I 'need' an iPhone or iPad to do that...
Yeah I understand. But there are plenty of good headphones that work with Android and include most of the features. That's kind of the point of Librepods right? To bring AirPods up to par for non-Apple devices and make them a viable option for Android and/or non-Mac users. So "this working" means those features.
Yeah no criticism of the devs here, it's a great project. I meant to point at Apple. Though I'm a customer and like many of their products. I do hate their rigid clearly profit driven walled garden.
AirPods update while charging in their case and paired with an xOS device. You'll need to make sure that they never connect with an Apple product to "version pin" them.
Why would they try to make the AirPods a worse purchase? Apple is happy to let you run whatever operating system on your Mac -- they aren't actively hostile there, but they don't help the community either.
Still, I would recommend the Sony WF-1000XM6 if you're not an Apple computer or phone user already. The UX is reportedly worse and a bit buggy, but the sound should be better.
> Why would they try to make the AirPods a worse purchase?
Why assume this is what they're doing?
Apple can only QA so much. To open up proprietary tacked-on features to a hardware ecosystem they can't control, opens up AirPods to be perceived as buggy on those devices, which isn't going to help the perception of quality of Apple products for non-iPhone/iPad users.
Even that is a lie. It allows other OSs, but they know quite well, that without drivers, it’s an empty promise. I can’t run anything else on my Mini for example.
You can configure them to pause them when you take them out of your ear, except when it is not an Apple device. They will refuse to do so, even though they clearly detect the event since you can no longer use the stem as a pause button when you do so.
Clearly they make it worse just because you didn't get an Apple device, so yeah idk what you're smoking but give me some.
Since the AirPods are an offline device, if you buy a pair now they should work indefinitely. But perhaps it would be better to reward manufacturers that don't make you jump through such hoops to use the hardware that you bought.
Sure. But on the other hand it makes sense to reward manufactures that make good hardware. And AirPods are very good hardware for me so I'm perfectly ok rewarding them for it.
By "reward manufacturers that make good hardware" do you mean "purchase their hardware" or do you mean some other long term commitment to them? Or is this a jab at the person who suggested you not buy their "good hardware" for other reasons?
Personally, I will use whatever gear is good as long as there's no risk of it becoming a paperweight because the manufacturer aggressively gets in the way of using it with other operating systems. I'm not "all in" on Apple and never will be. I love certain apple hardware but I'll likely never buy an M series Macbook because one day they'll stop supporting it even though it still works perfectly, and it doesn't support Linux.
I realize your statement is subjective, but AirPods are made up of variants with plastic buds and variants that come with literally 5 sizes of squishy tips in the box.
So you have a total of 6 different fits to choose from. Plus the fact that there are surely dozens of third party tip options available for the Pro models.
The idea that anything with that many fit options can be considered the most uncomfortable earbuds on the market is not really possible in concept. That idea is as meaningless as saying that a size 9 Converse All Star is the most uncomfortable shoe on the market.
We are many generations removed from the original one size fits all product which was much different.
There really aren't very many different tip types available for airpods, since they use a special clip attachment method that means you can't use any standard existing tips.
I've been looking for aftermarket tips for my pro 3s and there's maybe 5 actually different tips available (crappy foam, decent foam, bad hybrid, basic sticky silicone, basic bad rubber). They're distinctly lacking in good quality tips with different textures (can help with comfort and keeping them in your ears) or different bore sizes (comfort and changes the sound signature). TRI clarion, Tangzu Tang Sancai, Penon Liqueur, JVC Spiral Dot are a few different standard tips that would likely be way more comfortable than the standard airpods tips if you could actually use them.
Shoes are actually a great analogy here, because the companies all use different lasts, so it doesn't matter that eg. Adidas has thousands of different shoes in over a dozen sizes, none of them actually comfortably fit my feet because the heel is always too wide and the forefoot too narrow.
Also, they only come with 5 tip sizes (4+1 on the buds) and use an oval shape which I personally find less comfortable than circular tips+stems.
I would be surprised if they could. Linux on Macs is still a thing. In fact, Linux on Mac is why I keep all the Macs we have in the house from the mid to late 2000s because they still turn on and work, if I choose to install Linux on any of them they are still usable.
They can. Require a valid signature from the mac's secure cryptoprocessor in order to interoperate. There's nothing we can do.
Remember when we used to use cryptography to protect ourselves from government and corporation espionage? Good times. Now cryptography is used by governments and corporations to protect themselves from us.
One day we'll need such hardware attestations to even get an internet connection.
> Now cryptography is used by governments and corporations to protect themselves from us.
Just in case you're not kidding, I'll remind you it was always thus. The Nazi Enigma machines were not created by libertarian anarcho-punks to distribute The Whole Earth Catalog.
I was referencing the time period that saw the invention of the personal computer which democratized access to strong cryptography, leading to the crypto wars as the US government attempted to restrict civilian use.
Linux on older Macs, currently. I'd love to install Linux on my M5 (or even ARM Windows 11) but it's not possible due to Apple's lack of documentation and some other issues.
Basically all the annoying shit I have to handle with my AirPods is made up by how good of a product they are. I have nice headphones, speakers, studio and other microphones, etc for a bunch of use cases. AirPods are my workhorse. I haven't found anything as comfortable with as good a battery life and as good fidelity and as good price. The active noise cancelling is also very good.
This is my big conundrum with Apple. Their hardware is absolutely brilliant, but their combative nature against the users freedom on their hardware means I will never use it.
Even if you can hack around it, it is the culture that treats the users as someone to be controlled and coddled that bothers me.
It's less hostile and more lazy. The Airpods use standard bluetooth for everything that bluetooth has. The stuff that doesn't work on non apple platforms is the configuration, changing what the squeeze actions do and loading firmware updates.
There is no way to do this with standard bluetooth, you have to have a custom app for it. Apple just didn't build a custom app for other platforms but there is no reason they would care about someone else investing the resources in to building it. They still win because you bought the airpods and someone else spent the resources on making the app.
I've owned several pairs of AirPods over the years and this is the first I'm learning about some of their features. I almost found myself wanting there to be a third column for indicating Apple support (of course I'm being facetious).
It would be useful to explain to people who don't currently own AirPods and don't really follow Apple stuff much what features are lost when AirPods are paired with a non-Apple device.
> Note that this is the default for better quality (Bluetooth spec, not Linux).
Yeah, I have the impression most people assume Apple magically solved sound/mic quality in bidirectional mode. Or they just don't care. In any case, I'm unhappy about how much Airpods are used for meetings. They sounds so much worse than any wired mic! Or your laptop's mic, as long as you're not using the speakers.
They use hardware tricks (beamshaping) and software tricks (audio processing) to get as much out of them as possible, and they do sound better than generic cheap Bluetooth earbuds, but the Bluetooth connection is still the bottleneck.
They did announce a special "high quality recording mode" for Airpods in iOS 26 (which I didn't know, so thanks) but I couldn't find much except their developer announcement. It's not documented and I don't have the feeling it's being used.
I feel the main useful feature that I’m looking for is the ability to use the unlimited multipoint on other devices. The 2 points that most other devices gives you is terrible. It would be nice to be able to quickly connect to my voip deskphone at work from time to time.
FYI android 17 fixes the bugs in the Bluetooth stack that previously required root to fix. But, this app still charges $5 for using features your air pods have. I'll be spending my afternoon forking and enabling them.
I get the idea behind wanting to fork and improve it, I truely do. I also get the idea behind wanting to see how the innards work.
However I'm a developer and I gladly paid the $5 so I can support the original dev for all the work that they have already done, and also for open sourcing it. I really don't want to maintain my own fork, sync it, build apks etc
Hi! The developer here. The app requires a purchase only when you install it from Play Store. The FOSS version available on GitHub takes you to my GH Sponsors page where you can wait for a few seconds and return back to the app. Or you can also just click the Restore Purchases button. There's no need for a fork :)
> The aacp.rs and the att.rs files were translated from Kotlin to Rust with AI. Some parts of the media_controller.rs file, mainly the pulse integration, was also AI-generated.
you can grab a proprietary binary, open it up in IDA Pro (with MCP), spend some 10 minutes crafting a good prompt and after a few million (mainly input/cached) GLM 5.2 tokens you have a python script fluently speaking the proprietary protocol.
aside from https://github.com/mrexodia/ida-pro-mcp (which isn't mine) i have nothing i can publicly share. it's amusing how glm 5.2 jailbreaks itself, you ask it to quite literally break someone's software and it talks itself into it being a capture the flag competition.
I uploaded two binary save files from a game on my Steam Deck to ChatGPT, it diffed them and spat out a script to edit various values. The bots are really good at this sort of thing.
Not surprised at all; AI has dramatically lowered the bar to people wanting to create software they wouldn't otherwise have the time nor motivation to. Quality remains to be seen but IMHO it can only get better.
I’m going to be honest I fell for the AirPods Pro 3 hype about it being the best noise cancelling of all time and I bought a pair. I found the noise cancelling worse than my $30 Anker Soundcore P30i, I could never get the hearing test on the AirPods to pass no matter what depths of a quiet room I went to, and the sound quality on music was worse than my Ankers. Don’t fall for the hype or at least order from Amazon like I did so you can return them. I could hear my AC running with the AirPods, with the Anker I had to ask my girlfriend if it was on.
I had the original AirPods Pro and they were really great until Apple nerfed them. Apparently the noise cancelling was too strong in some cases so they worsened everybody's. After that they started making ear-piercing squelching noises, rendering them useless. I guess they make a good paperweight and reminder to never buy noise-cancelling products from Apple.
There was some problem with the first gen that you would hear static, Apple replaced those if you contacted support. Happened to me just before end of 1 yr warranty and kinda funny but they had me mail in my airpods to be replaced and lost them. So they ended up sending me a new pair and iirc $100 gift card for the trouble.
I missed the replacement window by three weeks and they offered to “repair” them for $180. Was not impressed. Judging by resale prices on eBay, it’s always the right ear bud that goes bad on gen1 pros
I’m glad the Anker’s worked out for you, but the Soundcore brand almost completely turned me off from Anker. After two weeks the Soundcore buds I had stopped charging.
I have limited experience with noise canceling headphones (some circa 2008 active Sony earbuds, and some not-that-great Beats Studio Buds+. On a whim I bought AirPods 4 ANC and I’ve found them way better than I expected. Good enough for airplane noise canceling without the seal of most ear buds. They feel smaller than the beats buds, even with the stem. They seamlessly switch from my phone to iPad to Mac. I haven’t sat down to compare their quality to any of my other headphones, but I don’t really care. Nothing comes close to matching the convenience and the sound isn’t so bad that I each for something else. I did not expect to like them as much as I do.
Maybe it’s hype, maybe I don’t know what better noise canceling sounds like. These aren’t the Pros, so maybe there’s a difference.
I recommend Bose QuiteComfort Ultra 2. That's way better in terms of ANC and sound quality than AirPods or Powerbeats or any other products from same line.
My Pro 2’s get so much use it’s ridiculous. Great cancellation and they’re always on my person thanks to the case perfectly fitting that tiny right pocket most mens’ jeans have (vestigial watch pocket?) and not taking up any primary pocket space.
For real, after being on wireless earbuds for quite some time and going back to wired, it is absolutely incredible how many things the cords get caught on. Even just your own hands!
I ask because I find Apple's wired EarPods to be less... selective than AirPods are—by that I mean they'll pick up more background noise whereas AirPods seem to only transmit my voice—but EarPods' clarity exceeds AirPods if you grab the mic and hold it next to your mouth, which you obviously can't do with AirPods.
google IEM. Decent sound quality is very accessible, I have 20 dollar aliexpress Tangzu Wan'er and I prefer them to my airpods pro 3 for pure music listening
While consumer electronics companies have gone for wireless earbuds, the hi-fi, in ear monitor market is very much alive. Not to mention also relatively affordable these days.
AirPods themselves aren’t really that great from an audiophile perspective. The only part I like about them is the integration with the Apple ecosystem. This is a fun project and cudos to whoever pulled it off, but I fail to see the motivation.
Airpods may not be "great from an audiophile perspective", but their sound is decent and they are actually well designed headphones. They are remarkably unremarkable. They have good (the new Pros even great) ANC. Their controls are intuitive and well thought out. It's hard for me to believe that I'm promoting an Apple product here, but they are what people often claim other Apple products to be – which I found to be BS for these other products. Someone sensible actually put thought into the product.
AirPods are widely appreciated in audiophile communities. Especially with some EQ applied, which is easy and common these days and easy to find for AirPods.
They're never going to appeal to the audiophile communities that pride themselves on being different and/or expensive above all else, but they're actually good hardware with decent out of the box tuning. Apply some EQ on top if you so desire and they're very good.
I am an audiophile, and for me the AirPods Pro replaced literally thousands of dollars of portable headphones, amplifiers, etc., which I don't miss a bit. Apple's audio engineering is truly top-notch, and all the convenience features are icing on the cake.
I actually really like the airpod pros from an audio standpoint. I find that a lot of wireless earbuds are way too heavy on the bass compared to the airpod pro.
"Audiophiles don't use their equipment to listen to music. Audiophiles use your music to listen to their equipment."
AirPods makes it easier to listen to music across multiple devices. They sound reasonable enough for people to enjoy their music. They enable people to enjoy their music. This is why they are so popular.
My thoughts exactly, what I’d rather have is the ability to integrate other stuff into Apple’s ecosystem (most notably my hearing aids, which despite being MFi can only really stream audio from my phone—I had a pair of Beats headphones a few years ago and the ease with which I could switch them between phone, iPad and Mac was so wonderful and I’d like to be able to do that with my HAs as well.
The sony earbuds are about the best I’ve had for sound quality and noise cancellation. Much better than AirPods, but not nearly as nice integration with the Apple ecosystem.
I find AirPods Pro 2 to be “good enough” where I gave away my set of XMs to someone who will actually use them.
Call (mic) quality in AirPods is better as well, if that matters at all to you. At least that’s what folks on the remote end of calls told me.
I got the InZone gaming buds version which are supposedly very similar to Sony's WF-1000XM5 (https://electronics.sony.com/audio/gaming-audio/all-inzone-h...) I wanted to try out the higher-end wireless Bluetooth LE Audio and their USB-C transceiver, and I wanted something that would let me side-step the Bluetooth stack on my Steam Deck (AirPods are horrible and get lag on Deck after 30 mins; that one is Apple's fault), but even in the best case I find Bluetooth on the Deck is annoying.
I would say the sound is great and overall better than AirPods Pro 3 when I compare the AirPods and InZone buds playing Spotify Lossless content from my iPhone, but the sound is not to my taste. Not sure how much of the quality comes from the LE audio vs better sound hardware engineering. They sound more detailed in vocals, mids, highs, but are a little warm and muddy in the lows. I can't get the sound profile to match my AirPod Pros 3 or my Kef bookshelf speakers with EQ, but I didn't try very hard. The left bud also sometimes takes a bit longer turn on once I put them in my ears, up to 30 seconds before it starts playing audio.
AirPod Pros 3 are ahead in noise cancelling, transparency, and touch controls -- the InZone buds use long touch vs short touch for volume up/down which is confusing, it's much easier to increase the volume and harder to decrease it. AirPods win out for convenience when using with Apple hardware also since I have to use the USB-C dongle since Apple hardware doesn't support Bluetooth LE Audio / whatever the codec is.
Overall I'm happy with the purchase -- they do a great job as Steam Deck headset use case.
I want to try out the new WF-1000XM6 as well, which seem to review better than the WF-1000XM5, but don't have any friends with them yet.
I would not recommend wireless Sony earphones or headphones. I’ve owned three different models and in all of them the batteries failed after a few years. Check out the reviews there is an abnormal amount of failures. My conclusion is that while Sony is great at many things, they can’t do wireless headphones or earphones well and I steer clear.
To clarify because this is confusing: The AirPods work as regular old BlueTooth earbuds on other devices already. This is an implementation of some of the extra features and interfaces that are integrated into Apple products.
How is it confusing? The top of the README explains it.
> LibrePods allows you to use AirPods features that are exclusive to Apple devices. It implements the proprietary protocol used to exchange data between AirPods and Apple devices
And then has a table listing the features.
I wasn't aware they operated as baseline Bluetooth headphones by default on other devices, so even having read the readme it wasn't obvious.
How else did you think they worked
I assumed, like Apple's Airtags (which use Bluetooth LE), that they used some proprietary pairing that's incompatible with non-Apple devices.
Airtags can be scanned with your non-Apple smartphone's NFC reader which gives you contact info for the owner.
Beyond that, all tracker devices are proprietary. The Tile/Chipolo network only works with Tile/Chipolo; Samsung's SmartTag only works with the SmartThings app which is exclusive to Samsung phones; etc.
I just don't think the comparison is apt
New chipolos work in both Apple Find My and Android Find Hub. Most third-party tags seem to support multiple platforms now.
Ugreen tags work with both Google's Find network and Apple's FindMy network.
> How is it confusing?
Judging by all of the other comments that assumed otherwise, a lot of people either weren’t reading the README or weren’t parsing what it was saying.
:sigh:
There's very little point having a discussion about something where other people can't even be bothered to properly read the link that was submitted - and even more frustrating when that link was literally a README file.
I didn’t follow that either from the README and I read the README before coming to the comments.
I have only used AirPods on iPhone and didn’t realize there were special features.
Therefore like most I had zero context.
Did the subheading "AirPods liberated from Apple's ecosystem." and the first line of body text "LibrePods allows you to use AirPods features that are exclusive to Apple devices." not provide the required context? Or at least strongly hint that there is context that iPhone-only AirPods users might not know - and for whom this project is probably irrelevant?
Apparently too many people on this forum of "clever" people think "exclusive" means the whole functionality of Airpods, including audio, is restricted to Apple devices...
A limitation that would make a lot of economic sense for Apple to do!
No, it did not. I found the link interesting like anything else open source. Will I use it? No. But I didn’t pick up on any of what you said. I thought they reverse engineered AirPods so they can work on Android, Linux etc
Not that they can already be used on other platforms as just Bluetooth devices (nor did I know that there were special Apple only features because it’s not widely known that those feature are Apple only)
_A lot of times_ people comment based on the title alone. I think it’s more common than one would imagine.
Yeah. And that's sad.
Recently, for the first time in over 15 years here, I've wished often for a "block user" function, so I can gradually weed those zero-effort zero-contributing users out. (If I didn't read HN across 4 or 5 different devices, I'd probably write a browser extension to allow me to do that...)
How would you handle replies?
What happens if they’re the top or middle of a pivotal subthread?
I think I'd "behead" subthreads at posts by blocked users, so their posts and any replies under them get hidden for me. I'm happy enough to lose followup discussion and/or arguments against anything a user who I've caught out not reading the actual post and replying - and been annoyed enough at too add them to my blocklist. I _might_ miss some interesting discussion that way, but I'm fine with that to be the cost of me avoiding getting irritated by annoying posters.
(And the mood I'm in right now, I'd probably block top level posts by blocked users as well)
Thanks for your reply.
Edit: If it were me, it’d be cool as hell if you implemented a way to compare - like a toggle on/off - so you could see if there was anything worthwhile with just a skim!
But it is not me, and I still appreciate your sharing.
So far most of the "discussion" on this thread is why did he post this. He just posted what he thought others missed, if people find it useless it will further down the page. TLDR, I find the comments under that thread questioning why he posted even more pointless.
That's not why one buys the AirPods. These things go with me from the iPhone to Apple TV, to my MBP, to the Mini. There is better sound available for less, but the sound is the least of the story.
The very first paragraph of TFA adequately explains this.
I know. That’s why I wrote the comment. I wasn’t responding to the repo, I was leaving some info for all of the other commenters who were confused about this.
If I remember right, there have been several Android applications that show the battery level of AirPods since at least 2021. For essential features in addition to being connected as an ordinary Bluetooth audio output and audio input device.
This project is great. Hopefully one day AirDrop is liberated too. https://github.com/seemoo-lab/opendrop looked promising, but it seems stale. maybe one day.
This was solved a little while ago.
https://www.android.com/quick-share/
For a very limited subset of Android devices
https://support.google.com/android/answer/9286773#zippy=%2Cf....
If I wasn't certain Apple will do their best to patch every avenue to this working in the future it might be motivation to buy AirPods.
The AirPods already work outside of the Apple ecosystem. This is just someone building out interfaces for their extra features that are already integrated into Apple operating systems.
Be wary - I do not have an iPhone, and I once connected my AirPods to my wifes MacBook. They now chirp at me loudly every time I pick them up, automatically try to connect to her phone etc, and I cannot unregister them from her account. I want to add them to Find My - I cannot add them to Find My from my MacBook, I 'need' an iPhone or iPad to do that...
Yeah I understand. But there are plenty of good headphones that work with Android and include most of the features. That's kind of the point of Librepods right? To bring AirPods up to par for non-Apple devices and make them a viable option for Android and/or non-Mac users. So "this working" means those features.
Still a useful project for those of us with a foot in both the iOS and Android camps. (And who use Linux as well as macOS)
Yeah no criticism of the devs here, it's a great project. I meant to point at Apple. Though I'm a customer and like many of their products. I do hate their rigid clearly profit driven walled garden.
AirPods update while charging in their case and paired with an xOS device. You'll need to make sure that they never connect with an Apple product to "version pin" them.
Why would they try to make the AirPods a worse purchase? Apple is happy to let you run whatever operating system on your Mac -- they aren't actively hostile there, but they don't help the community either.
Still, I would recommend the Sony WF-1000XM6 if you're not an Apple computer or phone user already. The UX is reportedly worse and a bit buggy, but the sound should be better.
> Why would they try to make the AirPods a worse purchase?
Why assume this is what they're doing?
Apple can only QA so much. To open up proprietary tacked-on features to a hardware ecosystem they can't control, opens up AirPods to be perceived as buggy on those devices, which isn't going to help the perception of quality of Apple products for non-iPhone/iPad users.
> Apple is happy to let you run whatever operating system on your Mac -- they aren't actively hostile there
Weird to praise Apple for the one line of devices they let you install your own operating system on and ignore that every other device doesn't.
Even that is a lie. It allows other OSs, but they know quite well, that without drivers, it’s an empty promise. I can’t run anything else on my Mini for example.
I'm expecting them to lock down future devices because of this. Asahi can't keep up so the feature is basically unused.
You can configure them to pause them when you take them out of your ear, except when it is not an Apple device. They will refuse to do so, even though they clearly detect the event since you can no longer use the stem as a pause button when you do so.
Clearly they make it worse just because you didn't get an Apple device, so yeah idk what you're smoking but give me some.
yeah the fact that many things start working if you change the host ID to apple device is very sus. i retract.
Since the AirPods are an offline device, if you buy a pair now they should work indefinitely. But perhaps it would be better to reward manufacturers that don't make you jump through such hoops to use the hardware that you bought.
> an offline device
Until you or someone else pairs them with an iPhone and leave them sitting overnight. The iPhone will send them the latest firmware.
Sure. But on the other hand it makes sense to reward manufactures that make good hardware. And AirPods are very good hardware for me so I'm perfectly ok rewarding them for it.
By "reward manufacturers that make good hardware" do you mean "purchase their hardware" or do you mean some other long term commitment to them? Or is this a jab at the person who suggested you not buy their "good hardware" for other reasons?
Personally, I will use whatever gear is good as long as there's no risk of it becoming a paperweight because the manufacturer aggressively gets in the way of using it with other operating systems. I'm not "all in" on Apple and never will be. I love certain apple hardware but I'll likely never buy an M series Macbook because one day they'll stop supporting it even though it still works perfectly, and it doesn't support Linux.
I wouldn't. Most uncomfortable earbuds in the market at any price.
I realize your statement is subjective, but AirPods are made up of variants with plastic buds and variants that come with literally 5 sizes of squishy tips in the box.
So you have a total of 6 different fits to choose from. Plus the fact that there are surely dozens of third party tip options available for the Pro models.
The idea that anything with that many fit options can be considered the most uncomfortable earbuds on the market is not really possible in concept. That idea is as meaningless as saying that a size 9 Converse All Star is the most uncomfortable shoe on the market.
We are many generations removed from the original one size fits all product which was much different.
There really aren't very many different tip types available for airpods, since they use a special clip attachment method that means you can't use any standard existing tips. I've been looking for aftermarket tips for my pro 3s and there's maybe 5 actually different tips available (crappy foam, decent foam, bad hybrid, basic sticky silicone, basic bad rubber). They're distinctly lacking in good quality tips with different textures (can help with comfort and keeping them in your ears) or different bore sizes (comfort and changes the sound signature). TRI clarion, Tangzu Tang Sancai, Penon Liqueur, JVC Spiral Dot are a few different standard tips that would likely be way more comfortable than the standard airpods tips if you could actually use them.
Shoes are actually a great analogy here, because the companies all use different lasts, so it doesn't matter that eg. Adidas has thousands of different shoes in over a dozen sizes, none of them actually comfortably fit my feet because the heel is always too wide and the forefoot too narrow.
Also, they only come with 5 tip sizes (4+1 on the buds) and use an oval shape which I personally find less comfortable than circular tips+stems.
I would be surprised if they could. Linux on Macs is still a thing. In fact, Linux on Mac is why I keep all the Macs we have in the house from the mid to late 2000s because they still turn on and work, if I choose to install Linux on any of them they are still usable.
> I would be surprised if they could.
They can. Require a valid signature from the mac's secure cryptoprocessor in order to interoperate. There's nothing we can do.
Remember when we used to use cryptography to protect ourselves from government and corporation espionage? Good times. Now cryptography is used by governments and corporations to protect themselves from us.
One day we'll need such hardware attestations to even get an internet connection.
> Now cryptography is used by governments and corporations to protect themselves from us.
Just in case you're not kidding, I'll remind you it was always thus. The Nazi Enigma machines were not created by libertarian anarcho-punks to distribute The Whole Earth Catalog.
I was referencing the time period that saw the invention of the personal computer which democratized access to strong cryptography, leading to the crypto wars as the US government attempted to restrict civilian use.
Linux on older Macs, currently. I'd love to install Linux on my M5 (or even ARM Windows 11) but it's not possible due to Apple's lack of documentation and some other issues.
Apple is still selling Macs with M3 and M4 chips.
Regarding M5 support, seems like a matter of time.
https://github.com/AsahiLinux/m1n1/pull/578
I am pretty sure Apple doesn't care
Basically all the annoying shit I have to handle with my AirPods is made up by how good of a product they are. I have nice headphones, speakers, studio and other microphones, etc for a bunch of use cases. AirPods are my workhorse. I haven't found anything as comfortable with as good a battery life and as good fidelity and as good price. The active noise cancelling is also very good.
And I'm an apple hater, in general.
Would you recommend those for someone with no Apple devices?
I'm thinking of gifting them to someone. But they are Android/Linux user.
Previous discussion https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45941596
Thanks! Macroexpanded:
AirPods libreated from Apple's ecosystem - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45941596 - Nov 2025 (462 comments)
I respect the work/hack involved.
However why support a company (by buying airpods) that is this hostile. i.e. I wouldn't be surprised to see a patch to stop this.
What's so hostile about it?
They can't _add_ features on top of regular Bluetooth connectivity, that they choose to only offer on platforms they're able to fully control and QA ?
Is even just making a feature exclusive really that 'hostile'? A company can't offer benefits for going with several of their products?
Or you mean they _are_ hostile because you're _assuming_ they will try to patch this?
This is my big conundrum with Apple. Their hardware is absolutely brilliant, but their combative nature against the users freedom on their hardware means I will never use it.
Even if you can hack around it, it is the culture that treats the users as someone to be controlled and coddled that bothers me.
It's less hostile and more lazy. The Airpods use standard bluetooth for everything that bluetooth has. The stuff that doesn't work on non apple platforms is the configuration, changing what the squeeze actions do and loading firmware updates.
There is no way to do this with standard bluetooth, you have to have a custom app for it. Apple just didn't build a custom app for other platforms but there is no reason they would care about someone else investing the resources in to building it. They still win because you bought the airpods and someone else spent the resources on making the app.
The fact that simple VendorID spoofing makes features available tells otherwise.
0. For the love of the game
1. Additional freedom for used purchasers, gifted purchasers, purchasers from a past era, whatever
I've owned several pairs of AirPods over the years and this is the first I'm learning about some of their features. I almost found myself wanting there to be a third column for indicating Apple support (of course I'm being facetious).
It would be useful to explain to people who don't currently own AirPods and don't really follow Apple stuff much what features are lost when AirPods are paired with a non-Apple device.
There is a feature compatibility list…
Dang, was hoping this would let me use Airpods as both speaker and headset at the same time on Linux
There is a PR for that https://github.com/librepods-org/librepods/pull/655
I tried it out, it seems to work well. Hopefully it's not blocked by patents
You can use your AirPods as both a speaker (playback) and a headset (microphone) at the same time on Linux,
but you must switch the Bluetooth profile to HFP (Hands-Free Profile) or HSP (Headset Profile).
Note that this is the default for better quality (Bluetooth spec, not Linux).
> Note that this is the default for better quality (Bluetooth spec, not Linux).
Yeah, I have the impression most people assume Apple magically solved sound/mic quality in bidirectional mode. Or they just don't care. In any case, I'm unhappy about how much Airpods are used for meetings. They sounds so much worse than any wired mic! Or your laptop's mic, as long as you're not using the speakers.
I kinda assumed apple had a magic sauce way to have higher sound quality on the iPhone rather than using the BT spec HFP, isn’t that the case?
They use hardware tricks (beamshaping) and software tricks (audio processing) to get as much out of them as possible, and they do sound better than generic cheap Bluetooth earbuds, but the Bluetooth connection is still the bottleneck.
They did announce a special "high quality recording mode" for Airpods in iOS 26 (which I didn't know, so thanks) but I couldn't find much except their developer announcement. It's not documented and I don't have the feeling it's being used.
I feel the main useful feature that I’m looking for is the ability to use the unlimited multipoint on other devices. The 2 points that most other devices gives you is terrible. It would be nice to be able to quickly connect to my voip deskphone at work from time to time.
Related: https://github.com/can1357/kAirPods
FYI android 17 fixes the bugs in the Bluetooth stack that previously required root to fix. But, this app still charges $5 for using features your air pods have. I'll be spending my afternoon forking and enabling them.
I get the idea behind wanting to fork and improve it, I truely do. I also get the idea behind wanting to see how the innards work.
However I'm a developer and I gladly paid the $5 so I can support the original dev for all the work that they have already done, and also for open sourcing it. I really don't want to maintain my own fork, sync it, build apks etc
Hi! The developer here. The app requires a purchase only when you install it from Play Store. The FOSS version available on GitHub takes you to my GH Sponsors page where you can wait for a few seconds and return back to the app. Or you can also just click the Restore Purchases button. There's no need for a fork :)
> The aacp.rs and the att.rs files were translated from Kotlin to Rust with AI. Some parts of the media_controller.rs file, mainly the pulse integration, was also AI-generated.
The future is now.
that's nothing.
you can grab a proprietary binary, open it up in IDA Pro (with MCP), spend some 10 minutes crafting a good prompt and after a few million (mainly input/cached) GLM 5.2 tokens you have a python script fluently speaking the proprietary protocol.
Sounds cool. Do you have a link or more info to share?
aside from https://github.com/mrexodia/ida-pro-mcp (which isn't mine) i have nothing i can publicly share. it's amusing how glm 5.2 jailbreaks itself, you ask it to quite literally break someone's software and it talks itself into it being a capture the flag competition.
I uploaded two binary save files from a game on my Steam Deck to ChatGPT, it diffed them and spat out a script to edit various values. The bots are really good at this sort of thing.
This is why the Steam Machine costs $1049
Not surprised at all; AI has dramatically lowered the bar to people wanting to create software they wouldn't otherwise have the time nor motivation to. Quality remains to be seen but IMHO it can only get better.
amazing project, is the experience as seamless as native Apple devices?
Looking at the comments from the previous thread at least on Android looks like you need to root the device. I'm not sure that is still required.
It looks like the issue has been fixed in Android 17 and root is no longer required if you have it.
I’m going to be honest I fell for the AirPods Pro 3 hype about it being the best noise cancelling of all time and I bought a pair. I found the noise cancelling worse than my $30 Anker Soundcore P30i, I could never get the hearing test on the AirPods to pass no matter what depths of a quiet room I went to, and the sound quality on music was worse than my Ankers. Don’t fall for the hype or at least order from Amazon like I did so you can return them. I could hear my AC running with the AirPods, with the Anker I had to ask my girlfriend if it was on.
I had the original AirPods Pro and they were really great until Apple nerfed them. Apparently the noise cancelling was too strong in some cases so they worsened everybody's. After that they started making ear-piercing squelching noises, rendering them useless. I guess they make a good paperweight and reminder to never buy noise-cancelling products from Apple.
There was some problem with the first gen that you would hear static, Apple replaced those if you contacted support. Happened to me just before end of 1 yr warranty and kinda funny but they had me mail in my airpods to be replaced and lost them. So they ended up sending me a new pair and iirc $100 gift card for the trouble.
I missed the replacement window by three weeks and they offered to “repair” them for $180. Was not impressed. Judging by resale prices on eBay, it’s always the right ear bud that goes bad on gen1 pros
I’m glad the Anker’s worked out for you, but the Soundcore brand almost completely turned me off from Anker. After two weeks the Soundcore buds I had stopped charging.
I have limited experience with noise canceling headphones (some circa 2008 active Sony earbuds, and some not-that-great Beats Studio Buds+. On a whim I bought AirPods 4 ANC and I’ve found them way better than I expected. Good enough for airplane noise canceling without the seal of most ear buds. They feel smaller than the beats buds, even with the stem. They seamlessly switch from my phone to iPad to Mac. I haven’t sat down to compare their quality to any of my other headphones, but I don’t really care. Nothing comes close to matching the convenience and the sound isn’t so bad that I each for something else. I did not expect to like them as much as I do.
Maybe it’s hype, maybe I don’t know what better noise canceling sounds like. These aren’t the Pros, so maybe there’s a difference.
Sounds like you either had a fake or more likely, couldn’t fit them properly
"you're holding it wrong"
in-ear monitors rely on you having a good seal in the ear to sound good. I wouldn't be surprised if ANC works worse if the tips didn't seal well
I recommend Bose QuiteComfort Ultra 2. That's way better in terms of ANC and sound quality than AirPods or Powerbeats or any other products from same line.
I have yet to try a pair of earbuds with better active noise canceling than the airpod pro 2.
My Pro 2’s get so much use it’s ridiculous. Great cancellation and they’re always on my person thanks to the case perfectly fitting that tiny right pocket most mens’ jeans have (vestigial watch pocket?) and not taking up any primary pocket space.
Coin pocket.
did you try different tips? I have heard this makes a big difference for some
I miss good wired earbuds.
Wired earbuds were great until they got caught on some piece of clothing and got ripped out.
For real, after being on wireless earbuds for quite some time and going back to wired, it is absolutely incredible how many things the cords get caught on. Even just your own hands!
Not to mention the microphonics
What do you mean?
I ask because I find Apple's wired EarPods to be less... selective than AirPods are—by that I mean they'll pick up more background noise whereas AirPods seem to only transmit my voice—but EarPods' clarity exceeds AirPods if you grab the mic and hold it next to your mouth, which you obviously can't do with AirPods.
Microphonics = cable noise, like when the cable drags against your zipper.
If you spend half the price of Airpods on good wired IEMs cable noise is barely a thing...
google IEM. Decent sound quality is very accessible, I have 20 dollar aliexpress Tangzu Wan'er and I prefer them to my airpods pro 3 for pure music listening
While consumer electronics companies have gone for wireless earbuds, the hi-fi, in ear monitor market is very much alive. Not to mention also relatively affordable these days.
They still exist. Truthear is a decent brand.
AirPods themselves aren’t really that great from an audiophile perspective. The only part I like about them is the integration with the Apple ecosystem. This is a fun project and cudos to whoever pulled it off, but I fail to see the motivation.
Airpods may not be "great from an audiophile perspective", but their sound is decent and they are actually well designed headphones. They are remarkably unremarkable. They have good (the new Pros even great) ANC. Their controls are intuitive and well thought out. It's hard for me to believe that I'm promoting an Apple product here, but they are what people often claim other Apple products to be – which I found to be BS for these other products. Someone sensible actually put thought into the product.
AirPods are widely appreciated in audiophile communities. Especially with some EQ applied, which is easy and common these days and easy to find for AirPods.
They're never going to appeal to the audiophile communities that pride themselves on being different and/or expensive above all else, but they're actually good hardware with decent out of the box tuning. Apply some EQ on top if you so desire and they're very good.
I am an audiophile, and for me the AirPods Pro replaced literally thousands of dollars of portable headphones, amplifiers, etc., which I don't miss a bit. Apple's audio engineering is truly top-notch, and all the convenience features are icing on the cake.
I actually really like the airpod pros from an audio standpoint. I find that a lot of wireless earbuds are way too heavy on the bass compared to the airpod pro.
"Audiophiles don't use their equipment to listen to music. Audiophiles use your music to listen to their equipment."
AirPods makes it easier to listen to music across multiple devices. They sound reasonable enough for people to enjoy their music. They enable people to enjoy their music. This is why they are so popular.
They are ludicrously expensive for what they do. They have an apple logo on the box.
My thoughts exactly, what I’d rather have is the ability to integrate other stuff into Apple’s ecosystem (most notably my hearing aids, which despite being MFi can only really stream audio from my phone—I had a pair of Beats headphones a few years ago and the ease with which I could switch them between phone, iPad and Mac was so wonderful and I’d like to be able to do that with my HAs as well.
I'm not an apple person so this surprised me. I guess I have fallen for the "apple gear is expensive and must be the best" fallacy.
What are good options for similar wireless bud headphones?
The sony earbuds are about the best I’ve had for sound quality and noise cancellation. Much better than AirPods, but not nearly as nice integration with the Apple ecosystem.
I find AirPods Pro 2 to be “good enough” where I gave away my set of XMs to someone who will actually use them.
Call (mic) quality in AirPods is better as well, if that matters at all to you. At least that’s what folks on the remote end of calls told me.
I got the InZone gaming buds version which are supposedly very similar to Sony's WF-1000XM5 (https://electronics.sony.com/audio/gaming-audio/all-inzone-h...) I wanted to try out the higher-end wireless Bluetooth LE Audio and their USB-C transceiver, and I wanted something that would let me side-step the Bluetooth stack on my Steam Deck (AirPods are horrible and get lag on Deck after 30 mins; that one is Apple's fault), but even in the best case I find Bluetooth on the Deck is annoying.
I would say the sound is great and overall better than AirPods Pro 3 when I compare the AirPods and InZone buds playing Spotify Lossless content from my iPhone, but the sound is not to my taste. Not sure how much of the quality comes from the LE audio vs better sound hardware engineering. They sound more detailed in vocals, mids, highs, but are a little warm and muddy in the lows. I can't get the sound profile to match my AirPod Pros 3 or my Kef bookshelf speakers with EQ, but I didn't try very hard. The left bud also sometimes takes a bit longer turn on once I put them in my ears, up to 30 seconds before it starts playing audio.
AirPod Pros 3 are ahead in noise cancelling, transparency, and touch controls -- the InZone buds use long touch vs short touch for volume up/down which is confusing, it's much easier to increase the volume and harder to decrease it. AirPods win out for convenience when using with Apple hardware also since I have to use the USB-C dongle since Apple hardware doesn't support Bluetooth LE Audio / whatever the codec is.
Overall I'm happy with the purchase -- they do a great job as Steam Deck headset use case.
I want to try out the new WF-1000XM6 as well, which seem to review better than the WF-1000XM5, but don't have any friends with them yet.
I would not recommend wireless Sony earphones or headphones. I’ve owned three different models and in all of them the batteries failed after a few years. Check out the reviews there is an abnormal amount of failures. My conclusion is that while Sony is great at many things, they can’t do wireless headphones or earphones well and I steer clear.