I’m on my second set of AirPods Pro headphones. You see, I tried replacing each part individually, and nothing quite fixed my biggest problem with them. All at separate times, I’ve replaced the right and left AirPods, as well as the case itself. That’s part of the reason you see a protective case on my charging case. I noticed the crackling issue in the left ear when I talked, but chalked it up to a problem that all noise canceling headphones have, after all, my first steps into noise canceling weren’t too impressive. The updated left AirPod has fixed that issue. The real problem I’ve had with my AirPods Pro has always been charging them.
Charging is easy, right? Just open the case, plop your AirPods in, magnets guide them into place, and they’re charging. Easy! It worked with my AirPods, both the original case and the wireless charging case. But then I got the AirPods Pro. I could never consistently get a charge from them.
I didn’t think much of it until I was talking to a friend who also experienced the same issues, also with two different sets of AirPods Pro headphones.
Apple’s headphones have a design flaw, and it’s incredibly annoying, especially now that I rely on my headphones for work.
Only Half Charged (Literally)
The issue may sound familiar. I place my headphones into the case, come back later, and I find that one of my headphones hasn’t been charged at all. The case has plenty of charge left, it just didn’t make the connection for one of my AirPods. I’ll wiggle it around, take it out and replace it, and it’ll start charging. It just wasn’t making the right contact.
I’ve noticed this now with two completely distinct sets of AirPods Pro, as had a friend of mine. It’s annoying to go for a Zoom call for work and realize I need to do something else to make sure I can be heard. Nothing like being a little late for a meeting because you had to whip out a flashy gamer headset or a Blue Yeti microphone. But even if I didn’t rely on it for that, simply wanting to be able to listen to music and not being able to is incredibly frustrating. I’d be in a bad mood, heading to work on a freezing cold or rainy day, and not being able to even listen to music because, for some reason, my AirPods Pro were dead. Now that I know this is a design flaw plaguing 100% of the 4 AirPods Pro headphones tested, I think it may be a more widespread issue than I thought.
Either that or my friend and I are just exceptionally unlucky.
The Design Problem
These contacts may not be making… contact.
My theory is that this comes down to the design of the charging mechanisms. On the AirPods stem, there is a split metal portion that makes contact with two pieces of metal in the charging case. These outcroppings are pointed, with the area they contact the AirPods being minimal. Anytime something requires perfect alignment that can be possibly misaligned, you’re asking for trouble. Drop it in just wrong, or the magnets don’t line up just right, and you’re not charging.
My hope is that Apple tweaks this design in a future update. Because, as of now, this problem is unacceptable. I wouldn’t buy another set of AirPods Pro headphones if they didn’t specifically improve upon this. I really like my AirPods Pro, but this issue makes me almost willing to recommend you buy any other set of headphones.