How the Apple AirPods 4 feature ANC without silicone eartips

Apple recently announced the iPhone 16 series, and with it, came some new accessories. This included the Apple Watch Series 10, as well as the new AirPods 4. While the changes and new features on the entire lineup were easy to grasp, one aspect of the new AirPods has had users puzzled. Just how is Apple offering Active Noise Cancellation on a pair of earbuds that offer no silicone tips?

Well, turns out the answer is a lot of complex micro-engineering, together with Apple’s H2 chipset, which the company also uses on the AirPods Pro Gen 2. Here’s how this works.

How the AirPods Gen 4 supports ANC

The AirPods Gen 4 comes with the Apple H2 chip on the inside. The chipset allows the phone to (among other things) understand external noise frequencies. These frequencies are then used to decipher countering frequencies that can cancel out the respective noisy elements.

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In an interview with Engadget, Apple’s Vice President of Hardware Engineering, Kate Bergeron revealed that the tech was in the pipeline since 2021, when she met with Eric Treski to test what would be the first iteration of the tech.

Now the catch is, when you don’t have silicone tips to seal out most sound frequencies to begin with – the principle most ANC earbuds work on – the ANC algorithm must be stronger to compensate for the extra noise entering your ears.

“It’s even computationally more intense in many ways than it is with the AirPods Pro,” Bergeron is quoted as saying. The advanced algorithms, paired together with the new H2 chip make real-time Active Noise Cancellation possible on the AirPods Gen 4

“The power of the H2 allows that, so we’re actually doing a lot with the H2 chip to manage ANC quality and listen from the mics for environmental noise to make sure we’re canceling as much as possible,” Bergeron added.

Whether the ANC quality of the AirPods 4 is on par with the AirPods Pro Gen 2, which features the H2 chip with silicone eartips, remains to be seen.

For those who don’t want the ANC feature, along with additions like MagSafe charging and built-in speakers in the case, the AirPods 4 also come in a non-ANC variant which is more affordable.