Apple plans to add a live translation to its AirPods via an iOS 19 update coming later this year.
As Bloomberg reports, your iPhone would listen to someone speaking in another language and relay the translation to you via your AirPods. If you respond, a translation will be read out loud to the other person on your iPhone.
Rival earbuds have offered similar features for years, Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman notes. In testing the feature on early versions of the Google Pixel Buds, however, we found that it was often just easier to use the Google Translate app on our phones. (Apple also has a built-in Translate app for the iPhone.)
This comes as Apple has recently added other accessibility features to its AirPods. Last year, it got FDA clearance for its AirPods Pro 2 to operate as hearing aids. We recently polled 20+ seniors about their effectiveness and got mixed results. Adaptive Transparency mode can also protect your hearing by automatically lowering the volume of any loud sounds around you.
With iOS 19, meanwhile, Apple is planning a major overhaul of its mobile operating system—possibly the biggest revamp since iOS 7 in 2013—with refreshed apps, menus, and windows. Expect a first look at WWDC 2025 in June.
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Apple is also rumored to be developing AirPods with built-in cameras. They will reportedly use AI to scan surroundings and offer an improved spatial audio experience on Apple’s Vision Pro headset. A patent uncovered in the fall also tipped a way to measure heart activity using an earbud’s microphone.
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About Jibin Joseph
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