How does the sound quality of AirPods 4 compare to other Apple earbuds?

Question

I have a keen interest in the audio performance of AirPods 4. How does their sound quality compare with other Apple earphones in the category?

Answer 1

The sound performance of the AirPods 4 is quite satisfactory even though they do not have rubber or silicone tips. With respect to the AirPods 3, the Airpods 4 tend to have an increased focus on the lows which may be due to new or better fitting drivers. While they don’t beat the performance of the Airpods Pro 2 in the low end, there is a noticeable improvement from the Airpods 3. Of course, auditory perception is quite individual and is impacted by the customer fit into the ear canal.

Comments

A quick way to test sound quality is to gently press each ear bud into your ears - enjoy the resulting solid sound.  Then let them go and wait for them to get naturally pushed slightly out of your ear as your ear canal relaxes. The sound quality drops off. How much it drops off depends how much they loosened up.  (This is not a terrible thing - even my silicone tipped earbuds need to be periodically set in my ear. The big question is whether the 4 ANC “equalize on the fly”.  The same on board sampling used for noise reduction can potentially be used for equalization as well. The flip side is that I think but cannot confirm that ANC flies out the window, as would any equalization, if the rigors of low latency are imposed. The sheer comfort of looser fitting hard shells in low latency mode makes them ideal for gaming.

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description is wrong : My review of Apple AirPods 4 versus AirPods Pro 2 and AirPods Pro 3

There is no pro 3

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great comparison, thanks for bringing back all those older products for those of us looking to upgrade

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Finally someone compared them to 2nd gen. Thank you

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Wow the sound difference with the airpods 4 is sooo good. I had ordered the airpods 4 with ANC so glad to see its really good mic quality.