My Apple AirPods Pro 3 Review: Big Improvements, Same Price, No Compromises

One situation with next-gen AirPods such because the AirPods Pro 3 is that they typically look similar to the previous model, leaving many individuals to query whether or not the upgrades actually matter. Nevertheless, after utilizing the AirPods Professional 3 for 5 days, I can say that these buds are considerably improved in 4 key areas: match, sound high quality, noise cancellation and battery life. The result’s that you do not really feel such as you’re making any compromises when shopping for the AirPods Professional 3. Learn on to see simply how a lot they’ve improved in every space and the way they stack up in opposition to different top true-wireless earbuds.  

Earlier than I get into all of the adjustments, this is a fast breakdown of what is stayed the identical.

• The AirPods Professional 3’s listing value remains to be $249 (£219, AU$429). That wasn’t a given with all of the uncertainty surrounding the Trump administration tariffs, however we’ll see the place their avenue value shakes out on Amazon and different retailers the place AirPods fashions typically get discounted.
• The AirPods Professional 3 are powered by Apple’s H2 chip — the identical one which powers the AirPods Professional 2, AirPods 4 and Beats Powerbeats Professional 2. Rumors pointed to an H3 chip, however that did not occur. 
• Nor did we get any new shade choices; white remains to be the one possibility.
• The AirPods Professional 3 follow Bluetooth 5.3, identical to the AirPods Professional 2 (although some true-wireless earbuds have already jumped to Bluetooth 6.0).

Now for the upgrades: I will run by them shortly, then share my tackle lots of them.

What’s new or upgraded

• Whereas they appear just like the earlier mannequin, the AirPods Professional 3 have been redesigned and their geometric form has modified a bit, with the angle of the bud shifted. They’re the identical size however are barely smaller width-wise, barely bigger depth-wise and weigh a contact extra (5.55 grams vs. 5.3 grams on the AirPods Professional 2).
• They arrive with new foam-infused silicone ear ideas in 5 sizes, together with a brand new extra-extra small dimension.
• They’re geared up with heart-rate sensors just like the Beats Powerbeats Pro 2.
• 2x higher noise cancellation in comparison with the AirPods Professional 2, in response to Apple.
• Whereas they’ve 10.7mm drivers just like the AirPods Professional 2, these drivers have been upgraded to reap the benefits of the buds’ new multiport acoustic structure, which strikes extra air by the buds and improves sound high quality.
• The microphones have been upgraded.
• Transparency Mode has been enhanced.
• New Reside Translation characteristic (additionally accessible for the AirPods Professional 2 and AirPods 4 sequence, however not the Beats Powerbeats Professional 2).
• Their battery life has improved to eight hours with noise cancellation on and as much as 10 hours in Listening to Support mode with transparency on.
• As a substitute of being IPX4 splash-proof just like the AirPods Professional 2, they have an IP57 ranking, which suggests they’ll face up to a sustained spray of water. (I poured water on them they usually survived simply fantastic). They’re additionally dust-resistant.
• The case now features a U2 chip, boosting Precision Discovering vary within the Discover My app by 1.5x (requires an iPhone 17).
• Like with the AirPods 4, there isn’t any longer a button on the case for Bluetooth pairing. You merely double faucet on the entrance of the case to have the buds go into Bluetooth pairing mode.

Watch this: Apple AirPods Professional 3 Evaluate: The Full Package deal

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Modified design improved the match for me

As I discussed, the AirPods Professional 3 are barely narrower, however extra importantly, their form and bud angle have been adjusted so the ear ideas level extra straight into your ear canals.

Moreover, the ear ideas have been redesigned. Conventional foam ideas are likely to really feel dense and squishy on the similar time, however these new ideas are infused with a skinny layer of reminiscence foam, significantly towards the entrance, giving them a firmer and extra premium really feel.

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Learn extra: Best AirPods Pro 3 preorder deals — $20 reward for select Best Buy members

Coronary heart-rate monitoring 

I have not spent a lot time utilizing the brand new heart-rate monitoring characteristic but, and I do not contemplate it a must have in earbuds, significantly in case you already personal an Apple Watch or one other watch with heart-rate monitoring capabilities. Whereas the heart-rate sensors have been custom-designed for the AirPods Professional 3 (they’re Apple’s smallest heart-rate sensors) and are not equivalent to those within the Powerbeats Professional 2, my expertise utilizing them was the identical as with the Powerbeats Professional 2, which I’ve examined extra extensively.

The monitoring is suitable with quite a lot of health apps, together with Apple Health and Health Plus, and might work in tandem with the Apple Watch’s heart-rate monitoring characteristic to get probably the most correct measurement between the 2 gadgets. You can too use a single bud for heart-rate monitoring — a characteristic Beats added to the Powerbeats Professional 2, too.

The one disadvantage of utilizing the heart-rate monitor on the Powerbeats Professional 2 or AirPods Professional 3 is that that you must launch an app to see your coronary heart charge. For instance, with the Apple Health app, it’s important to begin a exercise exercise like an out of doors stroll, run or cycle. Against this, with the Apple Watch (and different health watches), your coronary heart charge seems as quickly as you place the gadget on, making your coronary heart charge straightforward to trace whether or not you are understanding or not.

Utilizing the heart-rate monitor does have an effect on the AirPods Professional 3’s battery life — dropping from 8 hours with noise canceling on to six.5 hours — which is probably going why Apple did not design it to be at all times on. Nonetheless, I want there have been an choice to preserve the sensors operating at occasions and have my coronary heart charge present up in a widget on my iPhone’s residence display (and even lock display), as an alternative of solely after I manually begin it in a health app.

Apple ups its noise-canceling recreation 

The 2 greatest enhancements folks have been hoping for within the AirPods Professional 3 have been sound high quality and noise-canceling efficiency, with voice-calling efficiency coming in a detailed third.

I examined their noise-cancellation capabilities on a airplane in opposition to the AirPods Professional 2 and will positively inform a distinction, with the Professional 3s tamping down the cabin noise to a faint hum. The AirPods Professional 2 did job, however the Professional 3s took the noise degree down even additional. I am unable to say the Professional 3’s noise canceling is precisely twice pretty much as good because the Professional 2’s, which Apple claims, however it’s positively higher.

After I acquired again to New York Metropolis, I put them up in opposition to the Bose QuietComfort Ultra Earbuds (2nd Gen), which lots of people contemplate to have the very best noise-canceling capabilities with regards to earbuds — or headphones for that matter. (Though Sony’s WH-1000XM6 headphones additionally supply excellent noise cancellation — I named them the “new noise-canceling king” in my review).

What I can say is that Apple’s noise canceling now matches Bose and Sony, although it is arduous to call a transparent winner with no dear testing rig to offer scientific outcomes. Apple says the AirPods Professional 3 supply the “world’s greatest in-ear lively noise cancellation,” however it’s unclear whether or not it examined the AirPods Professional 3 in opposition to the 2nd Gen Bose QC Extremely Earbuds, which have been launched on June 28 internationally and on Sept. 10 within the US. Within the fantastic print, Apple says that testing was carried out in July 2025 and comparisons have been “made in opposition to the best-selling wi-fi in-ear headphones commercially accessible on the time of testing.”

I swapped Bose’s QC Extremely Earbuds 2s forwards and backwards with the AirPods Professional 3 whereas driving the subway and strolling the streets. Each have actually spectacular noise-canceling capabilities. In comparison with the AirPod Professional 2, the Professional 3s are designed to enhance noise cancellation throughout all frequencies, together with mids and highs that may be difficult to muffle. I may nonetheless hear folks’s voices on the streets however they have been toned down considerably and, except they have been speaking loudly, I had a tough time understanding what they have been saying. On the subway, the buds blocked out about 80-85% of the noise round me.

After I took the buds out of my ears or went into Transparency Mode, I used to be typically shocked by simply how a lot exterior noise there was.

Extra refined sound with higher bass

The sound high quality positive aspects will not be fairly as large because the noise-canceling positive aspects, however the Professional 3’s sound is certainly improved over the Professional 2’s. The bass has extra definition and extension — it hits more durable and goes deeper — and the earbuds sound clearer, extra pure and open with extra sparkle within the treble. I additionally suppose they play slightly louder.

I ran by the standard tracks I take advantage of for testing headphones — it is an eclectic combine. They included Spoon’s Knock Knock Knock, Athletes of God’s Do not Wanna Be Regular, Orbital’s Soiled Rat, Bjork’s Hole, Drake’s Passionfruit, Pixies’ Vault of Heaven, Florence and the Machine’s Choreomania, varied Foo Fighters songs, plus David Byrne’s new album Who Is the Sky?

Testing AirPods for sound high quality is a bit difficult since Apple’s spatial audio could make tracks sound totally different — generally higher, generally simply totally different. Most of my testing was achieved on Apple Music (utilizing an iPhone 17 with near-final iOS 26), which has loads of tracks optimized for spatial audio. I additionally tried Spotify and streamed a number of films on the Apple TV app, for the reason that improved audio carries over there as nicely.

Learn extra: You can preoder the iPhone 17 today — get it free with these carriers

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You are not going to get fairly the identical degree of sound high quality that you simply’d get from pair of wired studio headphones, however that further little bit of readability and definition places the AirPods Professional 3 in the identical league as a number of the best-sounding earbuds, together with the Sennheiser Momentum True Wireless 4 and Sony WF-1000XM5. I would nonetheless give audiophile buds just like the Noble Fokus Amadeus and Bowers & Wilkins Pi8 the slight edge sound-wise, however these fashions are bigger, dearer and might’t match the noise-canceling and voice-calling performances of the AirPods Professional 3.

In contrast to most high-end earbuds and headphones, Apple does not allow you to regulate the sound profile with EQ settings. Nonetheless, the AirPods ship all of the hallmarks of premium audio — or no less than premium Bluetooth audio. Apple has leveled up the listening expertise with purer, extra correct sound, tighter bass and a contact extra openness. In my AirPods Professional 2 assessment, I famous how spectacular the sound was for such small, light-weight buds — although it nonetheless fell a bit wanting the easiest earbuds on the market.

Merely put: The AirPods Professional 3’s sound does not fall quick anymore. And whereas they arrive at a premium value, these small, light-weight earbuds ship remarkably good audio for his or her dimension.

Voice-calling efficiency

AirPods have lengthy stood out for voice-calling efficiency in comparison with different true-wireless earbuds. Again when the originals launched, I bear in mind Android customers shopping for them only for calls — and each era since has remained top-tier in that division.

The factor that struck me in my assessments with the AirPods Professional 3 was simply how a lot background noise they eradicated. I made calls within the streets of New York Metropolis with so much ambient noise round me, together with visitors and ambulance sirens, and callers advised me they could not hear any of it. In loud environments, my voice would generally warble or sound a bit digitized to callers, however after I shared a recording of what I used to be truly listening to, they have been shocked — even surprised — by how a lot background noise was eliminated.

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At Apple Park, I acquired a demo of the dwell translation characteristic as a Spanish-speaking presenter spoke to a small group of us for a couple of minutes. What she stated was translated on the fly into English as I listened on the AirPods Professional 3, which have been related to an iPhone 17 Pro. The interpretation was achieved regionally on the iPhone 17 Professional (no web required), and the delay between what the speaker stated in Spanish and what I heard in English was temporary — solely a second or so — and the interpretation sounded fairly pure.

At residence, I examined the characteristic with Spanish-language YouTube movies and TV (you first need to obtain the language you need). It labored nicely for probably the most half, and also you additionally get a textual content readout of the interpretation as you hear it in your ears. The one actual limitation is that it presently helps simply 5 languages: English, French, German, Portuguese and Spanish.

You may program the motion button on the iPhone to shortly launch the Reside Translation app or maintain each stems of the AirPods to launch it. With the interpretation achieved regionally in your cellphone, you do not want cell protection to make use of the characteristic, so you possibly can reap the benefits of it in distant locations, too.

For dwell conversations in numerous languages to work, everybody concerned must be carrying AirPods with an H2 chip. Additionally observe: Reside translation solely works on iPhones that help Apple Intelligence — that features the iPhone 15 Professional, in addition to all iPhone 16 and iPhone 17 fashions.

Whereas corporations like Samsung, Google and even some finances Amazon earbuds additionally supply dwell translation (with Samsung and Google supporting way more languages), Apple’s model is notably easy to make use of and entry. We’ll need to see the way it evolves over time.

Transparency and Listening to Support modes

One space I anticipated Apple to enhance with the AirPods Professional 3 is Listening to Support mode. I nonetheless want to check it extra totally, however the already best-in-class Transparency Mode now sounds much more pure, seemingly due to upgraded microphones, and contains an computerized Dialog Enhance “for clearer speech in noisy environments.”

For those who’re not acquainted, transparency modes allow you to hear the skin world whereas nonetheless carrying the buds, despite the fact that they’re blocking your ear canals. Listening to Support mode builds on that through the use of transparency to amplify the sounds round you.

Higher battery life by chemistry

As famous, battery life has improved in each noise-canceling and transparency modes: as much as 8 hours on a single cost with noise canceling on (7.5 hours with spatial audio and head monitoring), and as much as 10 hours with transparency and Listening to Support mode. That quantity drops to six.5 hours when heart-rate monitoring is engaged. It is also price noting that Apple lists whole battery life with the charging case as 24 hours, versus 30 hours for the AirPods Professional 2. Some folks, together with me, are a bit perplexed as to why the general battery life time is decrease, significantly when the charging case is barely greater (my protecting OtterBox Core Series case for the AirPods Professional 2 did not fairly match on the AirPods Professional 3’s case). 

What’s attention-grabbing is that the battery within the buds is outwardly the identical dimension (with the identical capability) because the battery within the AirPods Professional 2; it is the battery chemistry that is modified. That change is basically what’s behind the battery life enhancements, together with some power effectivity gained by new software program written for the AirPods Professional 3. You get a further three prices within the charging case, which is lower than the AirPods Professional 2’s 4 prices.

Whereas sure AirPods Professional 3 options and enhancements are being made accessible to the AirPods Professional 2 and AirPods 4 by firmware updates, the AirPods Professional 3 have software program written solely for the earbuds’ {hardware} upgrades and new acoustic structure. That sadly means the AirPods 2’s battery life, sound high quality and noise-canceling capabilities will not be getting any higher.  

Upgraded U2 chip in charging case for Discover My

Whereas Apple did not add a brand new H3 chip to the buds, it did add a brand new U2 chip to the charging case. It says the brand new chip will increase the vary for Precision Discovering within the Discover My app by 1.5x (MacRumors reports that it offers 3x the range, however Apple says it is 1.5x on its web site). Regardless of the precise quantity, it means you’ll use Precision Discovering to hone in in your case’s location — virtually like a metallic detector — even from farther away. Observe that whereas the buds and case can each be tracked in Discover My, solely the case helps Precision Discovering, so you may need to lose them collectively in case you hope to trace them this manner.

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Whereas I did not get a brand new H3 chip and I hoped that the charging case would have the ability to convert into a Bluetooth transceiver to make use of the buds on a airplane with an inflight leisure system, I did get most of what I used to be on the lookout for within the AirPods Professional 3. The adjustments could seem incremental to some of us, however all the important thing components resembling match, sound high quality and noise cancellation have been noticeably leveled up together with single-charge battery. Not everyone will care that a lot about heart-rate monitoring, however for some, it will be a welcome add.

A number of new options resembling Reside Translation shall be accessible for the AirPods Professional 2, so many AirPods Professional 2 house owners will not really feel the necessity to improve immediately. However in case you’ve been utilizing AirPods Professional 2 for some time, it may be price passing them on to a pal or relative and upgrading to the Professional 3s. They’re about as shut as earbuds get to being full: wonderful noise cancellation, robust voice-calling efficiency and sound high quality that rivals the easiest. Few buds excel in all three areas — and the Professional 3s handle it whereas packing in loads of further options.