AirPods Pro 2: Why a quiet noise has recently been heard in the case

A soft chime that can be heard from inside the closed case has caused some puzzlement among owners of the AirPods Pro 2. The newly added noise left those who heard it with question marks, because why would the wireless earbuds sound when they are hardest to hear? Apple has clarified the purpose of the noise in a support document.

"To ensure that your AirPods microphones and speakers are working optimally (e.g. to provide high-quality listening test results), your AirPods may periodically play a low beep when they are in the charging case," says the official statement. This also explains why the noise has only just appeared, as the new hearing aids and the hearing test function were only introduced some time ago with iOS 18.1, iPadOS 18.1 and macOS 15.1.

Other sounds can be switched off

A listener comment on the ATP podcast got the ball rolling. There, a listener wondered about the strange noise, whereupon the three presenters also reported that they had had similar experiences.

In addition to calibration, the AirPods Pro 2 case also makes an acoustic noise on other occasions. For example, it also makes a noise when the battery is low when the device is connected to a charging cable or placed on a charging pad. However, these sounds can be switched off in the settings.

Why is there no overview?

The discussion, which initially revolved around the noise, is now more concerned with the question of why Apple does not provide better documentation so that buyers of the devices can see what these noises mean. There is criticism that there is no central point of contact, but that this information, as in this case, is distributed individually via various support documents.

Apple blogger John Gruber jokes in a post that Apple can apparently no longer afford to create "even something as simple as an interactive website with examples of the sounds the AirPods make and explanations of what those sounds mean."

(mki)