Apple reportedly has no ‘meaningful’ plans to update AirPods Max

AirPods Max
Apple has no immediate plans for a significant update to the AirPods Max, according to Mark Gurman’s Power On newsletter. While the company introduced a USB-C version of the headphones earlier this year, there are currently no plans for a major refresh with new features like an upgraded chip or improved noise cancellation.
Michael Burkhardt for 9to5Mac:
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Apple introduced AirPods Max in December 2020 at the high price of $549, and left them unchanged for nearly four years. We later got a USB-C version in September 2024, with some refreshed colors, but that was it. No upgrade to the H2 chip, no adaptive audio, or anything substantial.
According to Gurman, AirPods Max at their $549 price tag aren’t quite worth Apple’s time: “The headphones aren’t a hot enough seller to justify pouring money into development, but they’re also not a big enough flop to kill them outright. If you’ve ever been to an upscale gym in Los Angeles or New York, you can see these $550 headphones have a market — even with the high price and outdated technology.”

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MacDailyNews Take: Apple’s AirPods Max aren’t a hot enough seller because they’re priced too high, haven’t been upgraded for four years (not switching from Lightning to USB-C doesn’t count), and has a stupid, as-if-designed-by-Microsoft case “system” that is, has always been, and, for the foreseeable future, will always be crap.
If they’re selling well enough not to axe, then AirPods Max should already be on its second generation, at the very least, and retail for $399 or lower, but, again: Tim Cook’s Apple.
It’s not like Apple doesn’t have money and the “development” cost of replacing the H1 with an H2 chip and assigning a talented designer to fix the product’s laughably bad case aren’t a relative pittance.
Apple needs new leadership. The company needs vibrant, visionary, risk-taking leadership again. Apple’s “caretaker CEO” era (iterating products and services conceived by/under Steve Jobs) should have ended years ago. – MacDailyNews, June 6, 2024
As we explained in early April (regarding why Apple is years behind in generative and other AI):
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This is what happens after a decade plus with a caretaker CEO at the helm after he hits the last page of his iteration playbook, yet attempts to stay in the game for too long.
The good news is that the average age of outgoing CEOs across the S&P 1500 is 61.6 and Tim Cook will turn [turned] 64 on November 1st.