- Cameras can arrive as early as AirPods Pro 4
- IR -cameras will reportedly help unspecified Apple Intelligence -Functions
- Inclusion in AirPods 5 and AirPods Max seem unlikely, for us
We’ve heard stories about AI camera-Equipped AirPods for many months now, and the predicted launch date has been swinging back and forth for a while: It’s 2027! It’s 2026! It’s 2027 again! But a new report suggests that there is a more solid timeline now and that the cameras may arrive at AirPods Pro 4 and maybe also AirPods 5.
However, it “maybe” makes a lot of heavy lifting. It comes in a report from Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman that says AirPods Pro 3 is now done and dusty, Apple is working on the next generation and H3 chip to run them and add new AI features. And as part of it, Apple has “explored the idea of embedding cameras on the device.”
So do we get camera -equipped AirPods next year?
The short answer is “maybe”.
The first camera-equipped AirPods were reported back in 2024 by respected analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, who said embedded infrared cameras would help deliver a more precise spatial sound in Vision Pro. And the story was apparently confirmed by an Apple patent that archived the following summer (though Apple files many patents, only some of which make it into production hardware).
Kuo returned to the subject last year and said the cameras would be able to see movements that could then be used to control app or system features. It has also been suggested that the cameras will work with unspecified Apple Intelligence features, most recently by Mark Gurman: He said the camera’s investigation was part of the “larger deal” of “turning them into AI devices.”
If the cameras really come to AirPods’ next generation, it seems very unlikely that Apple will put them in AirPods 5: These are the smaller Premium versions and Apple likes to differentiate professionals from the more affordable models. Gurman says that Apple is unlikely to bring heartbeat to that product line and it makes cameras seem even less likely.
I do not see that embedded cameras are coming to AirPods Max either because these headphones are in the limbo between “Too popular to interrupt” and “not popular enough to justify large investments”.
So we’re back with AirPods Pro 4 as your earded AI friends. And that means that even 2027 seems terribly optimistic. The first generation was from 2019 to 2022, and AirPods Pro 2 races from 2022 to 2025. If Apple sticks to that time scale, we should not expect to see compensation for 2025 AirPods Pro 3 until 2028. If cameras actually come to Airpods, they will take a while yet.
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