Apple brings open-ear ANC and Siri AI to the new $129 AirPods 5

If you love active noise cancellation but hate the plugged-up feeling of silicone ear tips jammed in your ears, Apple just built something specifically for you.

Apple unveiled the AirPods 5. The headline story here is top-tier active noise cancellation in an open-ear design, starting at $129, with a step-up model featuring a wireless charging case for $149.

Pre-orders are live now, and units hit shelves on September 18.

50% more noise blocked, plus stem swipe controls

Apple claims the new open-ear ANC removes up to 50 percent more external noise than the previous AirPods 4 with ANC.

That jump comes from a newly designed multiport acoustic architecture borrowed from AirPods Pro 3, paired with next-generation Adaptive EQ and upgraded computational audio algorithms. You also get an improved Transparency mode, Adaptive Audio, and Conversation Awareness that drops your media volume the second you start speaking.

The lineup splits cleanly down the middle. The base $129 tier gets you open-ear ANC out of the box.

If you shell out $149 for the Wireless Charging Case edition, you get stem volume swipe controls—a first for Apple's open-ear lineup—along with 5 hours of listening time with ANC turned on (up an hour from AirPods 4) and 22 hours total with the case. The case works with USB-C, Qi chargers, and even Apple Watch pucks.

Hands-free Siri AI and Live Translation

Hardware aside, Apple is positioning these earbuds as the main audio vessel for Apple Intelligence.

Running alongside iOS 27's upcoming Siri AI beta, the earbuds let you query personal context completely hands-free. You can ask Siri to pull up a track a friend texted you or look up dinner plans buried deep in an email receipt. If you are in a quiet room, simple head gestures like nodding or shaking your head let you respond to Siri prompts.

There is also Live Translation. By pressing both stems together or asking Siri, users can hear real-time cross-language translations directly in their ears.

Keep in mind that Siri AI rolls out in beta on September 14 starting in English, certain server-side AI features will carry daily usage caps, and it will not be available in the EU at launch.

Why it matters

For everyday listeners who cannot tolerate in-ear rubber tips, AirPods 5 fixes the single biggest trade-off in portable audio.

At $129, Apple just lowered the barrier of entry for open-ear ANC to a point that puts immense pressure on rivals. The $149 model with on-stem volume control and longer battery life looks like an easy $20 upsell that most buyers will gladly take.

More broadly, Apple is slowly transforming AirPods from an audio peripheral into an ambient AI terminal. While the industry has been chasing standalone smart glasses and AI pins, Apple is leveraging the hardware hundreds of millions already wear every single day.

That said, open-ear noise cancellation is inherently capped by ear anatomy—what blocks 50 percent more noise for one person might leak for another. We will have to see whether Siri AI feels genuinely helpful in daily chaos or just another beta feature tethered to server limits.