Apple launches AirPods Pro 3 with live translation

Apple just announced the AirPods Pro 3, turning its flagship earbuds into a stealth fitness tracker and real-time pocket interpreter.

Priced at $249, pre-orders opened on September 9 with general availability starting September 19. The new buds pack significant hardware redesigns alongside deeper Apple Intelligence integrations.

Double the quiet and a bespoke fit

Active Noise Cancellation gets a noticeable jump. Thanks to a new multiport acoustic architecture, ultra-low noise mics, and foam-infused tips, Apple claims ANC cancels up to 2x more noise than AirPods Pro 2 and 4x more than the original AirPods Pro.

Battery life sees a meaningful bump as well. You now get up to eight hours of playback with ANC turned on, representing a 33 percent jump over the previous generation. In Transparency mode, battery life reaches up to 10 hours, up 67 percent.

To keep them seated securely, Apple redesigned the chassis using over 10,000 ear scans, 100,000 hours of user tests, and a 300-million-point dataset. The ear tip geometry is now centered to the main body, and ear tips come in five sizes, including a new XXS. Water and sweat resistance is rated at IP57.

Heart rate tracking and hands-free translation

The biggest hardware surprise is a custom photoplethysmography (PPG) heart rate sensor that pulses invisible infrared light 256 times per second. Combined with motion sensors and iPhone on-device AI, users can track over 50 workout types, close Move rings, and measure calories without an Apple Watch.

Workouts also gain Workout Buddy, an Apple Intelligence feature that dishes out real-time motivational prompts based on historical effort.

On the software side, Apple introduced Live Translation in beta. When talking to someone in person, the earbuds use ANC to gently dim the speaker's voice while feeding translated audio directly to your ears. If the other person lacks AirPods, the iPhone displays horizontal text transcriptions. Launch languages include English, French, German, Portuguese, and Spanish, with simplified Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Italian slated for later this year.

Hearing health features also expanded, bringing certified Hearing Protection to the EU and UK, alongside automated Conversation Boost for noisy environments.

Why it matters

Apple is quietly turning AirPods into an essential wearable platform rather than just audio accessories. By rolling heart rate monitoring into the ear, Apple makes fitness tracking accessible to runners and gym-goers who dislike wristbands or watches.

We think the Live Translation implementation is particularly clever. Using ANC to lower ambient dialogue while streaming speech translation directly to the ear canal creates a far more seamless face-to-face experience than awkwardly speaking into a phone speaker.

Still, limitations remain. Launching Live Translation without support for major Asian languages means international travelers must wait until late 2025 for full utility. Furthermore, constantly powering PPG infrared sensors alongside active computational audio will put serious demands on small earbud battery cells over years of use.