Forget the new features, the AirPods Pro 3’s most boring upgrades are their killer selling points
Three years on from their predecessors, the Apple AirPods Pro 3 are finally here, upgrades here and tweaks there – and, in a nice touch, a price increase of exactly 0% in the US, and even slight decrease in price in the UK. But ignore the other headlines you’ve been seeing about the buds.
If you’ve seen one Apple Event, you’ve seen them all: the company will make a massive song and dance about features that a) won’t work until months after release, b) will only affect a staggeringly small number of people with corresponding flagship Apple devices and/or c) are already commonplace in rival products.
That was no different with the AirPods Pro 3, as Apple unveiled a few headline-grabbing features that I’ll get to in a minute, and quickly rushed over two important specs which are far more important than anything else the Cupertino giant talked about. And I think that was a mistake.
These two specs (and one bonus extra) are the real upgrades over the AirPods Pro 2. Firstly, let me snidely downplay the two main features before I tell you what you should be caring about.
Driving headlines, not buys
As I see it, there are two new features Apple made a fuss about during the Apple Event. Firstly, there’s a live translation feature: the AirPods Pro 3 will hear people chattering to you in a foreign language, and will translate what they say. Apparently, the solution to how inconceivably rude it is for people to try and have a conversation with you while their AirPods are still in is to allow these people to also be rude in countries that aren’t their native one.
But more seriously: I’ve tested this feature on other buds and while I’ll spare you the details for another article, the translation delay and usual existence of background noises in most contexts makes them hard to use fluently. Oh, and just to reiterate, wearing AirPods while you’re talking to people is just rude.
The second new feature is that the AirPods Pro 3 can track your heart rate while you’re wearing them. Again, not a new feature for headphones, and it bumps up against the same problem that those other buds had (and, if we’re being honest, fitness trackers have): it’s just not as accurate as bespoke kit for the same purpose.
Apple lets you use its Fitness app to track workouts solely using headphones, and according to its promotional video it’ll blast a robotic-sounding ‘motivator’ into your ears while you do so. Honestly, if you want to hear someone who would clearly be elsewhere giving you half-hearted positive reinforcement while you exercise, just find an unwilling friend and promise them dinner afterwards. It’d save you money.
That may make it sound like I’m down on the AirPods Pro 3, but my intention was instead to downplay the two features that Apple advertised, in order to make my own recommendations sound even more enticing. Instead of translation and heart rate tracking, let me reveal the two actual upgrades of the new buds.
But there are big upgrades!
Apple did mention the AirPods Pro 3’s real upgrades in its presentation, but it spend so little time doing so that I’m convinced even it didn’t realize how important they are. That’s because, for people who aren’t dedicated tech fans (speaking as one: I’m a contributor, not a full-time TechRadar team member, after all), it’s the actual useful changes, the little things you notice day-to-day, that make the real difference. And the Pro 3 have two, or two-and-half, or two-and-an-honorable-mention, of those.
I’ll start with the smallest of the real upgrades, so that I can build up. That’s the IP rating, and I can already feel some people looking to see where the big ‘X’ close button is on the page. Stick with me! IP rating is important.
IP stands for Ingress Protection, and it’s a certification which measures how well products stand up to fine particles (dust and sand are the two biggies) and moisture (probably water). Almost every tech gadget will have an IP rating, and if something doesn’t, I’d recommend thinking really hard before buying it.
Gadgets need to be hardy to survive everyday life, especially headphones; they can get lost in a lint-filled pocket, bombarded with rain if you get caught in a storm, dropped onto a sandy beach if you frolick in the dunes in the middle of the night, the hypothetical examples go on. When it comes to an IP rating, higher numbers is always better.
Apple did the original AirPods Pro dirty with an IPX4 rating, but bumped that up to IP54 for the Pro 2. But it’s gone better (way better) for the new models which have an IP57 rating.
Let’s go through what that means. The first number refers to the ingress against solid particles, and 5 is the second-best rating (it goes up to 6). It denotes that the AirPods Pro 2 and 3 both won’t have their workings disrupted by fine substances like dust or sand, although they will let them in in small amounts (unlike an IP6X device).
But the second number, which refers to the protection against moisture, is where the important upgrades are. An IPX4 device like the first two generations of AirPods can withstand sprays of water, but nothing more intentional like a jet or beam of water or, God forbid, immersion in a liquid.
Not the case with an IPX7 device though, which can get dunked in water of up to a meter in depth, for 30 minutes.
That may sound extreme, but you always want your gadget to be better protected than you think you’ll need, simply to account for unpredictable quandaries life throws at you. And what if one fell out and into a puddle? The Pro 3 would be fine – the IP rating proves it.
That’s a cool addition, and it may save you having to buy a new pair of AirPods when you’re caught in nasty weather. And that’s also true for a new feature of the case, an improved chip which makes the location tracking better, so you’re less likely to totally lose them. But they’re not my favorite upgrade:
Numbers: they go up
The best upgrade of the AirPods Pro 3 is a number going up; specifically the battery life number, which has gone up from 6 hours of listening to 8 hours with ANC deployed – or 10 hours with Transparency on (4 hours more than the previous iteration). To quote Owen Wilson: “Wow”. That’s probably not what you’re saying, seeing a number increase by two (or four), but you should.
For me, and I’d wager more people than would care to admit it consider battery life one of the most important specs of earbuds. The difference from decent to great audio quality is a nice improvement, but the difference from decent to great battery life can change how long you listen when travelling, when you’re away from your charger or when you need to take a really long call. Essentially, any music is better than no music, because you ran out of juice (again).
And let’s admit it; Apple’s never been great when it comes to battery life. My iPad Pro lasts for about a page of writing before it conks out, and iPhones rarely crack the single-day barrier before needing to be recharged. The AirPods Pro 2 hit 6 hours of listening and that’s not good enough in 2025 – so I have to hand it to the tech giant for improving that.
I’ve tested myriad headphones for TechRadar over the years, and in that time I’ve come to regard 8 hours as the ‘standard’ battery life. If a bud lasts for 7 hours of listening, it’s below average. If it lasts for 9 hours, it’s above average. You probably know how averages work, but I wanted to make that clear.
For Apple, a company which has rested in the sub-standard battery life category for a long time, to put out buds that actually meet the average is nothing short of a revolution. It’s fantastic!
Admittedly as a reviewer, it’s annoying that I can no longer take bang-average buds and say “at least it lasts longer than the AirPods” when I’m struggling to find things to say, but it’s great for music fans who want to listen for long periods without doing the dreaded thing of buying non-Apple buds.
Of course, this stat isn’t set in stone as we’ve not actually tested the AirPods Pro 3 yet. Wait for our review to be sure, but when it does come out, the battery life is what you should really be paying attention to.
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