In September 2024, Beats took the unusual step of announcing that it was working on the much-anticipated second-gen of its Powerbeats Pro wireless earbuds and that we could expect to see them launch in 2025. If some new leaked photos are any indication, our wait may soon be over.
A prodigious leaker on X known as Arsène Lupin (@MysteryLupin) has posted several hi-res images of the Powerbeats Pro 2, and they’re our first real look so far at the new earbuds. Previously, a grainy video of baseball player Shohei Ohtani was the only visual record.
The leaked pics show the Powerbeats Pro 2 in vivid detail, including some of the available colors and a good look at the new charging case, which appears to be smaller and more pocketable than the first version.
We can see the more slender shape of the outer housings, and the absence of the physical “b” buttons. The Beats “b” logo remains, and it may be that the entire surface is now a touch control, to complement the top-mounted buttons that have been preserved from the original design.
But easily the most intriguing details can be seen in the image with the companion Android phone. On the screen is the Beats app, and it shows a greyed-out heart rate button, which indicates that the Powerbeats Pro 2 will do more than just provide the soundtrack for your workouts — they’ll also provide some sort of training feedback.
The other notable detail is the three-position slider, currently set to “off.” Some observers speculate that these are used for spatial audio profiles, but the icons — heads with and without halos — is more consistent with the way Beats shows noise cancellation modes for its ANC models like the Beats Studio Buds+ and Beats Fit Pro.
If that’s accurate, this is also the first confirmation that the Powerbeats Pro 2 will have ANC, something the first-gen earbuds lacked.
When will the Powerbeats Pro 2 actually launch? How much will they cost? And when will we learn more about their new fitness features? All good questions with no firm answers yet, but we’ll get them to you as soon as possible.
Instagram is making its way to yet another screen, and this time, Apple TV is getting a taste of the Reels rabbit hole. The company has launched a dedicated Instagram app for Apple TV, bringing Reels, longer videos, and live shows to the big screen. So, if watching one quick clip on a phone somehow turns into an hour of scrolling, there's now a much larger screen for that.
Instagram brings Reels and more to Apple TV
Audio-Technica, a brand well known for making some of the best studio and professional headphones on the market, has just come out with the ATH-AWX7000, which the company itself claims to be its "finest headphones ever." The new flagship closed-back headphone has debuted at an eye-watering price of $3,799. It combines hand-finished Japanese woodwork with a newly developed 58mm driver.
The earcups are made from Kiso cypress, a prized wood historically used for Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples. Each housing is finished by hand with traditional Echizen lacquer, which brings out the grain and is expected to darken over time. The frame and sliders are finished in a deep navy kachi-iro shade traditionally associated with samurai.
This post is brought to you in paid partnership with Best Buy.
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