Apple Officially Retires Beats Updater Utility in Favor of Over-the-Air Firmware Updates
Apple has officially retired Beats Updater, the software utility that lets users update the firmware of their Beats Wireless headphones, earphones, and speakers.
Beats Updater allows users to plug their Beats product directly into the USB port of their computer to check for firmware updates online, but with Apple's growing tendency to deliver over-the-air updates to wireless products via iOS and iPadOS, the company clearly feels the utility has reached the end of its life.
Beats Updater is still available to download for use with the following products, but Apple says no new versions will be available in future.
- Beats Solo2 Wireless
- Beats Studio Wireless
- Powerbeats 2 Wireless
- Beats Pill 2.0
- Powerbeats
- Powerbeats Pro
- Powerbeats3 Wireless
- Solo Pro
- Beats Solo3 Wireless
- Beats Studio3 Wireless
- BeatsX
If you have one of the Beats headphones or earphones listed below, pairing them with your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch will update them automatically. If you have an Android device, download the Beats app for Android from the Google Play store to update your firmware.
- Powerbeats
- Powerbeats Pro
- Powerbeats3 Wireless
- Solo Pro
- Beats Solo3 Wireless
- Beats Studio3 Wireless
- BeatsX
Apple recently released over-the-air firmware updates for AirPods (second generation), AirPods Pro, Powerbeats, Powerbeats Pro, and Solo Pro. The new firmware adds automatic switching support to these models and requires iOS 14, iPadOS 14, macOS Big Sur, or later. In addition to automatic switching, AirPods Pro also gained a new spatial audio feature.
Popular Stories
As reported by Bloomberg today, some of the new iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone Air models on display at Apple Stores today are already scratched and scuffed.
French blog Consomac also reported on this topic.
The scratches appear to be most prominent on models with darker finishes, including the iPhone 17 Pro and Pro Max in Deep Blue, and the iPhone Air in Space Black.
Images Credit: Consoma ...
Next year's rumored foldable iPhone will showcase an ultra-thin design resembling "two titanium iPhone Airs side-by-side," according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman.
Writing in the Q&A section of his latest Power On newsletter, Gurman says Apple's first foldable device will be "super thin and a design achievement," combining Apple's thinnest iPhone form factor with cutting-edge folding...
Apple released the first beta of iOS 26.1 today, just a week after launching iOS 26. iOS 26.1 mainly adds new languages to Apple Intelligence, but there are a few other features that are worth knowing about.
New Apple Intelligence Languages
Apple Intelligence is now available in Danish, Dutch, Norwegian, Portuguese (Portugal), Swedish, Turkish, Chinese (Traditional), and Vietnamese.
AirPo...
Apple is preparing to release iOS 26.0.1, according to a private account on X with a proven track record of sharing information about future iOS versions.
The update will have a build number of 23A350, or similar, the account said.
It is likely that iOS 26.0.1 will fix a camera-related bug on the new iPhone Air and iPhone 17 Pro models. In his iPhone Air review, CNN Underscored's Henry T. ...
While the iPhone Air is equipped with Apple's custom C1X modem for cellular connectivity, all of the iPhone 17 models are outfitted with Qualcomm modems still.
A teardown video shared on Chinese platform Bilibili today (via Reddit) appears to confirm the iPhone 17 Pro Max is equipped with Qualcomm's Snapdragon X80 modem in particular. The same modem is likely used in the iPhone 17 and iPhone ...
Apple's latest iPhone models launched on Friday, and some early adopters of the devices are experiencing intermittent Wi-Fi issues.
Affected customers say Wi-Fi connectivity periodically cuts out on the iPhone 17, iPhone 17 Pro, iPhone 17 Pro Max, and iPhone Air, with hundreds of comments about the issue posted across the MacRumors Forums, Reddit, and the Apple Support Community over the...
