The MacRumors Show: What Health and Fitness Features Are Coming to AirPods?

On this week's episode of The MacRumors Show, we discuss some of the key health and fitness features rumored to come to future AirPods models.

Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more videos

Last week, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman reported that Apple is working on new hearing health features for the AirPods. This comes after years of rumors about new health and fitness capabilities on the device, with reports suggesting that Apple is exploring adding respiratory rate monitoring, enhanced motion sensors for activity tracking, and ambient light sensors for biometrics, as well as body temperature, posture, and hearing aid features. We talk through some of the applications for these abilities and how they might emerge.

We also look at some of the week's biggest news, including the potential price hike for the iPhone 15 Pro models, mixed-reality headset components leak, and Apple's tentative work on generative AI.

Listen to The MacRumors Show in Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Overcast, Pocket Casts, Castro, Google Podcasts, or your preferred podcasts app. You can also copy our RSS feed directly into your podcast player. Watch a video version of the show on the MacRumors YouTube channel.


If you haven't already listened to the previous episode of The MacRumors Show, catch up for our discussion about Apple's Yellow iPhone 14 and ‌‌iPhone‌ 14‌ Plus, as well as the range of new Apple Watch bands and AirTag accessories, with TikTok star Frank McShan.

Subscribe to ‌The MacRumors Show‌ for more episodes, where we discuss some of the topical news breaking here on MacRumors, often joined by exciting guests like David Lewis, Andru Edwards, Tyler Stalman, Jon Prosser, Sam Kohl, Quinn Nelson, John Gruber, Federico Viticci, Sara Dietschy, Luke Miani, Thomas Frank, Jonathan Morrison, iJustine, Ross Young, Ian Zelbo, Jon Rettinger, Rene Ritchie, and Mark Gurman. You can also head over to The MacRumors Show forum thread to engage with us directly. Remember to rate and review the show, and let us know what subjects you would like the podcast to cover in the future.

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Top Rated Comments

sjsharksfan12 Avatar
27 months ago
Listening now and there were a couple things I wanted to respond to:

1. I typically buy the full phone outright. For one I like paying for things in full so I don't need to worry about it in the future. Also, I'm on a family account so I typically don't see the bills (I pay my family after they send an invoice to me). When I was buying things from Apple last year I always paid up front.

2. I love love more ways to track my health that doesn't include the watch. I think one of the reasons why I don't like the stand ring is because I feel like I'm a hostage to the watch because of it. I don't really like wearing it all the time, yet because of the stand ring it almost forces you to wear it all the time, at least until that ring is closed, if you want to close it (It's become habitual for me at this point). I would love to be able to take the watch off (It feels heavy sometimes) but still track my data. If Airpods can do that, that would be great. Even if the phone can do that (Android phones can track health data if the phone is on you), that would be nice.
Score: 1 Votes (Like | Disagree)