Just hours after Apple unveiled new second-generation AirPods with "Hey Siri" support and a new Wireless Charging Case, they've started selling out. At launch, Apple listed a U.S. delivery date of March 27 to March 29 for the new $199 AirPods paired with the Wireless Charging Case, but now, those delivery estimates have slipped to April 2 to April 5. The $159 second-generation ‌AirPods‌ with a standard Charging Case continue to be available for March 27 to March 29 delivery, as does the standalone $79 Wireless Charging Case Apple introduced for current ‌AirPods‌ owners. Those who want to pick up the new ‌AirPods‌ with Wireless Charging Case should do so soon, as historically, Apple has had trouble keeping its ‌AirPods‌ in stock due to high demand. We may soon see these delivery estimates slip even further into April. Apple's new second-generation ‌AirPods‌ do not bring exciting new features that were rumored like a new black color and health updates, but they're a solid upgrade over the previous version. There's a new H1 wireless chip inside that powers hands-free "Hey ‌Siri‌" functionality so you don't need to tap to access the voice assistant. Your ‌AirPods‌ are able to switch between devices two times faster when playing music, and there's an extra hour of talk time, bringing total talk time to three hours. The new Wireless Charging Case allows the ‌AirPods‌ to charge using Qi-based wireless charging accessories, and it perhaps heralds the upcoming launch of the AirPower. Apple is designing its own wireless charging mat meant to charge ‌AirPods‌, the iPhone, and the Apple Watch all at once, but it's not yet entirely clear when it will launch given the many delays since its 2017 introduction. In the meantime, with no ‌AirPower‌, ‌AirPods‌ can charge on any Qi-based accessory that you might already have for your ‌iPhone‌. Apple will likely have some stock of the new ‌AirPods‌ models in its retail stores next week for those who were unable to order and receive a March delivery date. If you order online, though, you can get your ‌AirPods‌ case engraved, a feature new to the second-generation model. We expect ‌AirPods‌ to be in stores right around March 25. The new ‌AirPods‌ require iOS 12.2, watchOS 5.2, and macOS Mojave 10.14.4, all of which are in beta testing right now. Those releases are expected on March 25, so ‌AirPods‌ could be in stores soon afterwards. We're giving away a pair of ‌AirPods‌ to one lucky MacRumors reader, and you can enter to win in our AirPods roundup.<doc-sep>Today, Apple finally announced its second-generation AirPods, most notably adding wireless charging to the popular headphones. Apple is even selling the wireless charging case separately, so that existing AirPod owners can join in the fun. The move brings Apple in line with its main competitors, whose phones and earbuds support similar Qi charging functionality, but there was one piece missing: Apple’s long-absent AirPower charger. If there was ever a moment to re-announce AirPower, this was the moment — instead, it’s a missed opportunity for Apple. A missed opportunity for Apple Back when Apple first announced the AirPower charger in 2017 (alongside the iPhone X), it was presented as an elegant, Apple-like solution to the present problem of keeping your ever-multiplying stack of Apple hardware charged. Instead of fumbling for a wire or three, AirPower promised to let you just drop your Apple Watch, your iPhone, and your AirPods on a charging pad and pick them up, fully charged, in the morning. But AirPower never shipped, and neither did a version of Apple’s AirPods that could take advantage of any wireless charging pad — until today, when Apple announced the new AirPods without so much as a mention that AirPower might still be on the way. Apple’s choice of charging standard might be telling, too: unlike say, the Apple Watch — which has a proprietary Apple wireless charging standard — the AirPods will work with any Qi charger, something that’s great for consumers, but less so for Apple who will presumably be looking to sell those customers wireless chargers in the future. Even if Apple does launch AirPower tomorrow or Friday, which seems vaguely possible given how many surprise Apple hardware announcements we’ve seen this week, it’ll still be too late. Right now, thousands of customers are sticking second-gen AirPods and wireless charging cases in their carts on Apple’s website — so many of them that new buyers won’t see their AirPods ship until April. An AirPower charger to use with those new AirPods is the easiest upsell in the world, given that it was literally designed for this exact product, and yet none of those thousands of customers can buy one today. Even if Apple does launch AirPower tomorrow, it’ll still be too late Instead, they’re probably buying one of the excellent Qi chargers that are already out there, or even one of the many, many knockoffs of Apple’s AirPower multi-device charging pad idea from companies like Griffin, Nomad, Anker, or any of these crowdfunded alternatives. Even more problematically, those chargers aren’t materially worse than the AirPower pad will be at charging a phone or headphones — AirPower’s claim to fame is some fancy charge indicators on an iPhone and some convenience in the form of its beam-forming tech. Those are certainly convenient: finding the sweet spot on a charger is annoying, and Apple’s promise to solve that is appealing, but it’s also a tough sell to someone who already has a pile of charging pads. Apple didn’t have to launch the second-gen AirPods today — there’s nothing that would have stopped it from waiting until AirPower was ready to launch. And though The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Apple has approved production on the long-delayed charger, which suggests the device will arrive someday, the fact that Apple didn’t have the charger ready to launch today alongside the AirPods suggests either another lengthy wait or a huge tactical misstep from a company that typically prides itself on a thriving hardware ecosystem. At this point, I’m not sure what the solution for Apple is: a launch later this week is unsatisfying, a quiet random launch untethered to another major product just highlights how late Apple is to the party, and tying it to this September’s iPhone event would mean that Apple will have taken a full two years to ship a wireless charger. None of it is a good look for the company, and that’s increasingly the story of AirPower — not a disaster, but a long and public unforced error that’s constantly looming.<doc-sep>
Apple’s week of surprise product launches continues with the announcement of the second-generation AirPods, which will include a wireless charging case and a new H1 chip that the company claims offers improved battery life and “Hey, Siri” support to trigger the virtual assistant without pressing a button. The new wireless charging case works with standard Qi charging, so it should work with nearly every wireless charger out there. Otherwise, both the second-gen AirPods and the case look virtually identical to the first model, except for a small LED light on the wireless charging case to indicate battery life. More talk time and faster connectivity Apple says the H1 chip offers a number of benefits over the W1 chip in the last generation. Specifically, there’s up to an extra hour of talk time, which Apple says is a 50 percent increase; better mic clarity; connection times are twice as fast when switching between devices; and the aforementioned “Hey, Siri” support — which Apple already offers on newer iPhones, iPads, Macs, and the HomePod — that allows you to ask Siri things hands-free. The new AirPods also includes support for Bluetooth 5. The H1 chip is the first in a new line of headphone-focused chips that Apple is making, breaking away from the W-series chips that the AirPods had borrowed from the Apple Watch line (which will continue to use W-series processors in the future). Apple will be selling the updated AirPods in two options: with the wireless charging case for $199 or with the standard case for the same $159 price as the previous generation. The company will also sell the wireless charging case separately for existing AirPod owners for $79. That way, users will be able to charge their headphones with a wireless charger without upgrading to the new model. Notably missing from the announcement is any mention of Apple’s still-missing AirPower wireless charger, which was first announced alongside the iPhone X over a year and a half ago. It was marketed primarily around being able to charge an iPhone, Apple Watch, and AirPods wirelessly at the same time. Update March 20th, 10:20am: Added additional details about Apple’s new H1 chip.