iOS 19/iOS 26 will reportedly enhance the AirPods experience by introducing new head gestures. The earbuds will also become smart enough to stop audio playback when you fall asleep while wearing them. Plus, you may finally be able to use the AirPods as a remote shutter for the camera.
With every new major iOS release, Apple added new features to AirPods as well. It appears the company may continue that trend this year as well.
New head gestures and automatic sleep detection
With iOS 18 in 2024, Apple introduced “yes” and “no” head gestures for AirPods Pro. This enabled hands-free Siri interactions and the ability to accept or reject calls. It also added Voice Isolation for improved audio quality and lowered audio latency while gaming. More importantly, iOS 18.1 turned the AirPods Pro into hearing aids.
iOS 19/iOS 26 will further improve the head gestures. As part of this, AirPods Pro 2 and AirPods 4 users can extend a “Conversation Awareness volume adjustment before returning users to their original noise-control settings,” reports 9to5Mac.
AirPods will supposedly also become smart enough to detect when you fall asleep while wearing them and automatically pause audio playback. Currently, the only way to achieve this involves using sleep timers; however, automatic detection would be a more effective solution.
Bringing a feature back from the EarPods-era, iOS 19/iOS 26 will supposedly let you use the AirPods stem as a Camera Control button. Imagine being able to prop your iPhone on a table and then using the AirPods as a remote shutter button.
New “studio quality” mode for better voice quality
Similar to the iPhone 16‘s Audio Mix feature, Apple will reportedly add a “studio quality” mic mode to AirPods with iOS 19/iOS 26. The new mode should enable capturing higher-quality audio, making it useful for content creators.
Lastly, a new AirPods feature will improve “the pairing experience in shared iPads, which will be especially welcome in classrooms where multiple students use the same device.”
Some of the new features may not arrive with the initial iOS 19/iOS 26 build. Instead, Apple may roll out some of them with a point release in the future.
