‘Doubtless the best noise-cancelling iPhone headphones on the planet’: I tested AirPods Max 2 and they really are that good — here’s why

Apple AirPods Max 2: Two-minute review

I haven’t always been an AirPods fangirl. In fact, in May 2021, when the company unveiled Apple Music Lossless and Hi-Res Lossless for free, as part of your Apple Music subscription, I may have come down quite hard on Apple’s musical headgear — and for some time after that. Why? Because it took four more years for the Cupertino giant to work out how to get its Lossless music standard into its own flagship headphones.

Another thing that’s taken Apple a very long time? Unveiling a second-generation update to said headphones. It’s been five years and three months between iterations, a vast expanse of time in any area of technology, but an epoch in Bluetooth audio and among the best noise-cancelling headphones.

A happy by-product of the fact above is that it makes my delay in filing this review seem minuscule in comparison (I had a spell in hospital, but it did mean I could test the ANC in a key user-case scenario!). However, I mention the timeline mostly as a way to emphasise that based on looks alone, you’d be forgiven for thinking Apple hadn’t used that huge stretch wisely. The ear cup design, webbed headband, driver array and yes, even the ‘headphone bra’ semi-case haven’t been tweaked whatsoever for AirPods Max 2.

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Did Apple simply not have the R&D budget, or did its engineers double down on their 2020 design as still being the best possible shape, construction, driver size and material for a set of cans? And why, given the glowing star-rating at the top of this review, am I still being so negative?

The answer to all of these questions is this: if you’re using an iPhone 15 Pro (aka, the oldest iPhone that is still able to support Apple Intelligence) or later as a source device, AirPods Max 2 are some of the most formidable, featured and fantastic shut-the-world-out headphones I’ve ever tested — and I’ve been doing this full-time since 2019. They’re doubtless the best noise-cancelling iPhone headphones on the planet.

That’s enough on what Apple hasn’t done with AirPods Max 2; let’s talk about what has been updated. The big upgrade is the inclusion of Apple’s newer H2 chip, over the H1 in the originals. Given that this is the same in-house Apple audio processor that made its debut in the September 2022 AirPods Pro 2 (and also takes the wheel in the AirPods 4, AirPods Pro 3, and original 2023-launch Apple Vision Pro), it might not seem like much of a headline grabber. But in AirPods Max it does a lot of heavy lifting.

The H2 chips — yes, you actually get one in each ear cup — add a plethora of new features, including Adaptive Audio (the Transparency mode can adjust itself to block some unnecessary sounds, and there’s an optional slider to tweak just how ‘adaptive’ you want it to get), Conversation Awareness (so the over-ears can automatically lower the volume of your music and filter external sounds should you start talking to someone, then put everything back again once you stop yapping), plus Loud Sound Reduction and Personalized Volume to help protect your hearing but keep the sonic profile how you like it.

There’s also Live Translation, which I enjoyed using here much more than on AirPods Pro 3, because it’s so much easier to access via a long press of AirPods Max’s on-ear Listening Mode button. The new Voice Isolation software also improves your call quality when it’s loud or windy around you — and thanks to some extra processing power afforded by that H2 chip, you get much better voice capture from the headphones’ three mics for voice pickup (two are shared with the ANC system, and one is an additional dedicated microphone) in the nine-mic total.

Elsewhere, Head Gestures let you nod to accept a call or check a message, shake your head to dismiss a message or decline a call, or nod to Siri silently. Also, the new Camera Remote feature means you can now take snaps on your iPhone camera using AirPods Max 2’s Digital Crown.

And I left the best for last: Apple claims that the active noise cancellation is “up to 1.5x more effective than the previous generation” and when Tim Cook‘s behemoth states such a thing, I sit up and take notice. The noise-nixing here is next-level — and I mean near-silent, calming, cocooning and enveloping. It’s like stillness as a backdrop to your music. If that’s what you need, buy these headphones.

Any negatives? Two. The battery life is unchanged at 20 hours (which is easy to beat even much further down the headphone food chain), and there’s still no support for wireless hi-res codecs. You can get Lossless-quality audio, but you have to use the bundled USB-C cable (or buy a USB-C to 3.5mm one, which Apple sells separately) introduced to the original AirPods Max via a software update in March 2025.

Does any of that last paragraph matter? For me, given the crispness, clarity, impact, fun, separation and sheer musicality available here, no. And I rarely say that hi-res codecs or stamina don’t matter.

Apple AirPods Max 2 review: Price and release date

• Unveiled on March 16, 2026 (available for pre-order as of March 25, 2026)
• Priced $549 / £499 / AU$999
• Available in ‘Midnight’ (black), ‘Starlight’ (white), Purple, Blue and Orange

There’s been a curious trend in Apple’s pricing of late. The inaugural AirPods Max arrived in December 2020 with an asking price of $549 / £549 / AU$899, so, with the second-generation update priced at $549 / £499 / AU$999, Apple is keeping the US MSRP the same, giving the UK a price cut and charging The Land Down Under a little more.

The thing is, this is not a one-off. Both the first-generation AirPods Pro and the follow-up AirPods Pro 2 were priced at $249 / £249 / AU$399 when they landed, so when AirPods Pro 3 arrived with a $249 price tag, it came as no surprise to US fans. However, those newest buds were priced a little lower than before in the UK, at £219, and — at AU$429 — a little bit more in Australia. For Apple’s flagship earbuds, £30 cheaper in the UK yet AU$30 more expensive in Australia felt a bit harsh.

Here, there’s a £50 saving to be had if you live in Blighty, but a AU$100 increase to pay if you reside in Oz. I’m sorry. I could suggest it’s down to Australian Goods and Services Taxes (GST), relative incomes, International shipping costs, or perhaps a more bijou consumer base, but all of that would be pure speculation. I just cannot make that make sense to you.

Anyway, what of direct competition at this not-insignificant level? AirPods Max 2’s chief rivals are perhaps most pressingly the five-star Bose QuietComfort Ultra Headphones (2nd Gen), which hit shelves at slightly more affordable $449 / £449 / AU$699 price points, or the also five-star Bowers & Wilkins Px8 S2, which cost a fair bit more, at $799 / £629 / AU$1,299. Oh, and let’s not forget the excellent Sony WH-1000XM6, which sell for $449 / £399 / AU$699.

But there’s no shortage of competition at this level and – given options such as the inexpensive 4.5-star Nothing Headphone (a) with its remote camera function – at a few levels down from it too…

Apple AirPods Max 2 review: Specs

Apple AirPods Max 2 review: Features

• Live Translation is enjoyable and useful
• Adaptive Audio is good; ANC is excellent
• Conversation Awareness is a game-changer

I’ve touched on a lot of great new features, so it might be worth mentioning an Apple headline grabber you won’t get: heart-rate monitoring. It is available in both the flagship AirPods Pro 3 and Beats Powerbeats Pro 2, yet despite the arsenal of sensors nestled in AirPods Max 2 (an optical sensor, position sensor, accelerometer and case-detect sensor in each ear cup, plus a gyroscope in the left cup), there’s no PPG infrared light sensor to measure light absorption in your blood. And because of this, Apple isn’t funnelling you quite so readily towards its free Fitness app with its over-ears, or offering you a virtual trainer, however you feel about that…

You also don’t get Apple’s Hearing Test or Hearing Aid suite of features; the only toggles to preserve your hearing health here are Loud Sound Reduction (switch it on and provided you’re listening in either Transparency or Adaptive modes, the headphones will actively reduce your exposure to loud environmental sounds) and Personalized Volume, to readily adjust the loudness of your media in response to your surroundings, but they both work well.

Now, back to what you do get, and top of the list for me personally must be Live Translation. Why? Because it can be accessed with a surreptitious long press of the listening mode button (ie. the flush pill-shaped button located on the right ear cup that isn’t the digital crown). I found this a much more reliable way to start Live Translation than squeezing both stems of my AirPods Pro 3. Quick accessibility is key with these kinds of life-hack features, and on a recent trip to Girona (the Catalonian city near Barcelona where Season 6 of Game of Thrones was filmed), I found it genuinely useful, rather than a novelty to play with. Now, Girona is a Catalan-speaking city, and Catalan isn’t yet one of Apple’s supported Live Translation languages, but I heard a lot of Spanish too — and I also have a long-suffering life partner who speaks both languages. You can see snippets of our conversation below.

I’ve said before that this is an Apple offering you need to spend a bit of time setting up — ideally before your romantic city break — because there’s a fair bit of red tape you’ll need to cut through. You’ll also need an iPhone 15 Pro or later running iOS 26 or later, Apple Intelligence turned on, the Translate app downloaded (and the language modules you want downloaded), plus the latest AirPods Firmware version.

I also customized the iPhone Action button on my iPhone 15 Pro Max to start Live Translation, because in the moment it can be easier to tap your phone rather than your headphones, and it’s all about speed of deployment with Live Translation. Once that’s done, audible English responses are piped in as your helper answers your questions, with a transcription of the information they’re giving you (and your questions translated) also appearing on your iPhone’s screen. OK, perhaps your helpful human will find the fact that you’re not taking off your headphones to talk to them a little rude, but it works beautifully and with very little lag.

Now to the other new features and claimed upticks in performance, all of which can be found, controlled, toggled and customized with a tap of the AirPods Max bubble near the top of the settings tab, or by swiping down from the top-right of your screen, to get the Control Center. Your listening modes include Off, Transparency (which works and without making music tinny, but there’s no slider), Adaptive (which does have a slider, to allow more or less noise into your cans, albeit dynamically and in response to noises the headphones pick up around you) or Noise Cancellation (no slider, but it’s excellent).

For me, the right way to go about this in most situations is to deploy both Noise Cancellation and the Conversation Awareness toggle, a little further down in that menu. This means that, by default, you’re not being bothered, but when you speak up, music is automatically lowered and external noises are piped in as you need them. It’s not that Adaptive Audio is bad, because it’s not; I simply found that when using the Adaptive Audio profile I’d keep setting the slider right down to allow for fewer distractions, but if you don’t have the luxury of blocking out the world in your working day, Adaptive will serve you well.

If you take just one thing away from this review, let it be that the noise-cancelling power in AirPods Max 2 really is 1.5 times better than before. It’s fabulous; almost wickedly good at inhaling the noise from your ears, but without the vacuum effect I often find nauseating in rival cans (the few that offer ANC anywhere near this good, anyway).

Call handling is excellent; callers said my voice was remarkably clear, even on a windy UK seafront in Dorset. Gesture Control is also good provided you’re relatively animated with your nods or head shakes, and the Camera Remote feature is a neat way to make photo capture easier on your iPhone. As with Conversation Awareness, it just makes for a simpler life when it comes to wearing headphones.

• Features score: 4.5 / 5

Apple AirPods Max 2 review: Sound quality

• Expansive, layered music aided by supreme ANC and Spatial Audio
• Vocals emotive and textured
• Could be a bit punchier, but a big improvement on the originals

I’ve spent enough time on how good the noise cancellation is, right? OK, so let’s move on to the joys of head-tracked Spatial Audio. It’s not a new feature with this iteration, but it is so beautifully implemented here you’ll find yourself whipping them off to check there’s no mini speaker under your chin or squirrelled away at the back of the room. Better than the original AirPods Max? Yes. It’s likely due to the new amplifier under the hood plus the processing power of the H2 chipset, but it’s cleaner all round — and I did listen in direct comparison.

My favorite home cinema setup is now an iPad and the AirPods Max 2 with head-tracked Spatial Audio engaged. If you’re not so sure, try watching the opening scene of Alfonso Cuarón’s 2013 movie Gravity (it’s a known test these days, but still). See?

When listening to music, you can expect an expansive, meticulously unfurled soundstage with a noise floor so low that bass frequencies rumble, snap and boom in so much space it’s almost a crime. Fontaines D.C.’s I Love You is brooding through the intro and able to celebrate the juicy depth of Grian Chatten’s vocals as well as I’ve heard in any wireless headphones. My Chatten playlist continues with The Score. Its textured acoustic guitar intro brushes each of my ears in turn before expanding yet further to let the vocal drop centrally. Add the USB-C cable to listen in Lossless on Apple Music and it’s even better.

Timing, too, is exceptional. I dare you to stream Bad Bunny’s Tití Me Preguntó and sit still. It’s raucous, defiant, joyous and, in these headphones, it’s why I love music.

For crisp leading edges of notes and an extra ounce of detail (again, we come to that ‘integrated hi-fi versus fun’ debate), you’ll get just a little more insight and honesty from the Bowers & Wilkins Px8 S2, but those headphones are pricier and for me, AirPods Pro 2’s Spatial Audio knocks B&W’s True Immersion solution clean out the water, with the latter coming off veiled and almost muffled in direct comparison.

Ask yourself this: do you want your music to feel emotional, zealous and fun — a more V-shaped presentation where upper mids (ie. vocals) and feels through the bass dart betwixt each ear? Or do you want a faithful, neutral stereo performance that leaves nothing out of the mix? Your answer is important because if you pick the first option, you own an iPhone and you can afford these headphones, I know you won’t be disappointed.

• Sound quality: 5 / 5

Apple AirPods Max 2 review: Design

• A new ‘custom high dynamic range amplifier’ is the only physical update
• …but for me, they’re still the most comfortable headphones around
• Could do with an audio handoff option — and better stamina

As I’ve already mentioned and pictured, AirPods Max 2’s appearance and indeed innards (save for a new chip and amplification module) remain largely unchanged. If you hoped Apple would completely overhaul the design, you’ll doubtless feel wronged. But I maintain that the headband here is the most comfortable I’ve ever worn, and the metallic yokes are the most reliable and silent. I wear headphones almost constantly, but I also suffer from migraines, so a headband digging into the crown of my head doesn’t help the pain in my noggin one bit. No such issue here, ever, and for me that’s priceless. What I’m saying is, I think Apple found the fix here and I wouldn’t want them to try again and alter it.

The ear cups are quite wide and extremely long, but they aren’t especially deep, unlike the audiophile-grade options I’ve tried that felt like long lenses strapped across my head. An IP rating would be a plus, as would an actual case rather than the headphone bra Apple has stuck with (see the new Sony 1000X The Collexion for a novel idea that still actually protects your expensive headphones, Apple), but the build quality is resoundingly premium. All the more reason to want to protect it…

My main gripe here concerns the battery life. At 20 hours (albeit with ANC deployed), Apple is being left behind. We recently knocked the Sony 1000X for a lack of stamina, even with 24 hours in ANC mode, but you’ll get 30 hours from the B&W Px8 S2 with noise cancellation on. And these options aren’t class leaders — Cambridge’s Melomania P100 (a fantastic set of cans) will go for 60 hours with ANC on.

And I have one other bugbear. In AirPods Pro 3, I suggested a dedicated iOS app might be necessary now, because of the additional Hearing Health suite (hearing tests, hearing aid functionality and virtual trainer perks), heart-rate monitor, and the fact that on-ear controls on an earbud are more fiddly than they are on an ear cup. Here, I think the in-iPhone solution suffices, but I’d like an audio handoff feature that works with Apple Music.

To be clear, I don’t mean a cross-device feature to resume playback on another Apple device when I walk through the door, as pioneered by Bowers & Wilkins between its wireless headphones and wireless speakers (not too many of us still use HomePods or HomePod minis, I imagine), or true multipoint connectivity — if you’re using the same Apple ID, your AirPods Max 2 will happily dart between your iPhone, Mac or iPad using its own Automatic Device Switching solution. No, I simply want to be able to seamlessly switch from streaming Apple Music on my iPhone to streaming Apple Music on my MacBook. I want to pause a song on my phone, sit at my MacBook Pro, open the Music app, and continue listening to the same track, or playlist. It’s odd that this still isn’t happening — but this is a review about AirPods Max 2, not the Apple Music user experience.

• Design score: 4.5 / 5

Apple AirPods Max 2 review: value

• The best ANC over-ears for iPhone owners
• Some might think Apple should’ve tried harder though…

Here’s the issue: people buy with their eyes first, then their wallets. And in one sense, there’s nothing new to see here — buy the newest AirPods Max and few people will be able to tell if you just bought the older, heavily discounted set or the brand new H2-toting pair. My Orange review sample is one of the new Max 2-only colorways, but with so many bright finishes available (and oddly, none of them correspond with Apple’s latest MacBook Neo colorways), it’s hard to keep tabs on what’s new and what’s not.

It’s unfortunate, because having tested them for over two months now, I can tell you that AirPods Max 2 are much better sonically than the originals. The ANC is as good as Apple claims it is, and they boast a greatly improved user experience to boot. But you’d never be able to tell that by looking at them, and when the model they look just like came out in late 2020, that could present a problem in terms of perceived value.

• Value: 4 / 5

Should I buy the Apple AirPods Max 2?

AirPods Max 2 score card

Excellent sound and ANC; lacklustre stamina

Sound Quality

Battery Life

Noise Cancellation

Group 1 Data

Product	Features ()	Sound Quality ()	Design ()	Battery Life ()	Noise Cancellation ()	Value ()	Overall ()
AirPods Max 2	4.5	5	4.5	3	5	4	4.5

Buy them if…

Don’t buy them if…

Apple AirPods Max 2 review: Also consider

How I tested the Apple AirPods Max 2

• Tested for two months
• Tested on a trip to Girona, a hospital stay, coastal walks, and at my desk
• Used an Apple iPhone 15 Pro Max and MacBook Pro with Apple Music, plus downloaded Flac files on my FiiO hi-res music player

I used AirPods Max 2 for two months while compiling this review. Why so long? Because I had to have shoulder surgery after accepting them for review, so my testing involved listening to podcasts and music post-op from my hospital bed, with ANC on to distract me from my immediate surroundings, then plenty of streamed movies during my recovery (and to distract me from painful rehab exercises).

I listened at home, on a quick pre-op trip to Girona (which is where AirPods Max 2’s Live Translation really came into its own) and on blustery Dorset coastal walks, and let me tell you, they kept me sane while navigating my early recovery away from my desk.

I’ve been testing audio products full-time since 2019, first as a staff writer at TechRadar’s sister publication What Hi-Fi? (locked in our hi-fi testing facility for two years, I was), then as senior writer at TechRadar and, since early 2024, audio editor.

My background as a professional dancer means I’m always interested in moving to good-quality music even with a non-functioning shoulder. I never stop listening for precision, clarity, faithful timing, insight and good old-fashioned fun in recorded audio. And when said shoulder’s fully better, I’m going to be back to throwing shapes while testing too. You just wait…

• First reviewed May 2026