Apples other Beats Electronics is often overlooked in favor of the eponymous AirPods. But they shouldn’t be: Beats offers more colors, often a better fit or different sizes/styles, and most of the same features you get with AirPods.
And today the company announced a long-awaited update to its most affordable earbuds and a new pair of very affordable earbuds.
Bat Solo 4
It was eight years since the release of the Beats Solo 3 in 2016. Clearly, an update is long overdue. The new Beats Solo 4 maintains the same size and style as the Solo 3, with some notable improvements. According to Beats, the new model is upgraded in the following ways:
- Refined acoustics with improvements to the transducer, voice coil and more to reduce distortion.
- USB-C charging
- Lossless audio via USB-C or the 3.5mm audio jack (which works without batteries)
- Up to 50 hours of battery life (and 5 hours with a 10-minute recharge)
- A new proprietary platform that supports most Apple and Android features
This last feature is perhaps the biggest upgrade. Beats Solo 3 used Apple’s W1 chip which only worked with Apple’s easy pairing features etc., but the new proprietary system supports Apple and Android features and more.
For starters, you now get personalized spatial audio with dynamic head tracking. Apple users enjoy simple one-touch pairing and iCloud pairing, hands-free “Hey Siri,” and Find My support. On the Android side, you get Google Fast Pair support, multi-point pairing support, and Find My Device support.
As with all Beats Solo products, there is no active noise cancellation.
Beats Solo 4 is available now for the same $199 price as Beats Solo 3. They come in matte black, slate blue, and cloud pink.
Beats Solo Buds
Beats Solo Buds are new to the Beats lineup, introducing the affordable “Solo” line to the true wireless earbuds category. At just $79.99, this is definitely the most affordable product Beats makes.
These little earbuds have an impressive 18 hours of playtime and a very small charging case. The charging case is so small because it doesn’t contain a battery: you use it to plug in a USB-C cable to charge the earbuds, but the earbuds don’t charge when just placed in the case, like AirPods or Beats Studio Buds+.
Like Beats Solo 4, the company uses its own proprietary platform to support Apple and Android connectivity features. This includes one-touch pairing, automatic account setup, and support for Find My (Apple) and Find My Device (Android). Like AirPods, they also have touch controls.
The Beats Solo Buds will be available in early June for $79.99 and will be available in matte black, storm gray, arctic purple, and transparent red (the case is transparent, the earbuds are opaque).
