Jason Hiner/ZDNET
Key takeaways
- The ability to switch quickly and seamlessly across an unlimited number of Apple devices is still the best feature of the AirPods Max.
- The low-latency upgrade in iOS 18.4 makes the AirPods Max a lot more viable for professional multimedia producers (and gamers) when using a wired connection.
- Comfort, battery life, and audio quality match high-end competitors from Sony, Bose, and others.
Follow ZDNET: Add us as a preferred source on Google.
Even with their imperfections and elevated price tag ($549), I have to admit that the AirPods Max are a product that I love to use every day. What they do best — pairing quickly and working seamlessly across my phone, laptop, desktop, and tablet — is the thing that makes me prefer the AirPods Max to all other over-the-ear headphones.
But one of the things you couldn’t traditionally do with the AirPods Max was use them for professional audio and video production, because of the latency issues with Bluetooth and the lack of an effective wired option. Apple fixed that in the spring of 2025 with the release of iOS 18.4, which brought a key software upgrade to the 2024 USB-C model of AirPods Max.
AirPods Max get pro audio
While the 2024 relaunch of AirPods Max was relatively disappointing since it only brought new USB-C connectivity and new color options, the spring 2025 software update for Apple’s over-the-ear headphones brought long-awaited professional upgrades that landed in iOS 18.4, as well as iPadOS 18.4 and MacOS Sequoia 15.4.
The new software drop gave AirPods Max 24-bit, 48 kHz lossless audio. The official line on this is that it preserves more details from the original studio recordings, and Apple reports that Apple Music has over 100 million songs in lossless audio. The reality is that the vast majority of people aren’t going to be able to tell the difference between a regular song on Apple Music (or any other service) and the lossless version.
Also: How to figure out if you should (or shouldn’t) buy the USB-C AirPods Max
Where this upgrade really made a difference was enabling ultra low-latency audio when connected via a USB-C cable. This opened the door to professional workflows with music production and video production so that technicians could have the kind of precision they need for studio work. It also allowed the pros to produce Personalized Spatial Audio in apps like Apple’s Logic Pro and immediately preview it with AirPods Max.
Gamers also benefited from the ultra low-latency audio via USB-C cable to the AirPods Max because it reduced lag to near-zero to match the same experience you’d get on a Mac, iPad, or iPhone when playing sound through the built-in speakers.
Jason Hiner/ZDNET
Why I still dig AirPods Max
Before the AirPods Max, I never found a pair of over-the-ear headphones that I could wear for more than about 45 minutes because they would hurt my ears. I can wear the AirPods Max for hours on long flights, which is one of my favorite uses. And their long battery life is another key on cross-country or international flights.
There are now several other over-the-ear headphones that are super comfortable and have great battery life, such as the Sony XM6 headphones and Bose QuiteComfort Ultra, which are both at the top of ZDNET’s picks for best headphones. But pairing and sharing across as many devices as I use isn’t great on headphones that aren’t AirPods because it’s usually limited to two devices.
Also: I wore the best headphones from Sony, Bose, Apple, and Sonos: Here’s how the AirPods Max wins
At the end of the day, most of us turn to over-the-ear headphones for two things: noise cancellation and audio quality. For both of these, the AirPods Max are in the same league as the best headphones on the market, including the ones from Sony, Bose, Sennheiser, and others. I can hear details in music and movies using the AirPods Max that I simply can’t hear with AirPods Pro or other earbuds. And when you pair the AirPods Max with an M4 iPad Pro that has a Tandem OLED screen, the quality of the audio and video experience you get feels like it could almost rival a high-quality digital movie theater.
Where AirPods Max need improvement
There are still a couple things that I don’t love about AirPods Max. The biggest one is the price. At $549, they are $100 more expensive than even the Sony XM6 headphones, which have feature parity with AirPods Max and the premium Sony brand. Most of the other premium headphones on the market are around $350.
The other issue is that Apple still hasn’t integrated its latest H2 chip from the AirPods Pro 2 into the AirPods Max. The H2 chip, which has more advanced noise cancellation and voice isolation, was released in 2022 but was not integrated into the latest AirPods Max released in 2024. For Apple to not put its best audio technology into its highest end headphones — especially at such a premium price — is disappointing.
Buying advice
The AirPods Max are only worth the extra money for people who use a lot of different Apple devices on a regular basis. Otherwise, I’d recommend going with the Sony XM6 headphones — or even the Sony XM5 version — to save money and get virtually all the same features, including even lower latency than AirPods Max.
