5 hidden tips and tricks for AirPods

AirPods are the wireless earbuds that ordinary Bluetooth headphones want to be when they grow up. They’re seamlessly integrated with your iPhone, Apple Watch, iPad and Mac. They’re deceptively simple — but if you want to get more out of them, you need to dig through Settings.

I’ve done some spelunking and found five super-handy hidden features you might not know about.

5 secret AirPods tips and tricks

You can watch these all in action in this video:

No. 1: Share audio between two pairs of AirPods

You want to listen to a song or watch a video with a close friend, so you each take a single earbud and press play. Who hasn’t done that?

Germophobes, probably.

But if your friend has their own pair of AirPods (or newer Beats headphones*) you can play music to both simultaneously.

To take advantage of this great AirPods audio-sharing feature, first tap the AirPlay button. Then tap Share Audio, make sure your friends’ headphones are nearby, and tap Share Audio. Your friend might have to tap Join on their iPhone. Then, just check the other device in the list. Uncheck it to stop.

You can each set different volume levels for your own AirPods, too. Open Control Center and hold down on the volume slider. You’ll see it expand into two sliders you can adjust.

* This works with AirPods (all models and versions), Beats Fit Pro, Beats Flex, Beats Solo Pro, Beats Solo³ Wireless, Beats Studio³ Wireless, BeatsX, Powerbeats, Powerbeats Pro and Powerbeats³ Wireless.

No. 2: Spy on a conversation with Live Listen

Apple’s Live Listen feature uses the microphone on your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch as an audio source, then transmits the sound to your AirPods. If you’re hard of hearing, or taking part in a noisy meeting, you can pick up on a conversation easier.

But AirPods have a really long range. That means you can leave your phone on a cluttered coffee table or bookshelf where people are talking and sit casually in an adjacent room to hear their conversation. Of course, you should always use this power for good, not for evil.

To use Live Listen, first go to Settings > Control Center and scroll down to tap + Hearing. This adds the Hearing accessibility controls to your iPhone’s Control Center.

With your AirPods paired, just tap this button and tap Live Listen to start.

No. 3: Customize your AirPods’ controls

On newer AirPods, you can squeeze the stem for a variety of controls: click to play/pause, hold to turn on or off noise cancellation. On older AirPods, you do this by tapping your earbuds.

But you can change what these actions do. You can even assign different controls for the left and right AirPods.

To tweak your AirPods controls, first make sure your earbuds are connected to your iPhone. Then open Settings > AirPods. Under Left or Right, you can pick a few different actions: Noise Control (on certain models), Siri, Play/Pause, Next Track, Previous Track or Off if you don’t want to use this feature. Personally, I use the left AirPod for Siri and the right for audio controls.

No. 4: Control noise cancellation from Apple Watch

If you have AirPods Pro, you might know that you can switch between Active Noise Cancellation and Transparency mode by pressing and holding the stem on an AirPod or in Control Center on your iPhone.

But you also can do it from your Apple Watch. From the Now Playing screen on your watch, tap the AirPlay icon in the bottom-left corner and select from the menu (Off, Noise Cancellation or Transparency). Doing it visually like this is sometimes easier than blindly clicking the button on your AirPods.

If you’re one of those people who goes running with a cellular Apple Watch without your phone, this is a really convenient way for you to quickly turn on transparency mode when you’re going through the city, and switch back to active noise cancellation when you get to a bike path.

No. 5: Announce calls and messages

In the same vein, you can have your AirPods announce who’s calling or read your text messages to you so you don’t need to look at your iPhone or Apple Watch.

Go to Settings > Phone > Announce Calls and set it to Headphones Only. Next, go to Settings > Notifications > Announce Notifications and turn it on.

This features proves really convenient if you don’t want to be disrupted by taking out your phone or staring at your watch while you’re exercising.

One More Thing™

The Cult of Mac Store offers loads of AirPods accessories. We have dozens of fun cases, an adapter for using your AirPods with a headphone jack, an Apple Watch band that holds your AirPods on your wrist, ear hooks for keeping AirPods secure while you run and more.