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After releasing the first betas of iOS 16 and macOS 13 earlier this week, Apple has now also made a new beta firmware for the AirPods available to developers.
Apple has announced its developer portal provided instructions for installing the new firmware. Essentially, developers need to pair the AirPods with the iPhone and then use Xcode 14 Beta on a Mac to enable the "Pre-Release Beta Firmware" option under the "AirPods Testing" section. According to the instructions, it can take up to 24 hours for the AirPods to update after enabling this option in Xcode. To install the beta firmware on the AirPods, the iPhone, iPad, or Mac with which they are paired must be running iOS 16, iPadOS 16, or macOS 13. It's also important to note that the beta firmware is only available for the second-generation AirPods, the third-generation AirPods, AirPods Pro, and AirPods Max.
AirPods beta firmware cannot be removed manually
The first-generation AirPods haven't received the update, at least not yet. It remains unclear what the update brings beyond "auto-switching improvements." iOS 16 introduces a new feature called "Personalized Spatial Audio," which uses the iPhone's TrueDepth camera to create a "personal profile" for Spatial Audio—so perhaps the new AirPods beta firmware is related to this feature. Last year, Apple released a beta firmware for the AirPods that enabled Spatial Audio for FaceTime and ambient noise cancellation for users with the iOS 15 beta. However, as with the previous beta, there's no way to downgrade to older firmware.
Once installed on your AirPods, the beta software cannot be removed. Your device will continue to run on this software until an updated non-beta software version is released. In the meantime, you will automatically receive any further beta software updates as long as you have enabled your AirPods to receive them using the installation steps below.
iOS 16 is currently available as beta software for developers via the Apple Developer website. A public beta version will be released next month and will be released to all users in the fall. Don't have AirPods yet? Then take a look in our Amazon storefront We have summarized all current models there. (Photo by Unsplash / Akhil Yerabati)
