First off, I have to admit despite the short time I’ve been using the AirPods I’ve already come to love them. So with that out of the way, lets get into the detail;Design and build quality?

As you’ll likely know by now, the AirPods look exactly like a traditional pair of Apple earbuds with the exception of (any) wires that cut off abruptly a couple of inches below the bud.

It’s certainly an odd look, and one that people can’t seem to be able to stop themselves glancing over, almost with a ‘double-take’. Essentially the buds dangle down from your ears and if I had to make a comparison, they almost look like the detachable heads from an electric toothbrush. I appreciate I’m not painting a great aesthetic picture so far, but trust me when I say – they’re comfortable; well, that is if you believe the freebie wired versions that come with the iPhone are. For me, that’s a yes.

It’s worth noting that there aren’t any physical media controls on the AirPods and Apple currently only provides two options for the ‘double-tap’ command. You can play/pause or invoke Siri. This is a little disappointing, as I really have no desire (in public or otherwise) to ask Siri to turn the volume up or skip to the next track, so I hope this will change soon with a firmware update. Oh, as an aside, if you’re an Apple Watch owner, you can control these functions and more directly through the music or ‘now playing’ app.

The AirPods come with a little charging case which in my opinion strangely resembles a tooth floss box (is there a theme here what with the toothbrush style headphones?), which extends their time away from the mains. They’re good for around five hours themselves, but you can then pop them back into the case and they’ll top themselves up with quick-charging technology. After using for some time now, I’m happy to report that the case itself offers around 24 hours of battery life before it’ll require charging.

Charging aside, the case is small enough to fit in most small compartments of jean pockets, so easy to have on you all the time, but the best thing about it is that when you flip open the case, a Bluetooth connection will automatically be initiated with your iPhone (assuming it has iOS 10 or later). This auto-pairing is really impressive, convenient and down to what Apple call their W1 chip technology. It works a bit like NFC; hold the case near a compatible device and hey presto, connected magic. Once connected, if you’re in range of your other iCloud devices, they just appear already and you can seamlessly transfer between devices.

The AirPods can detect when the earphones are being taken out of your ears thanks to built in optical sensors and motion accelerometers and will pause your music when doing so. It’s a handy feature and works across music apps (not just Apple), video including YouTube, but doesn’t most importantly pause or drop the connection should you take one of them out during a phone call. Once you pop them back in, everything just starts playing again.

Whilst on the subject of calls, this was an extremely important feature for me, and I’m happy to confirm that call quality (for both me and the recipient) is great. Most people I asked didn’t realise I was using a Bluetooth set, or indeed any headphones at all.

Overall, I’m very impressed with Apple’s AirPods. Sound quality is great, the auto play/pause function works impressively and call quality is up there with the best. So long as you can put up with glances from people when wearing them, I’d definitely recommend.