OPINION : I must admit , when theAirPods Maxwere first launched , I thought they were a hugely expensive fashion supplement masquerade as a dyad of headphones .

They looked odd , come with a charging fount that offered little protection , offered no how-do-you-do - Re audio support , did the common matter of only playing nice within the Apple ecosystem and , of course , that optic - watering price . Surely the AirPods Max would fall to the same fate as the originalHomePod .

How wrong I was .

When I ’m walk around London , or transpose on public transportation , I tend to look at what phone people are wear . There are the common suspects : Bose QuietComfortmodels , Sony WH-1000X(from Mark 3 to Mk5 ) , the cheaper Sennheisers buttocks , Apple AirPods(and their true wireless imitator ) and many , many more beyond that . But over the last twelvemonth I have n’t seen a pair of headphones as often as I have the AirPods Max . Everywhere I seem , there ’s a person wearing them .

And it ’s a surprising turnaround , at least to me . When the AirPods Max first launched , they were scarcely usable . Even several month to a twelvemonth after they were uncommitted , you’re able to find articles online blab out about how much of a success they truly are since they were as rare as hen ’s teeth .

But success is n’t measured in weeks and months but – in the suit of the Max – it ’s years , a slow burn that ’s become more democratic among the Apple favouring contingent . And the most interesting aspect about it are the people wearing the headphones . Not your business lawsuit wearing types with great deal of money to burn but those who are much younger , people who search like they ’re in their early twenties or so . Perhaps it ’s a birthday present , maybe the headphone were a Christmas giving – I ’m just speculate here – but the AirPods Max are proving to be very attractive to the untried , and ostensibly affluent mart , who are happy to spend ( or have someone else spend ) over £ 500 on a pair of phone .

And it ’s such a marked conflict in terms of people ’s expectations on what they ’d spend on a twain of earphone . I ’ve let my friends listen to a pair ofBowers & Wilkins Px8headphones ( RRP £ 599 ) and asked them how much they think the headphone cost . All of them felt they would cost around £ 200 , three times less than what they cost . When it comes to electronics , people tend to think towards the cheap end of the spectrum : DVDs instead of 4 KB Blu - rays , £ 300 55 - in 4 K TVs rather of spending £ 1000 , £ 50 true wireless alternatively of £ 200 .

And the AirPods Max are something of a comeback to that , succeeding where the first HomePod fail – a product that ’s another case of tolerate from not being cheesy . Plenty of expensive earphone turned up before the AirPods Max ; Sennheiser and Beyerdynamic were trade deal of pricey wired headphones , while Bang & Olufsen and Bowers & Wilkins were not averse to charging a premium for their headphone .

But despite their pedigree and expertness in the sound recording market , Apple has essentially gazump them and crowbarred enter the mass market for wireless headphones . You have to give Apple lots of credit for doing that , and it aid that the AirPods have such a close partnership with the iPhone , that ’s very plain the not - so secret weapon that gives Apple an advantage .

It looks like Apple is on its way to inhibit over - ear headphones as it did in cannibalize sales in the rightful wireless food market . Who would have think that when you could have barely detect a brace for love nor money in 2020 ?