The Beats Studio Buds were the brand’s first compact true wireless earbuds and not only delivered a cheaper alternative to the Apple AirPods Pro with similar specs, but they were also Android-friendly. Almost a year after their debut, Beats is rolling out some new colorway options for the Studio Buds, as well as some new features for Android users.
Although the Beats Studio Buds don’t include either the W1 chip used by the original Apple AirPods, or the H1 chip used by newer models including the AirPods Pro (which means they lack the ability to automatically pause your music when removed from your ears, multi-device connectivity, and location tracking) they still offer easy pairing with both iOS and Android devices using Android’s Fast Pairing. You just open the lid, place the Studio Buds near your device, and a pop-up pairing message appears on-screen. They also offered ANC at a very competitive $US150 ($208), and while the case skipped wireless charging, it was USB-C compatible instead of requiring a Lightning charging cable like the AirPods do.
The Beats Studio Buds have been available in red, black, and white colour options since day one, but starting tomorrow three new colours are being introduced: Sunset Pink, Ocean Blue, and Moon Grey. All three colours will be available from Apple’s online and brick-and-mortar stores, but Moon Grey will be an Amazon exclusive, Ocean Blue will only be available from Best Buy, and Sunset Pink will be found at Target.
Beats Studio Buds users on iOS have easy access to customisation controls for the earbuds through their device’s Bluetooth settings, but Android users have to download and use the Beats Android app to make changes to on-bud shortcuts and other tweaks. Today, Beats also announced an update to its Android app with added support for widgets making it easier for users to quickly access earbud customisation options and battery life details. The update also adds a “Locate My Beats” feature that allows users to see the last known location of their earbuds using Apple Maps as an alternative to Google’s Find My Device that’s offered the same functionality since launch but uses the Google Maps platform instead.