Apple AirPods Max vs Surface Headphones 2: Which headphones should you buy?

Surface Sounds

Surface Headphones 2

Apple tree's all-time

Apple AirPods Max

Airpods Max

Microsoft'southward latest headphones are incredibly impressive, with excellent battery life, a superb design and sound, and congenital-in voice features while cutting the asking cost quite significantly over its predecessor and certainly compared to Apple.

$250 at Microsoft

Pros

Fantabulous build quality and sound
Very comfortable
USB-C with fast charge
More affordable
Included carry case

Cons

Quite chunky.
Average maximum battery life

Apple tree'southward kickoff own-brand over-ear headphones talk a large game. They too accept an eye-watering toll tag to go with it. For non-Apple fans, information technology makes it hard to recommend.

$549 at Apple

Pros

Plenty of colors
Good design
Promise of amazing sound
On-ear controls
Included carry case

Cons

Very expensive
Lesser features on not-Apple devices
Boilerplate maximum battery life

Shunning the Beats brand this fourth dimension around and going with AirPods, the somewhat confusingly named AirPods Max will certainly be a quality product with excellent sound quality. But with bombardment life on par with the Surface Headphones ii, which too sound great and boast ANC, is Apple really worth $300 more of your coin than Microsoft? Unless yous're a fan, probably non.

Microsoft vs Apple

Surface Headphones 2 Black Source: Daniel Rubino / Windows Central

Both Microsoft and Apple discover themselves in the high-cease headphones marketplace. Of the ii, Apple tree usually puts out headphones under its Beats make, which has massive identity and appeal. But the company has much more than experience in creating audio products.

Nevertheless, the AirPods Max certainly are not a regular pair of Beats Headphones, not least considering of that $549 price tag.

Microsoft, on the other mitt, has now launched only its 2d generation of Surface Headphones. Rather than attempting to redesign the product completely, Microsoft simply refined the original model significantly while chopping a massive chunk off the asking cost.

What we stop up with is both Apple and Microsoft producing high-quality headphones, though the terminal discussion on the AirPods Max audio and ANC quality volition take to be reserved until they're on people's ears.

	Surface Headphones 2	AirPods Max
Noise cancellation	Active	Active
Battery life	Up to 20 hours (with ANC, Bluetooth, and voice-enabled)	Up to 20 hours (with ANC)
Charging port	USB-C Fast charge	Lightning
Toll	$250	$549

We do, of grade, know all about the Surface Headphones 2 and feel confident recommending them. Yous may well find better overall sound quality and ANC elsewhere, but they're excellent indeed as a complete parcel. And it doesn't matter whether you apply them with Android, iOS, or Windows; you'll get the same feature set. The same cannot be said of the AirPods Max.

It's hard to recommend to anyone that they should definitely spend an additional $300 on a like product, and honestly, will the AirPods Max truly audio $300 better? Probably not, but then if y'all have a budget for $549 headphones, are you necessarily concerned?

A great all-rounder

The Surface Headphones 2 are undoubtedly worthy contenders against the likes of Apple, Sony, and Bose. The latest model is a definite comeback, and you accept a loftier-finish pair of ANC headphones to employ with any device at a pretty attractive cost. If yous're not entrenched in Apple's ecosystem, or you lot'd like to save a serious amount of cash, they're the ones to get.

Superb value

Surface Headphones 2

The hard second album comes off with flying colors

Microsoft put its Surface design and build quality into a pair of headphones, tossed in vocalization actions and ANC, and fabricated something your ears will dear. And at less than half the price of the AirPods Max.

Time volition tell

There'southward no doubting that the AirPods Max is going to exist a quality product, and if the pre-order shipping dates are anything to go by, and so already people are flocking to buy. Simply $549 is a lot to ask for whatever headphones, no affair how skillful the audio. And when the Surface Headphones cost $300 less while offering similar battery life and features, is that money you lot're happy to spend? Merely fourth dimension will tell truly how proficient they are, but for non-Apple tree fans, it'southward a tough recommendation to brand.

Worth the wait?

Airpods Max

AirPods Max

High-fidelity audio

Yous can purchase a pair of AirPods Max in 5 different colors, space gray, silverish, green, sky bluish, and pinkish, merely with an eye-watering price tag, this is a serious investment.

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