Without comparing them to the PowerBeats Pro it’s kind of a wash of a comparison.

AirPods are my favorite phone call headphones but they’re not good at doing much more than that, and the fact that they’re so small and accessible.

As soon as you find out how bad AirPods and other non-isolating earbuds can be for your ears when you’re around loud sounds, turning up the music to compensate, you’ll reach the inevitable conclusion that different headphones are needed for different situations. All-around headphones do not and never will exist.

For proper noise cancelling headphones, you can get the Sony WN-H900N headphones (Wirecutter’s pick) for around $100 in like new open box condition on eBay. They’re an absolute steal, and I can’t believe I rode the train and plane so long without them.

The only other situations that need different headphones are probably working out and making quick phone calls, or other situations where over ear headphones are too big. The PowerBeats Pro are definitely better than the AirPods for working out.

You can hear your own voice best in AirPods but for every other situation the lack of sound isolation is a downside. The battery life is still too short and doing the left right charging jiggle gets old. The battery life of proper over ear headphones is basically longer than you can be awake.