Teardowns of new AirPods show no major repairability gains | Infinium-tech

Apple announced its AirPods 4 and AirPods Max with USB-C last month, and the team is over iFixt Have now shared their tears.

In short, neither of the new AirPods offer improvements in terms of repairability. The smaller AirPods 4 require a special jig holder that holds them in place while a heat gun helps open the top half of the buds by loosening the adhesive.

AirPods 4 torn apart (iFixit)

We can then see the speaker and battery components surrounded by a pile of glue.

Opening the bottom of the stem is much more challenging and requires a knife to cut the stem. The only difference between the AirPods 4 and the AirPods 4 with ANC is the larger internal microphone.

The charging case is also difficult to open and requires a lot of heat and probing before you can access the components inside. It is also really difficult to take out the 345mAh battery inside the case as it does not come with a pull-tab. All these factors leave the AirPods 4 with a provisional repairability score 0 out of 10,

Repairs to the new AirPods Max with USB-C are much more manageable but they still require a lot of heat and prying out components with a steady hand. Once inside the main components are the same as the first-generation AirPods Max, with a little more glue to hold the components in place and a USB-C charging port in place of the Lightning connector.

AirPods Max with USB-C get provisional repairability score 6 out of 10,