Wired earbuds are making a massive comeback, and they beat AirPods in 5 key ways

Published Oct 24, 2026, 11:00 AM EDT Tyler is an journalist and content contributor at How-To Geek with over three years of experience covering the automotive and tech industries. His work focuses on delivering clear, well-researched, and engaging content that helps readers better understand the vehicles they drive and the technology that they use everyday. Before entering automotive media, he spent five years as an academic editor, developing a strong foundation in research methodology, factual accuracy, and structured analysis. This background informs his journalistic approach today, ensuring that every article balances technical insight with accessibility for a broad audience. Wired earpods have become quite trendy right now. The shift back to this somewhat retro technology is fueled by celebrities being spotted ditching wireless AirPods for wired earphones. They've become pretty fashionable, with stars like Harry Styles, Zendaya, and Bella Hadid turning them into cool accessories that the masses want to copy. Beyond fashion and trends, there are actually quite a lot of ways that wired earphones just make more sense than wireless options like AirPods. The most important metrics for good earphones are practicality, affordability, and audio quality, and people are starting to realize that wireless earphones lose in just about every area. Some brands have already started to put out new wired products. Wired earbuds never run out of battery One less device to keep charged It is so frustrating how many devices in our lives nowadays need to be charged. This is perhaps the most annoying thing about wireless earphones, like AirPods. When fully charged, they can last quite a long time, but when you're on the move a lot, it's pretty easy to forget to charge them after a long day of use. This is especially true when they're only one of a plethora of things that you need to keep charged. This is obviously one of the biggest benefits of wired headphones. You just plug them in, and they work, powered directly by your phone. Yes, it is true that you can't really listen to music and charge your modern smartphone at the same time without some sort of splitter, but I'd rather carry around an adapter when traveling than worry about everything being charged. This also means that your phone's battery is the only limiting factor for how long you can use your earphones. They deliver true lossless audio Audiophiles prefer a wired connection You don't even have to be an audiophile to be able to tell the difference between audio played over a Bluetooth connection and audio delivered via a wire. This is because using Bluetooth means that you're going into bandwidth limitations, meaning that audio is going to be compressed. If you want 100 percent of the integrity of the audio to be upheld, then your wireless AirPods just aren't going to cut it. Wired headphones inherently support lossless audio. A wired connection has the necessary bandwidth to transmit uncompressed signals, meaning a superior listening experience. AirPods Max are technically capable of lossless audio, but they need to be plugged in with a USB-C cable. There is practically zero latency when you use wired earbuds Wireless AirPods aren't suitable for every job If you're just listening to music or watching Netflix on your phone, then the latency that you experience with AirPods isn't really going to bother you. There are, however, plenty of other use cases where the latency of a wireless connection can cause issues. Using your AirPods with a Bluetooth connection when gaming, playing music, or editing videos can cause audio lag that can cause some genuine problems. With a wired connection, however, latency is practically nonexistent. Most wired headphones achieve a latency of under five milliseconds, which is imperceptible. For comparison, wireless AirPods have a latency of roughly 144ms to 274ms. Wired earbuds work with just about everything No compatibility issues One of my problems with wireless earphones, including AirPods, is that they aren't universally compatible. For instance, using AirPods on anything other than an Apple device means that you miss out on certain features. If you're someone who likes to use your earphones when gaming on your console, or you have older devices that simply don't support a Bluetooth connection, then you're going to run into issues. The beauty of wired headphones is that they work on practically any device. If your device doesn't have the right port, you can also be sure there is a cheap adapter that will fix the problem. Your one set of wired earphones can be used for literally everything. No battery means that wired earbuds can last practically forever Less e-waste is always a good thing Because AirPods rely on a battery, they have a pretty set lifespan. Over time, your AirPods' battery life will get progressively worse. Batteries can only be cycled so many times, so at some point they will no longer hold a useful charge. Most AirPods are rated for 300 to 500 charge cycles, which means about two to three years of life. This extends the first point, but because wired earpods have no battery, you can use them essentially forever as long as you take care of them. Even at worst, a pair of good-quality wired earphones will easily outlast a pair of AirPods. The return of wired earpods is more than just a trend Back when Steve Jobs was at the head of Apple, the brand used to focus on simple, user-friendly technology. Unfortunately, things have changed, and consumers are noticing. Sure, the return to wired earphones right now might be driven by trends, but it shows that simple, frictionless technology will always be the best answer. It just works.