There aren’t AirPods with cameras yet and I hope it stays that way

Apple’s September hardware event brought a number of expected product updates — including a new foldable iPhone Duo, refreshed iPhone 18 Pro models, and Active Noise Cancellation for the base AirPods 5 — but it did not include the much-discussed AirPods Pro with cameras. According to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, those camera-equipped earbuds have been pushed back to 2027. The absence drew relief from some commentators who had flagged privacy and practical concerns.

Privacy worries center on putting cameras into devices that people wear constantly and often invisibly. Critics argue that small recording indicators on glasses or earbuds do little to reassure bystanders, and past examples of wearable cameras show users can hide their recording intentions. While recording in public is generally legal in the US, commentators describe how the behavior can still feel invasive, especially if earbuds allow unnoticed capture in sensitive situations.

Rumors suggest any cameras in future AirPods would be low-resolution and intended to feed visual-processing features rather than to capture shareable photos or videos. Proposed use cases include helping Siri provide turn-by-turn directions or identifying text and objects. Apple’s newly announced Audio Intelligence for the Watch was presented with documentation stating audio is not stored or accessible and that summaries created for Siri Recap are not readable by Apple and are end-to-end encrypted — a possible parallel for how the company might handle visual data if it ships.

Beyond privacy, there are technical and practical questions: cameras rely on having a clear line of sight, which could be blocked by a user’s hair, hoods, or jewelry, potentially limiting usefulness and raising design challenges. Some commentators suggest the reported 2027 delay could give Apple time to address those problems or distance the product from the fraught public reaction to other camera-equipped wearables. Advocates note potential accessibility benefits, such as improving situational awareness for people with low vision, aiding lip reading for the hard of hearing, or using visual cues to better focus microphones on conversation partners.

Even with possible benefits, the debate remains whether users and the public can trust companies to collect and use continuous sensor data responsibly. The Verge author John Higgins said the lack of an announcement was welcome and expressed hope the camera-equipped AirPods never arrive, while also noting Apple’s move into sensor-driven features makes further developments likely.