Google has gone back to the drawing board with its Pro earbud and the result isn’t just an incremental update – there’s something more substantial going on here. The Pixel Buds Pro 2 have me excited, because it looks like Google finally has a pair of earbuds that will garner a new generation of fans – hopefully, with me included.
Google’s Pixel Buds have something of a checkered history. The first-generation of Pixel Buds were wired, launching in 2017 and replaced in 2019 by true wireless Pixel Buds in 2019. Google announced these saying they were designed to be more open and not cut you off from the world around you. I found that to be the biggest problem: I wanted to be isolated from the world around me.
The Pixel Buds A series followed, which were good value for money and finally, in 2022, the Pixel Buds Pro launched and things started to look a lot more positive.
Pixel Buds Pro 2 address the Buds’ biggest problem
The downside of the Pixel Buds Pro 2 was the physical size. Compared to many rivals, these are big units that you have to stuff in your ears. Google has addressed that, reducing the body by 27 per cent and reducing the weight by 24 per cent. That’s a great start.
IMAGE CREDIT: GOOGLE
The compact body size incorporates a “stabiliser” on the body, designed so that you can twist the bud to get it secure in your ear. This isn’t just a push fit, there’s now more to it. To come up with this design, Google analysed 45 million data points from ear scans so that the Pixel Buds Pro 2 will give an optimal fit to the most users.
The Buds Pro 2 retain the silicone ear tip for isolation, but there’s now less physical bulk and that should improve the experience.
New Tensor A1 chip makes the good, better
Packed into these new headphones is new hardware, looking to improve the performance. Let’s reflect on the performance of the headphones they replace: the sound quality of the Pixel Buds Pro is good but nothing to get excited about; the active noise cancellation is decent, but not class leading; the battery life is great at 7 hours with ANC turned on.
The new chip claims to deliver twice the ANC performance of the previous generation and that has me excited, because honestly, the old Pixel Buds Pro are ok. Getting more control over noise cancellation will be most welcome.
IMAGE CREDIT: GOOGLE
The acoustic architecture has been boosted, with a new high-frequency chamber to boost treble. There’s also a separation between the audio processing and the ANC processing, so there shouldn’t be any interference between the two. There’s no information on what Bluetooth codecs are supported, but this was a weakness of the previous version. Fingers crossed there will be greater support for higher quality formats.
Despite being smaller, the battery life with ANC on is now said to be 8 hours – so you’re getting more for less, which is always great to see.
I’m a lot less excited about Gemini
The things I have covered so far have me excited, but I’m a little more anxious about Google’s assertion that these are “made for the Gemini era”. One thing I haven’t mentioned so far is the Google Assistant experience of the original Buds Pro. I found it to be slow, annoying and inconsistent. What started out as a clever premise, piping a lot more information into your ears thanks to Google Assistant, I eventually turned off. It was just too irritating.
IMAGE CREDIT: GOOGLE
When it comes to voice assistants, I haven’t really been impressed with the latest generation of AI versions. I tried talking to ChatGPT on the Nothing Ear (a) and it was painful. Gemini has also been limited so far – the inability to control music makes it a non-starter, because one of the things I need the most from a voice assistant on my headphones … is music.
Google says that the Pixel Buds Pro 2 will offer Gemini Live, which will bring a conversational experience with AI, so you can talk about “new ideas or practice for an important conversation”. I don’t want to be that guy, but perhaps you can use your Buds to call someone and speak to an actual human being instead?
The Pixel Buds Pro 2 will cost £219 and will be hitting retailers towards the end of September.
