The BeatsX earphones have been showing up briefly in stock for in-store pickup today at various stores across the United States on Apple’s Online Store tracker. However, the availability quickly turns back to currently unavailable and the ‘Add To Bag’ button for purchase remains grayed out.
The Best Buy website has also changed to an option to ‘check stores’, rather than an out of stock notice. Whilst the stock weirdness may suggest that a launch is imminent, perhaps later this week, it does not seem like they will be launching today.
The BeatsX headphones round out the set of announced W1 products, joining the PowerBeats 3, the Beats Solo3 headphones and the truly wireless Apple AirPods. Unveiled in September, the BeatsX were first announced to be available before the end of 2016. However, they were inexplicably delayed to this month at the same time when the Apple AirPods started shipping.
The BeatsX earbuds are connected by a cord, which means they can be left hanging round your neck when out of use. They connect wirelessly to Bluetooth devices for music playback and feature the Apple W1 chip for seamless one-step pairing to an iPhone. The pairing configuration will then sync via iCloud to other Apple Watch, Mac and iPad devices you own.
BeatsX tout eight hours of battery life, with a five-minute Fast Fuel charge for a quick 2 hours of playback, and charge via an integrated Lighting port. When they launch, BeatsX will go on sale for $149 — $10 cheaper than Apple AirPods.
We’ll keep watching the store and will let you know when the BeatsX go on sale for real …
