The AirPods with Eyes Might Be on Ice

A brief report from a somewhat reliable leaker has raised new questions about whether Apple’s so-called “AirPods Ultra” will see the light of day anytime soon, even as code sleuths discover references to them in the iOS 27 developer betas.

It’s the latest bendy curve in Apple’s rumored road to AI wearables. Over the past few months, sources such as Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, The Information’s Wayne Ma, and analyst Ming-Chi Kuo have all pointed to Apple’s work on at least three camera-equipped wearables that could be used as eyes and ears for Apple’s AI features like Siri and Visual Intelligence. These include smart glasses, a mysterious AI ‘pendant’, and AirPods with cameras. However, it’s never been clear if Apple has simply been exploring these ideas in parallel or if it plans to release all three.

Still, we’ve been hearing about camera-equipped AirPods since 2024, when Kuo inferred the plans from his supply chain sources — although he surmised at the time they’d be used as accessories for the Vision Pro.

That probably made some sense in 2024, before Apple began its big push into Visual Intelligence, but in recent months, Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman has repeatedly pointed to these being AI wearables, going so far as to call them “AirPods for AI.” To be clear, he doesn’t suggest that this will be the actual product name, but it’s as good a placeholder as any for now, since we’re getting tired of hearing the “Ultra” moniker thrown around for everything else, from iPhones to MacBooks.

While Apple’s first AI wearables were initially expected to arrive in late 2026 or early 2027 — and the AirPods themselves are said to be in advanced testing — Gurman reported last month that they won’t be coming until later next year, possibly as part of an AI wearable hit parade to accompany the iPhone’s 20th anniversary.

However, it now looks like they might be even further off. Earlier today, a leaker and prototype collector who goes by the handle “Kosutami,” posted the single word “Suspended” in a follow-up to earlier tweets that had obliquely pointed to Apple’s work on the new AirPods.

Kosutami has a habit of making brief proclamations like this, but the meaning seems pretty clear. The leaker has a reasonable track record, but it’s still worth taking this with a grain of salt.

Although Gurman hasn’t weighed in on the veracity of this latest comment, it doesn’t directly contradict what he’s shared previously. In May, sources said that Apple might delay the launch of the AirPods if it couldn’t get them working to its satisfaction, and the shift from late 2026 to late 2027 could imply Apple ran into some problems that might have eventually forced it to shelve the whole project and focus on other things.

Ironically, Kosutami’s post came only hours before developer Sam Henri Gold shared a code snippet from the iOS 27 beta that points to new Visual Intelligence hardware that would use alternating cameras on either side of the user’s head. While that could loosely describe smart glasses, it certainly seems like what we’ve heard about Apple’s work on “AirPods for AI.”

Those code findings don’t really prove anything conclusive, though. It stands to reason that Apple is working on code to support a variety of AI wearables, so it may not be exclusively for the “AirPods for AI.” Plus, if Apple only suspended this project very recently, it’s totally understandable that code artifacts would be found lingering in the iOS 27 developer betas.

[The information provided in this article has NOT been confirmed by Apple and may be speculation. Provided details may not be factual. Take all rumors, tech or otherwise, with a grain of salt.]