Apple AirPods Might Hit Store Shelves As Soon As Next Week, Evidence Suggests

For those of us waiting to get our hands on Apple’s new AirPods, the news that they might rollout in early 2017 was certainly not music to our ears. Well, now there’s a chance we could see AirPods released sooner than that.

An employee at Conrad — an online electronics retailer and Apple product reseller — has reportedly dropped a solid date when they’ll have AirPods in stock: November 17. The news comes from a German blog called Apfelpage.de. Below is a loosely translated quote.

“Hello, I have just talked with an employee of the Conrad Online Store, since I am there’d on 14.10 the AirPods ordered and I wanted to cancel today. According to information from the employee, they have stockpiles from 17.11, I will then have them between November 18-19,” the blog post said.

Cupertino first unveiled its new wireless headphones at it Sept. 7 keynote event, alongside the announcement of the company’s newest flagship iPhone 7 lineup — which, as we all know now, lacks a headphone jack, which could be easily remedied with a pair of AirPods. According to Apple, AirPods will last 5 hours on a charge, and will be able to pump out high-quality audio through a “seamless and automatic connection.”

Apple’s AirPods were originally due to be released sometime in October. When that didn’t happen, Apple announced that they needed to get the product right before releasing it to the public. Around the same time, news coming out of China suggested that Apple’s manufacturing partner would be shipping out AirPods in January 2017 — meaning that consumers wouldn’t be able to purchase them during the holiday season. For many, that seems a bit late — especially when Apple stores have already started receiving demo AirPods at their brick-and-mortar locations.

A word of warning, of course. This rumor is purely anecdotal. There’s always the possibility that it’s not true, or even that the Conrad employee was mistaken. Still, at least there is some hope that we’ll be able to get our hands on a set of AirPods before the holidays roll around.

Featured Image: Stuff.TV

[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.]