Apple will sell single replacements for their stupid airbuds because they know we’ll lose them

Courage.

That was the slightly wiffy explanation Apple gave for removing the headphone jack from the new iPhone. In its place, Apple users will now have one of three options if they want to listen to music on their £599 smartphone. There's a Lightning-compatible pair of EarPods that come included with the phone, as well as a slightly counter-intuitive free dongle to connect old, analog headphones to the device But real, Charlie Bananas option for iPhone users is to opt for a pair of wireless Bluetooth headphone buds dubbed AirPods. https://twitter.com/LanceUlanoff/status/773588912996438016 Courage. You'd have to be sodding courageous to don Airpods, such is the risk of losing the $159 device. https://twitter.com/SavionWright/status/773631635262627840 https://twitter.com/IHLaking/status/773634993499222016 But in a... philanthropic move, Apple have shown they understand that AirPods could be easy to lose, so they're offering to sell individual replacements "through normal service channels". As Mashable reports, if you find yourself losing one of the pods, you can pick another one up... for a price. How much? Well we're not sure yet. Mashable have done the maths though and reckon...

Going off the total AirPods price, which includes two earbuds, the charging case and a Lightning cable, we hope each one is no more than $55 per earbud ($110 for a pair of earbuds + $30 for the case + $20 for the Lightning cable = $160 total).

So around £40-£50 if you lose an earbud. Not a problem. We think. Read more...