Powerbeats Pro 2: The Best Compromise

Four years ago, I reviewed the Powerbeats Pro — Apple’s flagship wireless workout earbuds. I came away from that review mightily impressed, calling them “the best earbuds I have ever tried.” Evidently, I haven’t tried enough earbuds. Still, I really liked the snug fit of the ear hooks, the overall sound quality and the battery life. Aside from an unwieldy charging case, my biggest issue with the OG Powerbeats Pro was their lack of active noise cancellation (ANC). Enter their successor, the Powerbeats Pro 2.

In the six years between the 2019 release of the Powerbeats Pro and the 2025 release of the Powerbeats Pro 2, a lot changed in the wireless earbud space. Features like ANC, spatial audio, health tracking and wireless charging moved into the mainstream. The Powerbeats Pro 2 adopts all these features and more. I’ve owned my pair for 7 months, and I think they strike the best balance of passable ANC, good sound quality and health features at their current $200 sale price. At their $250 MSRP, competition is more fierce, which I’ll delve into later.

The Powerbeats Pro 2 ships with four sets of eartips, on top of the medium size which comes pre-installed on the earbuds. They’re available in just four colors: purple, black, orange and beige — I really like the purple color, hence why I bought it. That is a decrease from the eight colors that were available on the original Powerbeats Pro, ditching colors like red, yellow and green that were previously available — they really spoiled us with the colors on the original. Still, the Powerbeats Pro 2 has more color options than ear-hook competitors like the JBL Endurance Peak 3 and Anker Soundcore Sport X20.

Compared to the original, the Powerbeats Pro 2 adds ANC, transparency mode, built-in heart rate monitoring that works across several fitness apps, USB-C and wireless charging, personalized spatial audio, a much smaller charging case, a lighter weight, and marginally better battery life. They have the same IPX4 sweat and water resistance as the original Powerbeats Pro. They lack some features of Apple’s AirPods Pro 3, such as adaptive audio (adjusts ANC based on surroundings), conversation awareness mode (lowers music volume during a conversation), live translation, and hearing aid capability.

What the Powerbeats Pro 2 lacks in features — despite costing the same as the AirPods Pro 3 — it makes up for in fit. If you saw my review of the original Powerbeats Pro, I might sound like a broken record, but these will not fall out of your ears. I’ve used these earbuds for running, setting PRs at the gym, HIIT workouts and playing basketball, and I’ve never worried that they would fall out of my ears. Sure, I haven’t tried the AirPods Pro 3, but I’ve tried other earbuds, and the only earbud designs where I never have to worry are the wing-tip design of the Beats Fit Pro and the ear-hook design of the Powerbeats Pro series. The Powerbeats Pro 2 is not the only pair of earbuds to feature this design, but it remains in my eyes the key selling point of these earbuds.

A slight aside — another reason I like the Powerbeats Pro 2 is that it finally passes the glasses test! When I reviewed the OGs, I advised against wearing them with glasses. Not so with the second generation. Simply place the ends of your glasses on top of the ear hooks — or even more comfortable, behind them — and the sound quality remains the same.

In terms of physical controls, each earbud comes with a convenient volume rocker with satisfying clicks. Each bud also has a button on the side with a Beats logo. By default, a single press toggles play/pause, a double press skips to the next track and a triple press plays the previous track. Pressing and holding the Beats button on either side switches between ANC and transparency mode. Press the Beats button once to answer a phone call, twice to decline it and twice to end it. You can change the press and hold functions and call controls in Settings.

Keeping with tradition, the Powerbeats Pro 2 is compatible with Find My. If you misplace the earbuds outside the case, Bluetooth has to be on and connected to make the earbuds play a loud sound. However, directions to the buds still work with Bluetooth off, and with the buds in the case.

If you’re on Android, you’ll have to download the Beats app to control your buds. Personalized spatial audio, hands-free Siri and audio sharing don’t work on Android, but you can still locate them using Find My Beats in the Beats app. Heart rate monitoring also works on Android, but you have to manually start each session.

A big reason I emphasize the airtight fit of the Powerbeats is that they don’t sound like $250 earbuds. There isn’t anything particularly wrong with the sound profile. It’s pretty balanced overall, but it varies based on whether ANC is enabled. Interestingly, the sound profile is most balanced with ANC on — not super bass-heavy like past Beats — but it can sound tinny and hollow at times. With ANC off, however, the low-mids and bass become more prominent. I prefer how the buds sound with ANC enabled.

Speaking of ANC, I’ve seen plenty of other reviews raving about the ANC performance of the Powerbeats Pro 2 — but I’m not entirely convinced. When I go to the gym — a noisy environment — I choose to wear my over-ear headphones instead. The Powerbeats Pro 2 doesn’t reject as much sound as I’d like, and the aging Beats Fit Pro did a better job. Passive noise isolation is also not stellar, but transparency mode is very good.

The EQ situation on the Powerbeats Pro 2 is complicated. Like with all of Apple’s headphone offerings, there are no readily available custom EQ settings for the Powerbeats Pro 2. The Apple Music app has some genre-specific EQ modes, but that’s only while you’re in the app. However, if you go to “Headphone Accomodations” under “Accessibility” settings, it is remarkably easy to tune your earbuds. If you’re an audio engineer or an EQ expert, though, the process to adjust the sound profile for accessibility will probably not satisfy you, as it is clearly tailored for novices. Personally, I’m keeping the stock sound settings.

The earbuds also have some nifty features. With adaptive EQ, they analyze their own fit and seal and adjust frequencies in real-time. It’s difficult to fully appreciate or evaluate the effects of this, but I have noticed that the sound profile is very consistent. This could be due to the adaptive EQ, or it could be placebo. One feature Beats is pushing hard is personalized spatial audio with dynamic head tracking — basically virtual surround sound that makes it sound like the audio is coming from your device even as you turn your head. Automatic ear detection must be enabled to use personalized spatial audio. It sounds great in theory, but in reality, much of the supported content is paywalled. The Powerbeats Pro 2 also allows you to turn stereo audio into spatial audio with the “Spatialize Stereo” feature, though I haven’t gotten this feature to work. Support and use cases for these features might improve in the future, but I wouldn’t choose a pair of earbuds solely for these features today.

The microphone quality on the Powerbeats Pro 2 is pretty solid. I tested it against the built-in mic on the Bose QuietComfort wireless headphones and the iPhone 17’s mic in Voice Memos. Based on my testing, as well as other reviews, it seems on par with other flagship wireless earbuds. In my ambient noise test, the Beats also performed pretty well. The audio became a bit choppier with wind noise playing loudly in the background, but my voice remained clear overall — a huge step up from the original Powerbeats Pro, and from all previous-gen earbuds for that matter.

Last but not least, let’s talk battery life. Apple claims 10 hours outside the case and 45 hours in total with ANC off. With ANC on, Apple claims 8 hours of continuous battery life and 36 hours total with the case. Surprisingly, I found Apple’s battery claims to be pretty accurate. In fact, in my 7 months of ownership, I’ve used the Powerbeats Pro 2 multiple times from 100% down to empty in one sitting, and 8 hours is about what I get. As for the 40-ish total hours with the case, I haven’t tested that, but I’ll note that the earbuds seem to charge pretty quickly in their case. The battery performance outside the case actually falls just short of the original Powerbeats Pro, but is more than enough for most users, while the listening time with the case is almost double the original. Not too shabby.

When I bought the Powerbeats Pro 2 in May, I forked over the full $250 price tag. At that price, they do not deliver sound quality that matches similarly-priced earbuds like the Sennheiser Momentum 4 or Bose QuietComfort Ultra 2nd Gen. If you’re not interested in the snug-fitting ear-hook design, you should look elsewhere for optimal sound quality and ANC. But at their current sale price of $200, I can’t help but recommend them.

The bottom line is that the Powerbeats Pro 2 is probably the best pair of wireless earbuds for athletes. It’s not the best sound for $250, or even for $200, but as an athlete myself, I’d pay a lot for the peace of mind that my earbuds will never fall out of my ears, and my music will never stop playing when I need it to finish a set. I really don’t know why more companies don’t try the ear-hook design. If Bose made a “QuietComfort Sport” model with the ANC performance of the QuietComfort series and the ear-hook design of the Beats, I’d recommend the Bose instead. The reality, though, is that the only name-brand ear-hook competition comes from JBL and Anker Soundcore, and for less than half the price. There is no premium ear-hook option priced above the PowerBeats Pro 2, so you can’t really have the ultimate best-of-both worlds experience. That experience doesn’t exist right now. Sure, you could buy two separate pairs of earbuds — one for workouts and one with better sound quality for everyday life — but not for $200.

The PowerBeats Pro 2 is not perfect, then. The sound quality is good, but it’s not the best for the price. If you want superb sound quality and ANC above all else, these are not for you. Like the best things in life, it’s a bit of a compromise. But if you’re an athlete and you can't work out without your tunes, it’s a pretty good one to make.