Finding an affordable analogue of AirPods that could work fine with Android, and not just with iOS, has been almost the meaning of life for many lately. Despite the fact that many manufacturers have already launched their own TWS headphones, similar to the original from Apple, no one has yet managed to come close to the popularity of AirPods even by a tenth. After all, if someone produces cheap headphones, they invariably turn out to be a complete slag, and an expensive copy is clearly not the product that will be popular. However, Realme tried to accommodate both of these factors and released their Realme Buds Air.
An almost complete copy. Is not it?
When I first saw the Buds Air, I immediately decided it was AirPods. After all, both the headphones themselves and the charging case look almost identical to the original. Therefore, if you do not look closely to the details, you can consider the headphones for real. Needless to say, if the inside of the Buds Air is equipped with a similar sensor as the AirPods, which detects whether the headphones are on or off, and they are controlled by gestures on the touch panel on the bow.
Analog AirPods for Android
Try to distinguish Buds Air from AirPods
Most likely, the designers Realme were too lazy to create something from scratch, and they made a compromise by sketching the contours from AirPods. And so that it would not be so striking, they made a number of small changes to the design:
- If the AirPods had two technical holes on the back – rounded and oval – then Buds Air has only one and is noticeably smaller in size than the original;
- The AirPods have silver-colored wrap tips, while the Buds Air from Realme uses a thin bezel in the same shade, although the shape of the Chinese headphones is exactly the same as the original;
- If the AirPods case has a control button on the back, then Buds Air has it in front – obviously, this was done for convenience, since in this case the thumb rests anatomically comfortably on this element.
That seems to be all. There are not so many changes, and all of them are so insignificant that, I am sure, if an ordinary user is given the original and the Chinese product and the logos are closed, he will hardly be able to distinguish one from the other. However, in terms of internal execution, there are much more differences.
TWS headphones like AirPods
Realme The Buds Air uses the same design as the AirPods. It is obvious
At the heart of Buds Air is the R1 processor, which is responsible for fast connection via Bluetooth, saving battery life and synchronous operation of the headphones. The last aspect is very important, because, as we know, the original AirPods were delayed precisely because Apple could not make them sound in tune with each other. It's a pity that the default battery life of the earbuds is 3 hours, and when charging from the included case – another 17 hours, versus 4 and 24 hours, respectively, for AirPods.
Buds Air supports a unique mode, which in Realme for some reason is called the game mode. Its essence is to reduce the latency in audio processing by 51% and deliver the actual audio picture to the user as timely as possible. This is a rather strange mechanism, because if headphones can work with less latency, why increase it in normal mode? Unclear. Perhaps the whole point is that the gaming mode consumes more power, and the manufacturer expects that the smartphone will be discharged earlier than the headphones, but given the capacity of modern batteries, I would not hope so.
Should you buy copies of AirPods
Buds Air can be bought if you are looking for inexpensive TWS earbuds for Android
By default, the complete case is charged via USB-C, but it also supports wireless charging. Despite the fact that AirPods 2 also support the Qi standard and allow you to charge the case wirelessly, I suggest remembering that headphones cost from Apple – 17 thousand rubles, while Buds Air – less than 5 thousand. The brainchild of the Chinese confirms that technology can be inexpensive. The main thing is to use them correctly.
Buds Air from Realme is another attempt to create an analog of AirPods for Android. In my opinion, it is more successful than what other manufacturers have tried to do for two reasons. The first is, oddly enough, honesty. Realme honestly made it clear to us that this is not a rethinking of the original idea, but a banal copying. It just turned out that the cost of AirPods, if you remove the apple logo from them, will be 3 times cheaper. The second reason flows smoothly from the first. Of course, this is the price. For 4990 rubles, for which Realme is going to sell headphones in Russia, this is an excellent solution. I don't know how they will sound, but it's useless to argue with the fact that this is a real and, most importantly, a cheap analogue of AirPods.