Chinese critics have been roasting Apple for the AirPods Max price tag

• The launch by Apple on Tuesday of the company’s new AirPods Max over-the-ear headphones has sparked widespread and sometimes incredulous criticism among users in one of Apple’s most important markets.
  
• Weibo, the Chinese microblogging site, has been flooded with comments about the headphones since Apple’s launch, many of which are criticisms of the AirPods Max price tag.
• The AirPods Max is available for preorder now for $549 and will ship to buyers on December 15th.

“Do these headphones cure deafness or what?”

That’s what one Weibo user wanted to know, facetiously, upon the launch by Apple on Tuesday of the AirPods Max, the iPhone maker’s first over-the-ear headphones that feature Adaptive EQ, Active Noise Cancellation, and spatial audio. It wasn’t because of those features that the product sparked tons of discussion across the Chinese microblogging site Weibo, however, among potential customers in one of Apple’s most important markets. No, the user in the comment above was specifically complaining about the price tag in China — 4399 yuan, according to press accounts there, which is roughly equivalent to $674 and more than you’d pay for some of the entry-level iPhones.

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The full comment from the Weibo user above (“I don’t understand. Do these headphones cure deafness or what? This is way too expensive”) garnered more than 7,000 upvotes on the platform. According to the South China Morning Post, hashtags related to the AirPods Max made the product a hot trending item across the site — with comments garnering some 110 million views and sparking more than 240,000 discussions across Weibo.

“It’s definitely normal for good headphones to cost up to 10,000 yuan,” another Weibo user wrote. “But headphones from Apple? I’m not sure.” Lamented another: “The 4,399 yuan price tag is off-putting, might as well play games instead.”

As part of its announcement of the headphones this week, preorders for which have begun, Apple explained that they combine a custom acoustic design, H1 chips, and advanced software to power computational audio for a breakthrough listening experience. The headphones also come in five colors, including space gray, silver, sky blue, green, and pink.

Other features include:

• Active Noise Cancellation:�Apple says that the AirPods Max delivers immersive sound with noise cancellation thanks to the presence of each ear cup featuring three outward-facing microphones. They detect environmental noise, while one microphone inside the ear cup monitors the sound reaching the listener’s ear.
• Spatial audio: The headphones also use spatial audio with dynamic head-tracking to deliver a theater-like listening experience for content recorded in 5.1, 7.1, and Dolby Atmos. Per Apple: “Using the gyroscope and accelerometer in AirPods Max and iPhone or iPad, spatial audio tracks the motion of a user’s head as well as the device, compares the motion data, then remaps the sound field so it stays anchored to the device, even as the user’s head moves.â€

Still, the Weibo crowd has found much to complain about, including the headphones’ weight, with one user writing that “With a weight of nearly 400 grams, the experience for daily commuters would be greatly impaired no matter how great the noise reduction is.â€

Comments like these shouldn’t be taken as suggesting the possibility that the AirPods Max will be a flop in China, which also saw plenty of similar criticism online in China about other Apple products like the iPhone 12 (which went on to become popular in China, regardless). And, besides, as the SCMP noted, other Weibo users rose to the defense of Apple, like one Weibo user who thought criticizing Apple over the lack of a charger is unfair: “We can debate the functionality and the pricing of the headphones, but criticisms of the chargers are quite unnecessary.â€