Apple plans camera AirPods alongside upgraded foldable iPhone in 2027

The new AirPods are designed to be Apple’s first AI-focused wearable product.

Apple’s upcoming camera-equipped AirPods, a product meant to vault the company into the AI device market, is scheduled to launch in late 2027 as part of a flurry of new releases.

The company aims to release the device around the same time as a next-generation foldable phone and a fresh iPhone model that will mark that product’s 20th anniversary, according to people familiar with the matter.

The offerings will be part of what Apple intends to be its biggest wave of new products yet, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the plans are private.

The devices should help provide a tailwind to the company during its first full year under chief executive John Ternus, who takes the reins on Sept 1.

All three products reached advanced stages of development in recent months. Bloomberg News reported in May that work on the new AirPods had accelerated, with prototypes now featuring near-final hardware and software.

The company is also preparing a slew of new chips for future devices, built on next-generation silicon manufacturing processes.

Apple is now testing next fall’s devices alongside iOS 28, an iPhone software update code-named Bell that is slated for 2027. Last week, the company introduced iOS 27, which will be available to consumers later this year with a new version of Siri.

The new AirPods are designed to be Apple’s first AI-focused wearable product. The device’s computer-vision cameras won’t be intended to capture photos and video – instead, they’ll act as sensors that feed visual context into Siri.

The goal is to let users ask Siri questions about objects and the surrounding environment. Someone looking at a collection of ingredients, for example, could ask what to make for dinner.

The AirPods, code-named B798, were originally slated for release in 2026, according to the people. The deadline slipped in part because of Apple’s prolonged struggles with artificial intelligence software. The company also had to develop visual AI models capable of identifying objects in a user’s surroundings.

At its developer conference last week, Apple announced similar functionality for the Vision Pro headset. But the stakes of getting it right are much higher for the AirPods, a more popular product that Apple believes has huge potential as an AI wearable.

The camera AirPods will help solidify Apple’s push into what it calls Visual Intelligence, technology that can analyse images and provide instant context. The company has already made Visual Intelligence a focal poi