Apple has covered these sound issues for me, every time they have apparently diagnosed that the issue matches my complaint. But I've had to make 5 warranty claims for this in just over 2 years of ownership! I have only made 8 warranty claims ever in my life, over 60% of my lifetime warranty claims have been for one airpods pro purchase!

Something is seriously up with the design of the original pros. I hope these issues have been resolved for 2nd gen.

This might be because each were sold with the old firmware (better noise cancellation), and eventually got updated to the new firmware (better battery).

I've had this happen three times now in 2.5 years. The first symptom is that the noise cancellation gets worse. Some months after that, you start hearing a crackling sound, particularly while speaking, or if you adjust the airpod in your ear.

I believe what is happening is that earwax is building up in the grille on the top inside of the airpod which houses a microphone. As the sound from this microphone gets more distorted, the noise cancellation gradually stops working. You can also see this because after you've had the airpods a couple of months you will never get the ear tip fit test to pass.

Every time this has gotten to the crackling stage, Apple has replaced these without charge, even though I didn't have Applecare. They have some sort of machine in the back of the store that they use to test them, and if your set fails the test, they give you a new pair (sometimes just one).

Wow, thanks for sharing this. I've had mine for 9 months and just started hearing the crackling noise. I didn't know this was a widespread issue or that Apple addresses it so easily. Fingers crossed...

It's not firmware - the issue develops very gradually rather than all at once. This is part of what makes it such an insidious fault, like the boiling frog analogy.

I think that was an issue on the earlier airpod pros and they had/have a replacement program for that issue: https://support.apple.com/airpods-pro-service-program-sound-...

Make no mistake, the issue is in no way resolved on new manufactured 1st gen pros. New manufactured stock are more likely to be covered by the original purchase warranty and so there is less pressure on Apple to extend support.

I recently had my pre-Oct 2020 pros replaced with new manufactured stock under this support program. Within less than a month the replacements developed the same sound issues, supported by Apple's diagnosis and another free replacement.

I don't think I use them in an unusual way - I don't even wear them during exercise. There is just something inherently flawed in the design that causes the sound quality to subtly degrade by a significant amount.

> noise cancelling degrades over time

Glad to know that I’m not the only one with this issue. I’m already on my third replacement pair, but the problem keeps coming back. In my case when it fails the noise cancelling amplifies low frequency noise.

> My guess is just wax and gunk getting to the external microphone mesh

I’ve came to the same hypothesis and wiped my second replacement pair down with alcohol every other day, the problem STILL eventually manifests.

> My guess is just wax and gunk getting to the external microphone mesh over time, but there is no way to deal with it

I haven't tried this myself but someone on reddit mentioned you can use blu tack (sp?) - press it on the external mics, then pull off to clean it. I imagine it works but as I said, haven't tried it personally.

I have tried it (and done this more than once) -- it does work, but it's not quite that easy. You have to fashion the tack into various shapes to get into the crevices, and it has taken the better part of an hour to be satisfied with the result each time. Still worth it.