Gen 4 ANC are magic and almost dangerous.

Had mine since launch day and used them mostly yesterday. These are basically the closest I will get to Pros because the silicone and foam in-canal tip style is a no-go for me.

I don’t care if they are “objectively worse” (see someone’s prior thread) at ANC than those because it’s not a relevant comparison given it’s a style I personally can’t tolerate.

What I can say is compared to Gen 3 and Gen 2/1, these are game changers, especially for some upcoming intercity bus rides and flights I have planned. Testing them already at the laundromat and on the bustling streets of NYC, they are great while washing but almost too good at cutting my spatial awareness (with ANC) walking down the block. Some car or biker could easily run into me and I’d be oblivious. I don’t know if need the active transparency mode or just the usual passive bleed is enough, but I can see myself keeping them in regular non-ANC mode if I am ambulatory because the ANC is too good and there’s no way (yet) to throttle it down a little, other than automatically via the conversation mode which just disengages it entirely.

Likes:

-Fit is as good as Gen 1/2 again or better, as Gen 3 was larger and worked for me but always turned out to be a smidge less secure as it was larger. -ANC is dangerous magic, and conversation mode does work well enough, sometimes a little too well if others have a conversation near you that you may not need to be a party to. -Smaller case size is not a big deal but doesn’t hurt. -Light on the outside is so much easier to use to verify charging status. It also makes sound now by default which would be a strong dislike except these can be easily turned off in settings. (For a while the MacBook startup hum was hard to disengage, at least without an app, so this could have gone either way.) -ANC can be engaged/disengaged via the stems AND because it works on-device, it even works when paired to an ANDROID phone, and presumably a PC too (though I didn’t explicitly test the latter yet).

No likes:

-Still no stem volume control, which is really upsetting because it shouldn’t be a “Pro” only feature if not everyone can physically tolerate the Pro design style. If they had released a $200 version with Pro features in this style I’d have paid more for stem volume control. -Was hoping for a full UWB chip inside for true AirTag-like Find My. What you get is a more basic hot/cold and it is still for the case not the earbuds. Sufficient enough I probably don’t need to affix an AirTag to it, but not 100% sure.

These have been a worthwhile upgrade for me so far especially since I redeemed nearly $200 worth of gift cards from donating blood the last two years to earn them. I am trading in my Gen 1’s as part of the cost and my Gen 3’s will be spares or sold.