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Apple could be fixing the biggest problem with iPhone earbuds

Apple's iPhone is known for being a great phone, a great camera, and a great portable music player. There's only one thing holding back that last part: Apple's ever-tangled, iconic earbuds. 

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tangled earbuds earphones iphone
Justin Baeder / Flickr, CC

Apple's earbuds — officially called "EarPods" — are free with every iPhone purchase, and they're awfully convenient.

They also may be going away when Apple unveils the iPhone 7 later this year — report after report indicates that Apple's going to remove the traditional 3.5 mm headphone jack from its iPhone lineup,  instead using the existing Lightning charge port as a headphone jack.

That said, rather than simply swapping the existing earbuds for a new pair that could plug into Lightning ports, it looks like Apple may be completely changing the way its headphones work — and permanently fixing the issue of tangled earbud wires.

Behold, the magnetic breakaway cable:

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Apple patent, earbuds
Apple

As seen above, the new earbuds would break away just below the neck — think of it like a magnetic power cord on an Apple laptop. The difference here, though, is that the music wouldn't stop. Instead of pausing your music/podcast/etc., the audio would continue playing wirelessly to the headphones (via Bluetooth or another wireless communication method). 

Don't get too excited just yet, though: this patent comes from way back in 2012, and was picked up by Apple Insider this week only because it was finally published by the United States Patent and Trademark Office. 

That said, with a big change expected in Apple's earphones coming later this year, 2016 could be the year that we see Apple's magnetic earbud tech — and finally say goodbye to tangled earbud cords forever.

Apple
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