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I love my new Bose headphones, but Apple could soon essentially make them obsolete

Bose QuietComfort 20 Acoustic Noise Cancelling headphones
Bose

I recently got a pair of Bose noise-cancelling headphones, and I absolutely love them.

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They have completely changed the experience of flying. The noise-cancelling technology almost completely drowns out the sound of the airplane engines, and I'm able to lose myself in a world of music, an audio book, or a podcast.

But I'll probably return them because Apple is about to make them obsolete.

If reports turn out to be true, Apple will ditch the ubiquitous 3.5 mm headphone jack on the next iPhone, which will is expected to come out this fall. Instead, you'll have to connect wirelessly via Bluetooth, or through the phone's Lightning port, the same plug you use to charge the iPhone.

There are a lot of good reasons for Apple to do this — using the Lightning port will up the sound quality and perhaps even allow Apple to make the next iPhone slightly thinner. But at the same time, it will also make a lot of people feel like the headphones they have are obsolete.

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Take my new Bose QuietComfort headphones, for instance. The headphones, which at $300 aren't by any measures cheap, have a somewhat bulky external battery that powers the noise-canceling feature.

bose battery pack
Bose/Tech Insider

This battery pack may fade into oblivion in just a few months when Bose inevitably releases a version of the headphones that connects via Lightning. That's because the Lightning port will be able to provide power to the headphones, so it won't need an external power source.

It's by no means the end of the world — there will be adapters galore, so I'll still be able to use the headphones. But $300 is a significant investment for an accessory when I pretty much know there will be a better version in just a few months. Plus, even if I keep these headphones, I'll need an adapter to use them with the new iPhone, which just gives me another thing to lose.

My experience is a taste of what we're going to see in a few months if Apple really does end up removing the headphone jack in the new iPhone. Plenty of people out there have really nice headphones that work with the traditional headphone jack. But they'll either need to replace them or buy an adapter if they get the new iPhone.

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