AirPods may not ship until January 2017

AirPods battery case

After Apple shared disappointing news that the much vaunted AirPods aren’t quite ready yet and won’t meet its self-imposed late-October deadline, a new report from Chinese-language Economic Daily News re-published Tuesday by Taiwanese trade publication DigiTimes suggests that Apple’s first-ever wireless earphones may not actually go on sale before January of next year.

Citing market watchers, the Chinese-language publication claims Apple supplier Inventec is expecting to achieve an annual growth of seven percent in 2017 while its earnings per share will also grow 35 percent “thanks to AirPods orders”.

“Apple originally planned to release the AirPods at the end of October, but has postponed release,” reads the article. “Inventec is expected to begin shipping AirPods in January 2017,” the paper noted. Apple’s website now simply states that the AirPods are “coming soon” without providing any specific timeframe.

Like a lot of consumers, most of us here at iDownloadBlog (but not everyone) are very excited for the AirPods so I guess we’ll have to wait longer than expected to get our hands on them. While any product delay is a disappointment, I’d rather Apple release them when they’re ready rather than kill goodwill by rushing out a half-baked product.

Source: DigiTimes