5 AirPods features you need to enable manually

AirPods are designed to work seamlessly from the start. In fact, setting up the device for the first time is as simple as taking the AirPods out of the box and opening the charging case with your iPhone nearby. You should immediately see the setup animation appear on your mobile. From there, just follow the on-screen prompts and the AirPods should be ready to use.

But to truly unlock the full potential of your AirPods, you need to enable some settings yourself. These AirPods features are not enabled by default for several reasons. On the one hand, they can temporarily interfere with out-of-the-box functionality, which you might not like. Some settings are also a matter of preference.

Don’t worry, though. Accessing the AirPods settings to enable these features is quite quick and easy. To do this, wear at least one AirPod and make sure it connects to your iPhone. Next, go to your phone’s settings and open the AirPods option that appears under your name. You’re free to browse the settings page to check which ones you want to enable, but to give you an idea, here are five AirPods settings you can enable manually.

It’s a universal problem: you go to bed watching a video on YouTube, listening to relaxing sounds on Spotify, or listening to Audible, and you end up falling asleep with the video or music still playing. A few hours later, you wake up to a dead phone and AirPods. The worst part is, if you’re unlucky enough that the earbud doesn’t fall out of your ear, you might be woken up by the sounds in the middle of the night. To prevent this from happening, you should normally rely on the sleep timer built into the app you are using. But if you forget to set it up or the app just doesn’t come with a sleep timer, your phone will likely keep playing the music or video until you wake up and pause it yourself.

Fortunately, AirPods 4 and AirPods Pro 2 and 3 users no longer have to worry about this. They can simply enable the aptly named AirPods setting Pause Media When Falling Asleep. It works exactly as described. Once you doze off, your AirPods automatically pause media for you. You only need to activate it once, and you’re pretty much set.

Besides your iPhone and iPad, you can also use this pause feature when watching on your Mac or Apple TV. To find AirPods settings on your Mac, click the Apple icon and select System Settings. On your Apple TV, go to Control Center and tap your AirPods.

By default, your left and right AirPods are set to switch listening modes when held down. This is a handy tip for AirPods that eliminates the need to dive into your AirPods settings every time you want to switch from Noise Cancellation mode to Transparency mode and vice versa. But you don’t really need both of your AirPods to do the same thing. You can actually set either AirPod to do another action: turn on Siri.

This is a great alternative if you don’t like taking out your phone just to activate Siri, perhaps during a run, on the commute to work, or whenever your mobile is buried in your bag. Instead of picking up your phone and saying “Hey Siri,” all you have to do is press and hold the AirPod’s stem.

To make a specific AirPod activate Siri, follow these steps:

1. In the AirPods settings, go to the Press and hold AirPods section.
2. Choose Left or Right.
3. Tap Siri.

Now, when you hold down the stem of your AirPod of choice, you’ll hear a chime. It’s up to you to say a voice command. You can use all supported Siri commands and you should hear Siri in your AirPods when it responds to your request.

If you have AirPods 4, AirPods Pro 2 or 3, or AirPods Max 2 and an iPhone or iPad updated to iOS 26 or iPadOS 26, one of the most convenient AirPods settings you can manually enable is Camera Remote. It turns your AirPods into a remote control for supported camera apps, including the standard camera app, Adobe Lightroom, and Halide Mark III.

Ideally, this works for both photos and videos. On the iPhone Camera app, there is a three-second countdown before the photo is taken. This means you won’t have to set the timer yourself. This can come in handy any time you need to use your iPhone or iPad remotely – for example, you’re taking a group photo, taking full-body photos, or recording yourself and the view during your solo travels. It can also save you from having to reach for the shutter button to take selfies. In the AirPods settings, Camera Remote can be set to one of two actions. Specifically, you can trigger the camera shutter by simply tapping or long-pressing.

There is, however, a downside to enabling Camera Remote on your AirPods: the temporary unavailability of the original tap once and press and hold features. Right out of the box, tapping once is actually used to pause or play audio. It also allows you to answer calls and mute or unmute during calls. On the other hand, pressing and holding causes the AirPods to change the listening mode from noise canceling to transparent. Now, if you enable Camera Remote, these gestures will not work when the camera app is active. You must exit the app to use the original features again.

The AirPods 4 ANC, AirPods Pro 2 and 3, and AirPods Max 2 come with a nifty feature that makes it easier to talk to people while wearing both AirPods. Called Conversation Awareness, this AirPods setting is designed to detect when you’re speaking and automatically adjust playback to help you focus on the conversation. If you’re listening to music, the volume is turned down, and if you’re listening to a podcast, movie, or other spoken media, it’s paused. Conversation awareness is especially helpful if you have frequent, brief conversations throughout the day. This could include co-workers approaching you for tasks, the cashier at the cafe taking your order, or even unexpectedly meeting friends while out and about. You won’t need to repeatedly take your AirPods out and put them back in just to strike up a conversation.

Conversation awareness activates with the sound of your voice. Then, as soon as you finish the conversation, you can seamlessly return to what you’re listening to without manually changing settings. Your AirPods automatically return to your previous settings for you. If you want to manually stop conversation awareness, just press and hold the stem. There’s also a toggle in Control Center when you long-press the volume slider.

When you first connect your AirPods to your iPhone, you actually have the option to turn on Conversation Awareness. If you haven’t done so, you can easily find it in the AirPods settings, under Audio. It is important to note, however, that conversation awareness may falsely activate in some cases. Since it triggers when you start speaking, it can pause your media or lower the volume when you’re talking to yourself or singing a song.

When you receive incoming calls while wearing your AirPods, you normally have to touch the earbud to answer. This may seem quick and easy, but it can be annoying if your hands are full. Maybe you walk your dogs, cook dinner, or hold grocery bags. Luckily, AirPods let you interact with your calls (and even notifications) hands-free via head gestures.

This feature, currently limited to AirPods 4, AirPods Pro 2 and 3, and AirPods Max 2, only uses head movements to respond to incoming calls and texts. It specifically supports two actions: up-and-down and side-to-side movements. By default, nodding lets you reply to messages and answer incoming calls. Meanwhile, shaking your head clears the notification and rejects calls.

Just like Conversation Awareness, you can enable head gestures during initial setup. But you can always enable it later from the AirPods settings. You can also change the gesture action and try the gestures to see how they work. However, before you can use head gestures with your AirPods, you need to enable announcement notifications. To do this, open the Settings app, then open Apple Intelligence and Siri and follow these steps:

1. Tap Announce Notifications.
2. Activate it.
3. Under Announce when connected to, enable headphones.
4. Choose the apps you want to receive notifications for.
5. Return to the main Apple Intelligence and Siri page.
6. Select Announce Calls.
7. Choose Headset Only.

Now, when you receive a call or notification, Siri will announce it. Immediately afterwards, you can nod or shake your head to respond. Keep in mind, however, that some apps don’t support replies via Siri, including Gmail, Facebook Messenger, and TikTok.