AirPods Max 2 teardown exposes a frustrating truth about Apple’s $549 headphones

Apple’s $549 AirPods Max 2 just got cracked open, and what iFixit found inside might bother you more than the price tag. A new teardown confirms that beyond the H2 chip, these are basically the same headphones Apple sold in 2020, design flaws and all.

The AirPods Max 2 are a copy-paste job, minus the fixes

iFixit published its teardown of the AirPods Max 2 this week, and here’s the kicker: the first-gen teardown manual worked just fine on the new model. The internal layout is nearly identical to the original AirPods Max from over five years ago.
The only real hardware change is the jump from the H1 to the H2 chip, which adds Adaptive Audio, Conversation Awareness, and better noise cancellation. But the battery, headband, and button assemblies all appear to be carried over from the 2020 and 2024 versions.

Video by iFixIt

A six-year-old flaw Apple still won’t fix

This is where it gets frustrating. Apple has done nothing to address the condensation problem that’s haunted the AirPods Max since launch. Users have reported moisture collecting inside the earcups, which can mess with ear detection, and Apple’s official advice was basically “wipe them with a cloth”.
iFixit found zero evidence of any design change to fix this. For a $549 product in its second generation, that’s not just disappointing. It’s lazy.

Apple’s repairability push stops at the door

Apple has spent the last few years building out its self-service repair program and loudly telling us it cares about repairability. None of that extends to the AirPods Max 2.No official replacement parts, no repair manuals, and the USB-C port (technically replaceable) requires tearing apart most of the headphone to reach. Apple still leans on adhesive throughout the earcups, which makes any DIY fix a gamble.

On the bright side, the unchanged design means repair tools and some components should work across all three AirPods Max versions. That’s at least a small win for cutting down on e-waste.

The H2 chip alone doesn’t justify this price tag

I haven’t personally owned a pair of AirPods Max, but I’ve been following this product line closely, and the pattern is getting hard to overlook. Apple took six years to deliver a real update to its premium over-ear headphones, and when it finally did, it dropped in a new chip and shipped it.

The H2 brings genuinely useful features, no question about that. But at $549, you’re paying top dollar for headphones that haven’t physically changed since 2020, and that still have unresolved hardware problems.

Sony and Bose have refreshed their flagship headphones multiple times in that same window, improving comfort, shaving off weight, and making repairs easier. Apple could have done all of that too. It just didn’t, and this teardown makes that choice pretty tough to defend.