In other words, without getting too much into the weeds of things, active noise cancellation works by the device "monitoring" the outside noise and emitting an inverted soundwave, or what Treski calls "the anti phase," to neutralize or negate the external cacophony.

In a recent interview with Engadget, Apple's vice president of hardware engineering Kate Bergeron and AirPods marketing director Eric

For the first time ever, the entry-level AirPods have active noise cancellation (ANC). Apple unveiled the new AirPods 4 on Sept. 9 at the "Glowtime" event where the Cupertino-based tech giant debuted the new line with two variants: one with ANC and one without ANC.

There's no feeling quite like the anticipation of a new tech product that promises to do something pretty wildly different, and then having that anticipation paid off by the product actually delivering the goods.