A report by Fast Company yesterday “confirmed” earlier rumors will ditch the headphone port on the iPhone 7. Instead, Apple will rely on the Lightning port to connect headphones and for those unfamiliar, there are several headphones out there that support Lightning. Not many, but there are a few.Safe to say that this would be quite disruptive for many headphone makers if the rumors proved to be true, but at least one company seems to be taking it in stride. Speaking to Tech Insider at CES, the company’s CEO Dr. Andreas Sennheiser seems to be pretty okay with the idea that the iPhone 7 might not have a headphone port.
He was quoted as saying, “If Apple decides to go with a new standard, we will look at the opportunistic side and how we can exploit that change in a positive way to give a better sound experience.” He also notes that “in the audio world we’ve seen different connection standards come and go for many many years.”
However we should point out that this isn’t really a “standard” per se since it would be proprietary to Apple’s iOS devices, not to mention how troublesome it would be if you wanted to swap between your iPhone and your laptop, especially since laptops do not sport Lightning ports.
It would make more sense if Apple were to utilize USB-C instead, which is expected to be the new standard for connectivity. Of course this is just one headphone maker’s take on the rumors and we’re sure that there are some out there who can’t be too thrilled by it, which is probably a good thing Apple owns Beats Electronics since they get to make their own headphones now.
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