Microsoft is expected to announce new Surface devices very soon including a Surface Book 3 and Surface Go 2, but new Surface accessories are also on the way. If the Surface Earbuds were previously announced last fall, we also expect to see new Surface Headphones, as well as a revamped Surface Dock with USB-C ports.
Windows Central reports today that a manual for the Surface Earbuds is available on an FCC listing. The document includes interesting information about touch gestures for controlling music playback, volume, and activating a digital assistant. We already know that the Earbuds will support all popular digital assistants, including Cortana, Alexa, the Google Assistant, and even Siri, and considering the limited appeal of Cortana in 2020, supporting other assistants was probably the right thing to do.
A new version of the Surface Headphones could also bring some interesting updates according to a Bluetooth SIG listing discovered by 91 Mobiles (via The Verge). According to the document, the new Surface Headphones will support Bluetooth 5.0, Qualcomm’s aptX audio codec, and provide 20 hours of battery life, which is 2 hours more than the original model. The listing also mentions new dial buttons for controlling Noise cancellation levels, which would be a change from the rotating dial on the original Surface Headphones.
Other than that, we don’t know yet if the new Surface Headphones could introduce significant visual changes. It’s also not clear yet if the new Surface Headphones could be announced soon along with the aforementioned new Surface products, but the Surface Earbuds are expected to start shipping on May 6 according to leaked retailer information.
