Every AirPods User Should Try This Wacky Hidden Feature. iPhone users who also own Apple AirPods have a lot of tricks to figure out when they get their first pair.
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But most of them pertain to the regular audio experience, be it listening to audio content or talking on the phone.
However, there is a great iPhone accessibility called Sound Recognition that can cater to AirPods users in addition to the target audience.
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As we explained before, Sound Recognition is a hidden iPhone feature that can help people who are deaf or hard of hearing to control the important sounds around them.
How to Enable Sound Recognition on iPhone
Maybe it's a smoke alarm going off in the house or a certain noise an animal makes. iPhone can listen for these sounds and send a notification to notify you of the event.
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The same accessibility feature works well for people who don't have hearing problems. But they can use AirPods or other headphones that can prevent them from hearing the different background sounds around them.
Sound recognition is a feature that Apple has built into iOS since iOS 14. You'll find it on Accessibility menu after loading the settings application.
Turn on the feature and tap the button sounds menu to customize the type of sound you want to receive alerts for. Select all the sounds you want your iPhone to pay attention to and send you notifications.
Again, this is great to have around if you have hearing problems. But it also works if you use AirPods a lot at home.
Especially models that support noise cancellation. You won't have to worry about missing specific sounds around you, like babies crying, alarms, appliances or pets.
How to Add Sound Recognition to Control Center
To access the sound recognition feature more easily, add it to the Control Center on iPhone.
go back to settings application, choose the Control Center menu and tap the button + sign next to sound recognition.
This will place a Sound Recognition shortcut inside the Control Center which will be helpful for your AirPods Sound Recognition experience.
Every AirPods User Should Try This Wacky Hidden Feature
Tap the shortcut to quickly turn on or off all the sounds you want your iPhone to hear while you go about your business. Rinse and repeat whenever you're at home and using AirPods.
As useful as this feature can be, you might not always want to use it. If you're not wearing your AirPods, you'll likely hear most of these sounds.
And you don't want a barrage of Notifications constant. That's why the Control Center shortcut is useful for quickly managing the Sound Recognition experience.
Also, remember that the feature is only as good as your iPhone's ability to pick up these sounds. You can use the sound recognition tool to train the iPhone for custom sounds and improve its reliability if you are on iOS 16. We cover this in detail in this link.
Finally after configuring your iPhone, you'll be one tap away from making sure you're on top of all the noises going on at home. While we're focusing on AirPods in this guide, the feature works just as well whether you're using other wired or wireless headphones with your iPhone.
