It is estimated that 750 million pairs of wireless earphones have been sold worldwide since 2017, i.e. wireless headphones for listening to music and podcasts and talking on the phone. The most famous and sold are Apple's AirPods, whose small white stems hang from the ears of millions of people every day, but Samsung's Galaxy Buds and headphones from various Chinese brands are also known and widely used: in Italy, for for example, those of Xiaomi are quite good.
The Financial Times journalist Alexandra Heal had bought earphones of the latter type for herself, produced by a Chinese company called EarFun and paid 69 pounds (in Italy find for 69 euros), about half of a pair of AirPods. But after less than a year, the EarFuns broke and stopped working. It's a fairly common fact: it's estimated that the average life of a pair of wireless earbuds, whether it's from well-known brands is less well-known, or barely two years – that, of course, if you don't lose them sooner.
In most cases, writes Heal, when a pair of wireless earbuds breaks, you throw them out and buy another one. This is almost always done for convenience: as is the case with Heal's EarFuns, these are often inexpensive products, and consumers find that it is not worth wasting time trying to fix them. Also, because they are small and fragile objects, earphones often break in ways that aren't covered by the warranties: after a fall, or crushed by a shoe.
But even if they aren't mistreated , the wireless earphones are however destined to stop working within a couple of years: the tiny batteries that make them work are subject to degradation processes which, in just a few years, make them in fact unusable. And since the batteries are not replaceable, the earphones are to be thrown away.
Heal, however, decided to try to repair his earphones anyway (which had not been dropped or crushed) and discovered that it's practically impossible.
While all the big earphone manufacturers have replacement and repair programs for their products, in reality they mostly do the first thing. Apple, for example, offers a “Replacement, Service and Repair for AirPods” service, but when Heat contacted the company, a sales rep explained that if a consumer actually sends their AirPods for warranty repair, Apple does. Send a new pair directly.
Same goes for Samsung, whose repair service actually only includes a replacement, and even for the little-known EarFun, which offered to send Heat a pair of new earbuds, not even wanting the broken ones back.
When Heat tried to turn to independent repairers, they all refused to work on his earbuds. The earbuds are too small, trying to fix them would take too long and not worth it, even considering their price when new. Furthermore, since the components are glued rather than screwed together, it is practically impossible to open them for repair without damaging them irreparably. “They are not meant to be repairable,” said one of the technicians. iFixit, a famous site that deals with verifying the repairability of technological products, has given the AirPods a rating of 0 out of 10.
When a wireless headset breaks or stops working, therefore, throw it away it's pretty much the only option.
And with 750 million pairs of earbuds in circulation this is a waste management problem because, as Heat explains, wireless earbuds are still electronic products. which contain highly polluting metals and chemical components. It is true that many companies have take-back programs for used products. Apple, for example, in some countries (but not all) offers to take back AirPods that are no longer working for free and recycle them.
But the impact of these programs is relatively limited, also because often the consumers throw away their earphones without treating them as electronic waste. The damage is substantial: in 2019 only one fifth of the 54 million tons of electronic waste in the world had been recycled, and small electronic products are one of the biggest problems. Justin Greenway, the manager of an e-waste recycling plant in London, told Heat: “As consumers, we struggle things like kettles and toasters. Let alone a small insignificant headset “.
