Nothing unveils new Ear, Ear (a) buds with ChatGPT integration

The new Ear and Ear(a) buds will be available in India next week.

London-based technology major Nothing Inc. on Thursday (April 18) unveiled the new generation Ear and Ear(a) True Wireless Stereo (TWS) buds at the Q1 Community Update event in Tokyo.

The latest premium Ear buds retain the same design elements of the predecessor. It has a see-through design language, but comes with improved audio delivery capability and the biggest upgrade is the ChatGPT integration.

With a simple tap gesture, the owner can summon ChatGPT to perform tasks on the phone such as search for real-time information on sports, and weather and even take screenshots. However, this capability will be limited to Ear buds paired with Nothing Phones only.

“By integrating ChatGPT with Nothing earbuds, including the new Nothing Ear and Ear (a), and with Nothing OS, we’ve taken our first steps towards change, and there’s more to come,” said Carl Pei, CEO and Co-Founder of Nothing. “As always, we look forward to feedback from our community.”

The new Nothing Ear buds.

Another notable enhancement in the new Ear buds is the new Smart ANC algorithm. It is capable of checking for noise leakage between the earbuds and the ear canal and adds more noise cancellation accordingly. The new Ear buds also take care of background distractions with Adaptive ANC, which automatically applies one of 3 noise cancellation levels, high, medium, and low. It can reduce the outside noise by up to 45 dB, twice better than that of the predecessor. With support for bandwidth of up to 5000 Hz, Ear can effectively detect and reduce more challenging sounds such as vehicles' horns in heavy traffic.

Add to that, the new Ear buds come with Nothing's most advanced Clear Voice Technology. It features a new talk mic design, which allows for less obstruction when speaking on a call. A new additional airway has been added on the stem so the wind has a clearer pathway, which reduces interference by 60 per cent compared to Ear (2).

Thanks to the new compact custom driver, the Ear buds can deliver up to 40.5 hours of battery life, around 25 per cent longer than Ear(2). It also supports fast charging. With just 10 minutes of charging, it can last for 10 hours.

The company also unveiled a budget Ear (a) series buds with a similar design but with a touch of refreshing yellow colour scheme, a first for Nothing product. All the current gadgets are available only in black and white colour options.

Nothing Ear(a).

Like new premium Ear buds, the Ear (a) too, boast the same Adaptive ANC. It can detect distractions in the environment and automatically applies high, medium, or low noise cancellation levels to your surrounding noise.

It also supports high-resolution audio over Bluetooth connections at up to 990 kbps at 24 bit/96 kHz and is compatible with the widely supported LDAC (Lossless Digital Audio Codec) format too.

Each Ear (a) bud houses 46mAh battery and a 500 mAh battery in the charging case. With a full charge, the TWS can deliver up to 42.5 hours of music playback.

Like the new premium Ear buds, the Ear (a) comes with ChatGPT integration. Users have to perform the pinch gesture to summon the chatbot. Nothing will also improve the Nothing smartphone user experience in Nothing OS by embedding system-level entry points to ChatGPT, including screenshot sharing and Nothing-styled widgets.

The new Ear is priced at Rs 11,999 and hit stores on April 2. The Ear (a) costs Rs 7,999 and goes on sale on April 22.

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