After years of covering translation gadgets at CES, I’ve seen plenty that struggle in the exact places people need them most – loud convention halls, busy streets, or crowded meeting rooms. When I stopped by the iFLYTEK booth this year to try the company’s new AI Translation Earbuds, where background noise is constant and conversation often becomes a battle of signal versus chaos, they handled those challenges more capably than most.
The earbuds were comfortable to wear thanks to their lightweight open-ear design, and even in that noisy environment, translations came through quickly and with impressive accuracy. iFLYTEK’s multi-sensor noise-cancellation system – combining bone conduction, air conduction, adaptive ANC, and algorithmic filtering – clearly pays off, offering up to 97% speech-recognition accuracy in environments as loud as 80 dB.
Where these really stand out is range. Most consumer translation earbuds work only when the speaker is within a few feet of you. iFLYTEK takes a different approach: the earbuds can pair with the company’s AI Recorder S6 to provide long-range translation from as far as 20 meters away. For anyone attending a business presentation, training session, or group meeting, that’s a genuinely useful capability rather than a gimmick. The S6 recorder itself is built for far-field pickup, using eight microphones and beamforming to capture voices from across a room.
The earbuds also offer something many don’t: end-to-end simultaneous interpretation. Rather than waiting for long sentences or clunky pauses, translations play back with as little as a two-second delay. That makes conversations feel far more natural, especially in situations where timing matters – interviews, negotiations, or quick back-and-forth exchanges. The system supports 60 languages across calling, face-to-face conversations, online meetings, and in-person events, giving it flexibility for both travel and business use.
Despite the translation emphasis, these are full-featured earbuds. They’re Hi-Res Audio certified, offering better-than-CD sound quality for music and calls. The open-ear design uses a titanium ear hook and silver-ion antibacterial materials, keeping them light and comfortable for long wear. Battery life lands at up to 12 hours of music or 6 hours of translation per charge, with the charging case extending that to 42 hours of music or 21 hours of translation. Another perk is the built-in AI assistant, which supports voice wake-up, Q&A assistance, and natural-sounding responses.
At $350, the iFLYTEK AI Translation Earbuds aren’t inexpensive, but they deliver something most competitors don’t: reliable, fast, real-world translation that works even in loud environments, plus long-range capabilities when paired with the recorder. After trying them in one of the toughest settings possible – the CES show floor – I came away impressed at how natural the conversations felt.
The earbuds aren’t available yet, but pricing is set at an MSRP of $350 on the iFLYTEK website.
[Image credit: Techlicious]
