Apple’s (almost) definitely about to launch new headphones

As the saying goes, once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, and six times is a sure sign of an imminent product launch. Football star Lamine Yamal has posted to Instagram yet another photo of himself with a pair of unreleased Beats over-ears, and come on people, who are we kidding, Apple is definitely about to drop some new headphones.

Last week, we reported on the Barcelona midfielder’s “inadvertent” posting of four carefully posed photos and one carefully posed video of himself with the unidentified pink cans, and speculated that it was most likely paid stealth marketing ahead of a launch. Now he has posted another still photo, this time in the form of a story on his Instagram account, and it shows the player hugging a fan and clutching a bag with not one but two pairs dangling off the handle.

Who carries around two pairs of the same headphones? Not many millionaires, I would have thought. They have people for that, right?

Most convenient of all, the two pairs are in different color finishes. The ones we saw last week were seen in a pale pink, but in the new post, they are joined by a pair in a Beats trademark creamy off-white. These look to correspond respectively to the Cloud Pink finish of the Beats Solo 4 and the Sandstone on the Beats Studio Pro. No current model offers both colors.

Such unsubtle guerrilla marketing hints that Apple will release the new Beats headphones in the near future. An updated version of the Beats Studio Pro is a strong possibility, particularly after Apple filed documents with the FCC last month.

We don’t currently expect any hardware to be announced at the WWDC 2026 keynote next week (on Monday, from 10am PT), but it’s not impossible that Apple will spring a surprise. Join our WWDC live blog as we discuss all the news and rumors surrounding the event.