Apple has taught us to expect emotional Christmas commercials for its products around this time of year, and the company delivered yet another touching ad that will make you cry.
Released on Thanksgiving Day, the Heartstrings ad already tops one million views on YouTube, though you’ll also catch it on other social media channels. The ad is nearly two minutes long and tells a Christmas story centered around a family and a particular Apple product: The beloved AirPods Pro 2.
It so happens that this is the best time of the year to buy AirPods of any kind, but especially Apple’s best models. The AirPods Pro 2 see great discounts during Black Friday and Cyber Monday, offering better prices than the usual deals running on Amazon throughout the year.
But Apple’s new ad is all about the brilliant features Apple added to the AirPods Pro 2 model, which make it a must-have device for certain categories of buyers. The AirPods Pro 2 works as a hearing aid in some markets, making them ideal for anyone dealing with hearing loss.
“For so many of us, sound and how we hear shape how we connect to the world around us,” Apple’s ad description reads. “Yet, people with hearing loss wait an average of 10 years before getting their hearing tested and fitted for hearing aids. Leaving millions unaware they’re living with hearing loss and without the assistance they need.”
“Now with the world’s first end-to-end hearing health experience, you have access to a Hearing Test that provides scientifically validated results within minutes and the ability to activate a clinical-grade Hearing Aid feature on your AirPods Pro 2 — right from home.”
Apple announced the Hearing Aid feature during the iPhone 16 event in mid-September, confirming rumors that described the feature. The functionality is FDA-approved, so you can use the AirPods Pro 2 as an official hearing aid before buying something more expensive.
The AirPods Pro 2 can be configured as a hearing device on the iPhone using the Hearing Test and Hearing Aid features available in iOS 18 in select markets.
The Heartstrings ad does a great job showing how useful the health feature can be. We have a family at Christmas time, with the focus on the dad, who is already struggling with hearing issues. He watches his daughter open up a Christmas present while remembering moments from their past together.
The sound is muffled during the ad’s first minute to indicate that the protagonist is struggling with hearing loss.
As soon as his teenage daughter starts playing and singing, the mom tells her husband to listen. He puts one of the two earbuds in his ear, and the sound becomes crystal clear. The same memories play out, but the sound is clear this time.
The dad is relatively young, which is an intentional choice here. This drives Apple’s point that people struggle with hearing loss well before getting tested. I say that as someone probably in the early years of dealing with hearing loss without getting it tested, someone waiting for the Hearing Test and Hearing Aid functionality to be approved in the EU.