During its WWDC keynote briefing in June 2020, Apple announced something that really piqued our interest and sounded like a potential game-changer: spatial audio. Almost two years on and this 3D audio technology has really gained traction in the Apple world.
Essentially Apple’s take on Dolby Atmos for Headphones and Sony’s PS5 3D Audio, Apple spatial audio is designed to deliver surround sound and 3D audio through headphones – and in optimal fashion through the AirPods 3, AirPods Pro, AirPods Max and Beats Fit Pro.
The feature first arrived for movies and TV shows as part of iOS 14 in September 2020, and then it was released on Apple Music on 7th June. Since last summer, spatial audio has been extended to tvOS for use with the new Apple TV 4K (in conjunction with Beats Fit Pro and AirPods, Pro and Max) and it can now also be used with Macs powered by the company’s latest M1 chip.
So how do you get Apple spatial audio? How does the implementation differ between movies and music? And how does it compare
