How to clean and sanitize your AirPods

Surprise! Those AirPods that you regularly wear in your ears, sometimes for hours on end, often when you’re sweating in the gym, need regular cleaning.

Some people simply wipe clean and get on with their day, while others want to thoroughly clean and sanitize their AirPods.

I am good

have seen a lot of uses, and they can clean well, so I thought I’d bring you along.

Note that while I’m cleaning the AirPods Pro here, the process is the same for the AirPods.

Note: Apple gives official instructions on how to clean AirPods this.

I find people overcomplicating the cleaning process. I want to keep it simple. Here’s what I gathered for the job:

• Some Q . tips
• Some camera lens wipes
• Disposable surface for cleaning (so that everything is not covered with earwax)

I’ve met people who use isopropyl alcohol to clean but I don’t want to soak AirPods in solvents. I don’t think dissolving the earwax and pushing it deeper into the headphones will do them any good in the long run. Then there is the possibility of damage to the plastic.

This is my process.

First, I rate how bad things are. Apple replaced my AirPods Pro headphones a few months ago because they had a banging problem. They look pretty new. On the other hand, the case is more than two years old, and it looks like that. It is scratched, and has missing pieces. No need cleaning or polishing it will make it look like new.

I noticed that there was also a bit of difficulty getting stuck in the Lightning port.

I start with the case. There are a lot of nooks and crannies in this design, and they trap a lot of debris. Around the hinge area, where the AirPods are located, and the connectors at the bottom that provide power to charge the headphones all appear to be fake magnets.

However, cleaning the lens (you can also use screen cleaner) and Q-tip can’t solve it. I was really surprised at how easy it was to take off.

The Q-tip is especially handy for cleaning around the charging connectors.

Like I said, the AirPods themselves are pretty clean. However, they did benefit from removing the earcups and general cleaning.

To clean the Lighting port, I used – gently, with caution – the Q-tip’s bamboo stick. Be careful, don’t get the gorilla completely into it, and you’ll be fine. If you have a can of compressed air, this might work, too.

My AirPods Pro certainly don’t look like new, but they look a lot cleaner and a lot more hygienic.

How often do I recommend doing this? It really depends. Maybe every few months will help the AirPods look new. However, it’s probably been over a year since I cleaned my AirPods Pro cases, so for each of them!