Long haul flights can be a real pain in the arse for a lot of reasons, but there’s no shitty cherry on top of cramped seats and dodgy meals quite like those awful headphones they hand out for the in-flight entertainment system. They might as well tape two biscuits to your ears.
Before Bluetooth headphones became the standard for most people, the alternative was simply unplugging your everyday wired pair from whatever device they were attached to and using those instead ” providing you had an adapter. Wireless gear obviously makes the whole thing a little trickier.
These days, there are a few quality Bluetooth transmitters getting around that’ll make your in-flight audio a much nicer experience.
The Twelve South AirFly Bluetooth transmitter is one of the better alternatives out there and is geared towards those using AirPods, but will work with pretty much any Bluetooth headphones/earphone.
It has eight hours of battery life and uses Aptx Low Latency Bluetooth protocol, which is a good indicator of great sound quality. You can pick one up on Amazon right now for $69 (nice).
It’s not exactly the cheapest workaround out there, but if you travel a lot, you’ll definitely get your money’s worth out of it. Besides, if you’ve already forked out big bucks on a decent pair of headphones/earphones, you’ll wanna be able to use them in any situation. It can also be a great alternative to wired headphones when using devices like a Nintendo Switch.
If you want a slightly cheaper option, TaoTronics has a similar unit for $39.99. It runs on the same Aptx protocol, so the performance should be fairly similar. This one can also be connected to two Bluetooth receivers at once if that’s something you’re into.
May your ears be devoid of airline biscuit headphones on all your future flights.