Sometimes it’s the celebrity shots that give away nifty forthcoming products on the horizon.
Prior to Saturday’s playoff game between the Los Angeles Lakers and the Denver Nuggets, superstar LeBron James was spotted carrying what appeared to be an unreleased version of the Pill speaker from Apple’s Beats brand.
The original Beats Pill was a wireless Bluetooth speaker introduced in 2012 before Apple acquired Beats Electronics. It received a few updates in its first several years on the market, with the final revision being a redesigned Pill+ with a Lightning connector introduced under Apple’s ownership in 2015.
The Pill+ speaker remained on the market prior to being quietly discontinued in early 2022.
Given the LeBron photo, Apple may be bringing the Pill back, complete with a lanyard that was not present on previous versions of the speaker.
With the direction of Apple’s product lineup, a USB-C port for charging appears likely. Given that the previous Pill+ was introduced almost nine years ago, there have been significant advances in Bluetooth and other technologies since that time, so this upcoming version is likely to be a significant improvement. Specific details on the speaker, including a release date, however, remain unknown.
Stay tuned for additional details as they become available.
Via MacRumors and Lakers Instagram