Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Audio / Video
  3. News

These glow-in-the-dark Powerbeats power your run while keeping you safe

Simon Cohen
By

Glow-in-the-dark paint has all kinds of uses. It can make watch faces and camera markings easier to see at night, it can illuminate bike lane markings, or it can simply make your multimillion-dollar hypercar even harder to ignore. But Beats by Dr. Dre is using the material to create wireless headphones that might offer some safety benefits. Today, the company announced limited-edition, $200 glow-in-the-dark Powerbeats created in collaboration with Japanese fashion brand Ambush.

Glow-in-the-dark Powerbeats 4
Beats by Dr. Dre

It’s the first time Beats has created a glow-in-the-dark product, and it’s the first time it has worked with Ambush, a brand that is probably best known for its line of comic-book-inspired “Pow!” necklaces.

Recommended Videos

“I live in the middle of Shibuya [Japan] and I am always inspired by how the city just glows at night time,” said Yoon Ahn, the co-founder and creative director for Ambush. “I thought it would be really cool to design a product that could capture that same city energy when you’re outside late at night listening to music.”

Related

With the exception of the glowing paint job, the presence of the Ambush logo, and an included co-branded ripstop pouch, there’s nothing that differentiates these Powerbeats from the company’s normal $150 Powerbeats 4 headphones. The extra $50 is pretty much for bragging rights.

Glow-in-the-dark Powerbeats 4
Beats by Dr. Dre

They feature 15-hour battery life, Apple’s H1 wireless chip for quick and easy pairing with Apple devices and hands-free Siri, and IPX4 water-resistance.

The phosphorescent material in the product’s paint is similar to many other glow-in-the-dark products. To charge it up, you expose it to a light source, whether natural or synthetic. Depending on how bright the light and how long the exposure, the Powerbeats will emit some of that light back in the form of a gentle greenish glow.

Beats wouldn’t offer a concrete number for just how long the glowing effect will last, but it’s, ahem, safe to say that the extra visibility it offers runners and other folks who like to get outside after the sun goes down will help increase safety for as long as it continues to glow.

The limited-edition Powerbeats will be available starting on November 18, at Apple.com, Dover Street Market, select Nordstrom stores, and Nordstrom.com.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics
Simon Cohen
Simon Cohen
Contributing Editor, A/V
Simon Cohen covers a variety of consumer technologies, but has a special interest in audio and video products, like…
There’s a massive Sonos sale happening this weekend
The Sonos Arc, Sub, and One SL speakers set up in a living room.

If you're unfamiliar with Sonos, it's one of the best-known companies for making high-end consumer audio, which often means you'll put down a lot of money to grab a Sonos product. Luckily, there are some great Sonos deals floating around this weekend, so if you want to grab a Sonos soundbar or subwoofer, now is absolutely the time to do it.
Sonos One SL -- $159, was $200

It's not often that you find a small speaker with a lot of sound behind it, but the Sonos One SL manages to be loud and provide you with great audio fidelity. You can also pair it up with a second Sonos One SL, which is really the ideal setup for stereo sound, and it works as a great replacement for traditional wired speakers. Whether you go for one or two, you can control them through the Sonos app,  and can even stream music using Apple AirPlay 2, which is quite a handy little feature to have.

Read more
Google’s entire Pixel Buds line is heavily discounted right now
Google Pixel Buds A-Series

Google has been making a lot of inroads in the electronics category, whether it's their range of smart home devices or smartphones. In the last couple of years, Google has also started pushing into the earbuds space with the Pixel Buds series, which are surprisingly good quality, and great value, especially if you want additional access to the Google ecosystem.
Google Pixel Buds A-Series -- $79, was $99

The Google Pixel Buds A-Series are somewhat of a culmination of Google's attempts to create an affordable set of earbuds, and at a competitive price, many people might say they managed to hit the nail on the head. Audio fidelity is great in the higher ranges, making this great for calls and vocals-heavy music, although it does suffer a bit in the mid and lower ranges. It also does have ANC, although it's not competitive with some other earbuds, such as the ones from Samsung, but it does have a nice little feature that automatically changes the volume as you move through noisier and quieter environments. As for battery life, you can expect 5 hours in the earbuds and another 17 hours in the case, so you get about 24 hours of charge time in total, which is excellent.

Read more
Usually $2,500, the 65-inch LG C2 OLED TV is over $1,000 off
An African landscape on the LG C2 OLED.

LG is one of the most well-known panel-making companies in the industry, along with Samsung, so when we see a new TV from LG come out that promises to buckle the trends, we listen. Luckily, the LG C2 is a perfect entry into the premium TV category, and with the deal from Woot bringing it down to $1,395 from the usual $2,500, it's an incredible steal.

Why you should buy the 65-inch LG C2 OLED TV
The first thing you might notice when receiving the LG C2 OLED TV is how incredibly light it is, just 37 pounds or so with the stand, which seems too low for something as powerful as the C2. Luckily, the OLED panel is sublime, with the ability to reproduce deep blacks, and the Alpha 9 Gen 5 processor does a great job at pumping out brightness while still maintaining detail. That's interesting given OLED's propensity to do better with Contrast, while QLED does deep blacks better, and while we have a deeper breakdown of QLED vs. OLED technology, suffice to say that OLED has a lot of advantages, from being easier on the eyes, having better viewing angles, and generally lower response times and input lag.

Read more