Apple Lightning EarPods and (top) an adapter for users of older EarPods models.
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Users who haven't yet bought the Short Lightning EarPods Adapter — After eight years of use, Apple’s 3.5mm headphone jack is now a goner, as the iPhone 7 accessory appears to be discontinued.
Apple’s Phil Schiller might have called the iPhone 7’s ditching of the headphone jack “brave,” but the company didn’t dare ditch wired headphones entirely. Instead, it simultaneously released a short, chunky Lightning to 3.5mm adapter and included it in the box with the iPhone 7, iPhone 8, and iPhone X and XS models.
Released in September 2016, the adapter is still available for $9 eight years later. It’s now sold out in the US and most other online Apple Stores.
It’s still available to order from the online Apple Store in a few countries, including France and Sweden, as first spotted by MacRumors.
While Apple hasn’t announced it’s discontinuing it, it’s likely that even overseas stores will stop selling the adapter once current stock runs out.
It’s possible that after eight years, the AirPods’ ubiquity is such that sales are too low to justify continuing. It’s also true that the adapter was one of the last Apple products to use Lightning.
More recently, Apple’s Magic accessories were the last to be updated to use USB-C, meaning the iPhone 14 and iPhone SE are now the only devices still using the older connector.
However, if the adapter has been quietly discontinued, that doesn’t mean Apple has completely stopped selling a way for iPhone users to use any wired headphones. The company still sells its own wired EarPods with USB-C, Lightning, or 3.5mm connectors.
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