The move away from Bluetooth Classic and towards Low Energy (LE) Audio is well underway with the latest release from Sennheiser, the Momentum True Wireless 4, bringing LC3 along with it. As DATAportl suspected many new models would, the new earbuds come equipped with dual-mode Bluetooth enabling Bluetooth Classic for when LE audio isn’t available on the source device. Naturally, this will help to bridge the gap when more smartphones are LE Audio enabled.

DATAportl expects the rise of LE audio to lead to numerous upgrades not only for headphones but also smartphones, creating a temporary uptick in the number of consumer devices shipped in the next five years. However, we believe this growth will only begin once Apple releases its first LE audio-compatible smartphone, which may well be held off until it has developed its own third-party codec enabling it to compete.