The End of AirPods’ Monopoly: Apple to Unlock Proximity Pairing and Smartwatch Replies

To comply with the European Union’s stringent Digital Markets Act (DMA), Apple is expected to introduce two pivotal features for the EU in the upcoming iOS 26.3 update: third-party device Proximity Pairing and more comprehensive notification interaction. This shift means that, within Europe, non-Apple headphones and smartwatches will be able to offer a pairing and connectivity experience approaching the seamlessness long associated with AirPods and the Apple Watch.

According to current beta notes and statements from EU officials, the changes are intended to give third-party developers a fairer competitive landscape. The new capabilities include:

• Proximity Pairing: Until now, connecting third-party Bluetooth headphones required users to navigate manually through Settings and search within the Bluetooth menu. With this feature enabled, supported third-party accessories—such as Sony headphones—will trigger an AirPods-style pairing card when brought close to an iPhone or iPad, allowing users to connect with a single tap and dramatically simplifying the process.
• Notifications and Interaction: In the future, third-party smartwatches such as those running Wear OS will not merely receive notifications from an iPhone; users will be able to view and reply to messages directly on the watch—an ability previously exclusive to the Apple Watch. Apple, however, has imposed a clear limitation: notifications can be forwarded to only one connected device at a time. In practice, enabling notifications on a third-party watch will automatically disable them on an Apple Watch.

Despite support for faster pairing, there are currently no indications that third-party devices will gain AirPods-like automatic switching between Apple devices such as the iPhone, iPad, and Mac. This once again reflects Apple’s familiar strategy in response to the DMA: doing the bare minimum required for compliance, while strictly confining these concessions to the European market.

For European consumers, the change is unquestionably positive. They will finally be free to choose the headphones or smartwatch they prefer without worrying about poor iPhone compatibility. For users elsewhere, this kind of region-specific software experience may feel distinctly unsatisfying.

Apple appears willing to invest in maintaining parallel system behaviors rather than globalizing these conveniences, a choice rooted in protecting the lucrative ecosystems surrounding AirPods and the Apple Watch. Once third-party wearables achieve full iPhone compatibility, the Apple Watch’s long-standing moat would inevitably be challenged.

These features are expected to roll out across the EU in 2026. Whether they will ever extend to other regions remains doubtful; unless local governments apply pressure comparable to the EU’s DMA—as Japan has begun to do—the likelihood appears vanishingly small.

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