Apple just put its strongest open-ear noise cancellation on the cheapest AirPods it sells. AirPods 5 start at $129 and include Active Noise Cancellation on both models, a change from last generation when that feature cost $179. The $149 version adds a wireless charging case, an extra hour of listening, and a volume swipe on the stem. Pre-orders opened today, September 9, 2026, with store availability on September 18.
Apple spent years watching other companies ship foldable phones. John Ternus used his first September event as CEO to close that gap with iPhone Duo, a short, wide book-style handset that closes like a passport and opens into a 7.6-inch Super Retina XDR display. Ternus called it the most transformational change to iPhone since the original.
Hubble’s latest monthly image, posted by ESA and NASA last week, frames N44, also listed as LHA 120-N44, a nebula in the Large Magellanic Cloud. Sitting 160,000 light-years away in Dorado, this companion galaxy to the Milky Way gives researchers a nearby laboratory for busy star birth, close enough that dust and distance do not hide the action the way they often do inside our own spiral.
Nintendo revealed Metroid Ravenous in its September Direct and set a firm date of January 28, 2027, exclusive to Switch 2. Samus Aran is already hurt when the story starts. Unknown attackers drain her energy on an alien moon, then send her tumbling into desert sand. She has to claw her way back to the surface first. Getting off the moon comes second, and the odds look thin.
Peter Ryseck built a pole that balances on a contact patch about the size of a coin and stays there long after most people would have walked away. Four drone propellers sit on a 3D-printed mount at the top and give small sideways pushes whenever the shaft begins to tip. Nearly all of the weight still travels down the tube and into the ground, so those motors spend most of their time barely above idle.