There are three kinds of people who get new tech first — tech journalists, people who worked on the project, and big celebrities to show it off before it hits shelves. LeBron James is a big fan of Apple’s Beats brand — and it looks like we just got our first glimpse of a new Beats Pill Bluetooth speaker thanks to a video of the NBA superstar.
Clad from head to toe in black, the Lakers player swings a pill-shaped speaker from its chord in a video posted to the Lakers Instagram feed. There’s not much you can tell from the video, apart from one thing — it’s nothing like the previous Pill, the Pill+, and that’s been discontinued for two years.
The Return of the Pill
Beats Pill Bluetooth speakers were a popular option for those looking for a small, attractive Bluetooth speaker, and the cool factor of it also being used by some of the biggest megastars on the planet was always a bonus. It sat on the recording tables of the likes of will.i.am, and in the training rooms of basketball stars like Lebron, giving them the air of exclusivity and ‘if they’re good enough for them, they’re good enough for me’.
Alas, Apple discontinued the Beats Pill in 2022, with little rhyme or reason to the decision — although it looks like the funkiest Bluetooth speaker is back if the silvery-looking sound oval that hangs from LeBron’s finger is anything to go by. What’s new? Well, for one, it seems to adopt a shape more akin to the older, cylindrical pill rather than the more conventional shape of the Pill+ that we last saw.
Is the bag in his other hand the case for the speaker? It looks awfully big, so probably not. We can tell there’s going to be a chord attached to the speaker, so big news for those who like to hang their Bluetooth speaker from things. There’s that color too — a bright silver, with what looks like a white back. There’s not much else you can tell from the short video, but it's a tantalizing taste of what Beats might have to offer.
Apple seems to have been bringing Beats back to the forefront of the Bluetooth sound space, updating headphones like the Studio Pro, and the Buds+. There are rumors of the Beats Solo4 coming soon as well, so a new Beats Pill would be nice to see, rounding out the lineup with something that isn’t a pair of headphones. Whatever happens, we can’t wait to get our hands on the potential new Pill and put it through its paces — it might even find its way amongst the best Bluetooth speakers. Maybe Lebron will let us borrow his?
“Dear Mr Lebron James, if I can get three more baskets than you in a small, one-on-one, will you let me…”
