Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've never understood why people complain so much about the environmental impact of AirPods. I mean it would be great if they were rechargeable and recyclable etc - but they weigh 4g - about 1/50 of a pair of headphones. If the average person uses them for 2 years they'll be a drop in the ocean to the tens or hundreds of kilos of plastic and other objects they don't recycle fully in that time.
I got curious, and did some back of the envelope mathematics / Fermi estimation. > Analysts estimate Apple sold between 14 million and 16 million AirPods in 2017.[38] In 2018, AirPods were Apple's most popular accessory product, with 35 million units sold.[39][40] 60 million units were sold in 2019. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AirPods In 2020, another 114 million units were sold. https://www.businessofapps.com/data…
It’s about equivalent to a weeks worth of plastic Starbucks cups every morning and far less than the packaging on a average shopping trip.