Soundcore Expands Thus AI Chip Across New Audio Lineup at IFA 2026
At IFA 2026 in Berlin, Soundcore announced four new audio products: the Space 2 Pro headphones, AeroClip 2 and AeroClip 2 Pro open clip earbuds, and the Liberty Buds 2. The lineup shares a common silicon foundation in Anker's Thus processing chip, which the company is expanding across its portfolio after introducing it in April alongside the Liberty 5 Pro series (The Verge).
The Soundcore Space 2 Pro marks the first headphones to utilize the Thus chip. The over-ear model uses a 6-microphone array for voice isolation and eight microphones for adaptive active noise cancellation. Soundcore claims the Space 2 Pro's ANC is 1.5 times stronger than the previous-generation Space One Pro across the 20Hz to 2,000Hz frequency range. The headphones support high-res audio via LDAC and use Soundcore's HearID listening preference test to create customized sound profiles. Battery life is rated at 60 hours of listening time at 50 percent volume, 30 hours with ANC on, or 20 hours of talk time on a single charge. The Space 2 Pro launches on September 22 for $200 in gray, white, and black, with availability in the US, EU, and UK (The Verge).
The AeroClip 2 open clip earbuds also include the Thus chip and will retail for $170 in black, red, white, and blue at its September 22 launch. The AeroClip 2 Pro steps up the feature set with AI note-taking capability, recording online meetings and phone calls alongside in-person interactions. The Pro model uses 11mm dual-diaphragm drivers, supports LDAC hi-res audio, and provides about 10 hours of playback at 50 percent volume, with 30 hours total including the charging case. It includes a free AI transcription starter plan providing 120 minutes per month for 24 months, with an option to subscribe for additional transcription minutes. AeroClip 2 Pro pricing and a firm launch date were not announced; the product is expected later in the year (The Verge).
The Soundcore Liberty Buds 2 are 4.7-gram earbuds that include the Thus chip for call clarity and use a 6-microphone ANC system. They will be available in purple, black, and white on September 22 for $130 (The Verge).
Anker describes the Thus AI chip as the world's first neural-network compute-in-memory AI audio chip (Anker). Designed specifically for wearables, Thus supports HearID 5.0, performing hearing profile analysis, audio detail restoration, and environment adaptation in parallel on-chip (Anker). Anker markets the chip as delivering on-device audio AI with 150x computing performance. In Soundcore earbuds, the Thus chip uses 8 sensors to process 384,000+ noise signals per second, enabling multimodal noise reduction that monitors both ambient noise and residual noise in the ear canal in real time (Anker). Prior to this expansion, Soundcore equipped its Space 2 earbuds with 10 sensors and the Thus chip to provide clear calls in environments exceeding 100 dB of noise (Soundcore).
Beyond the audio lineup, Anker also launched an AI-powered home hub at IFA 2026 alongside the new Soundcore products (Tom's Guide).
The strategy behind pushing Thus across product tiers is straightforward. Compute-in-memory architectures reduce the power penalty associated with shuttling data between separate memory and processing blocks, a constraint that matters acutely in battery-limited wearables. By handling inference directly on-device, Thus sidesteps cloud latency for noise processing and keeps the audio data pipeline local. For products like the AeroClip 2 Pro, which transcribes meetings and calls, local processing also limits the exposure surface for sensitive audio data before it reaches a transcription backend.
The inclusion of a tiered transcription model on the AeroClip 2 Pro is worth flagging. Hardware-attached software subscriptions are a model the consumer audio industry has largely avoided. Tying a monthly minute quota to earbud hardware creates a recurring revenue dependency that differs from the standard one-time-purchase model for audio gear. The 24-month free window functions as an extended trial, and the conversion rate to paid transcription tiers will likely determine whether this feature expands to other Soundcore products.
Looking at the product mix, Soundcore is using Thus to standardize signal-processing capabilities across open-clip, in-ear, and over-ear form factors simultaneously. For engineers tracking the integration of AI silicon into consumer peripherals, the IFA 2026 lineup provides a concrete case study in scaling custom neural hardware from flagship earbuds to broader product categories.
