With all of this Nothing Phone(1) business, it’s easy to forget that Nothing debuted with a pair of earbuds. They were called the Nothing Ear(1) and they received pretty positive reviews. They were notable because of their transparent build.

Now, the Nothing Ear(1) STICK earbuds were revealed

Any person with an ounce of tuition would guess that the successor to the Nothing ear(1) earbuds would be called the Nothing ear(2). However, it seems that Carl Pei is not done defying expectations. Mukul Sharma, a noted leakster, has posted an image of a pair of earbuds that bare the trademark Nothing aesthetic. They have the transparent design with white, black, and red accents. Printed on the transparent plastic is the text ear(1) STICK. These earbuds look really similar to the previous version with just a few minor differences. For starters, on the ear(1), we see two microphones on the ear(1)’s body (one on the bottom and one in the center right above the colored dot). On the STICK, we don’t see a microphone on the bottom and the one in the center is now circular. Next, there’s a side-mounted microphone on the earpiece for both iterations. However, the STICK’s microphone looks to be a bit bigger. Last, but not least, we see, under the STICK’s transparent plastic, two notable dots. These look like they could be the charging pins but viewed from the top side. That’s just speculation, so you’ll want to take that with a grain of salt.

This might not be the next generation

From the looks of the leaked image, these new buds are missing a microphone. If this is the case, then there’s the possibility that these are a cheaper version of the original Nothing ear(1) buds. These could be a version with less robust Active Noise Cancellation and less premium tech. This is just speculation, as the company has said nothing on these earbuds.