Leaked macOS Tahoe Build Exposes Camera AirPods Architecture

Code in an early macOS Tahoe 26.7 build reveals Apple's camera-equipped AirPods in unprecedented detail. Each earbud carries an RGB camera capturing stills up to 1 megapixel, synchronized via accelerometers accounting for head movement. On-device processing, labeled "peripheral inference" in code, handles preliminary computation. The system captures periodic stills for Visual Intelligence, not video, and rejects frames degraded by motion or occlusion.