Since iPhone 7, Apple smartphones have been shipping with wired EarPods that connect to the Lightning port, but that prevents you from using them with your USB-C based Mac or 2018 iPad Pro without a special adapter, like this little new dongle from accessory maker Anker.

Approved by Apple via the “Made for iOS” certification program, the accessory features lossless audio quality thanks to full digital 48KHz/24-bit transmission. And don’t worry, this cool adapter also supports handy mic and remote controls while connected to your USB-C devices.

Aside from Apple’s own Lightning-based EarPods and the Beats urBeats3 earbuds with Lightning connector, the audio dongle works with third-party Lightning headphones (believe me, those do exist somewhere out there), including these models:

  • Apogee Sennheiser AMBEO Smart Headset, including binaural recordin
  • Audeze iSINE LX, LCDi4, iSINE20, iSINE10, SINE and EL-8 Titanium
  • Pioneer Rayz, Rayz Plus and Rally
  • Radius HP-NEL21, HP-NEL31, HC-M100L and HP-NHL21

According to Anker, the dongle takes advantage of USB Audio Class 2 for plug and play compatibility. It works with other Lightning-based audio products, not just headphones.

The Verge has more:

So if you’ve got something like a microphone that plugs in over Lightning, this might not be what you need to get it working through a USB-C port.

Anker also notes that it’s not a charging adapter.

This is an extremely handy adapter, albeit a bit on the pricey side, that we wish was released back when Apple started bundling iPhones with their wired, Lightning-based EarPods.

You can get the adapter for $30 a pop through Amazon.