I've only been using Apple's new AirPods Pro for a few hours, but it already feels like the upgrade we've been waiting for

During my first hour with Apple's new AirPods, I wore them during a quick walk around New York City's Financial District and while I worked in my office.

The noise cancellation feature worked well enough to dull the sound of busy traffic and boisterous construction as I strolled around downtown New York. When I set up shop in my office's kitchen to work for the rest of the afternoon, the earbuds successfully drowned out the voices of coworkers chatting nearby.

The difference between the AirPods Pro and the regular AirPods in this regard is certainly noticeable: I could subtly hear the muffled voices of my coworkers in the background, but couldn't make out what they were saying with noise cancellation turned on using the AirPods Pro. I noticed when I switched to the standard AirPods that much more sound was able to get through and I was able to make out words and sentences.

One of my only gripes with Apple's standard AirPods has been that it can difficult to commute with them in New York City given how loud the subway typically is — especially as trains screech and grind to a halt. The AirPods Pro should help with this.

If you want to be able to hear what's happening in your surroundings, you can also kick the AirPods Pro into transparency mode. This can be done through the Control Center on your iPhone or by pressing and holding on a groove located on the AirPods Pro's stem.

As previously mentioned, you can press and hold sensors located on the stems to perform certain actions through the AirPods Pro. A long press switches between transparency and noise cancellation mode, while a quick press pauses or plays music or answers a call. You can also press twice to skip forward or three times to rewind.

Although Apple's original AirPods may have earned some ridicule back in 2016 because of their elongated stems, the AirPods Pro gave me a new appreciation for this design. It makes it easy to quickly find exactly where you need to press if you want to perform an action like pausing or switching to transparency mode without using your phone. Gesture options for other devices, like the Echo Buds, often entail pressing and holding on the part of the bud that fits in your ear, which I've always found to be uncomfortable.

Even after spending just about two hours with the new AirPods Pro, I can tell that they improve on the originals in a few important ways.

The new design feels lightweight and comfortable and even more secure than their predecessors. And the noise cancellation is bound to make them much more useful compared to regular AirPods, especially for those who plan to use them in a noisy gym, during a bustling city commute, or to drown out distractions in a busy office.

The real question is whether or not they're worth the higher price, and that largely depends on what you're priorities are and how much you're willing to spend. Chances are, if you have an iPhone, you're probably already eyeballing a pair of AirPods over rivals like the Galaxy Buds and Amazon Echo Buds, both of which are priced at $130.

I'll have to spend more time using them before providing a more definitive recommendation, but if that's the case, you'll probably want to take a look at the Powerbeats Pro as well — they run on the same chip as the AirPods but offer longer battery life and are a bit cheaper.

If you're deciding between the AirPods and AirPods Pro, your choice will boil down to how important features like noise cancellation and wireless charging are to you. If you're the type of person that wears headphones throughout the work day, it might be worth spending the extra $50 to get noise cancellation compared to the $200 second-generation AirPods with the wireless charging case.

But if you just want the basic AirPods experience — headphones that connect to your iPhone quickly and effortlessly and offer decent sound quality, without frills like wireless charging, it may be worth sticking with the cheaper $160 standard pair.

Our full review will have more details about how the AirPods Pro compare to the regular version, what the sound quality is like, and more.