Your iPhone earplugs may not work with other devices in future

Washington: You will not be able to use your iPhone earplugs with other devices in the near future.

Apple has modified the "Made for iPhone" (MFi) standard to include headphones that connect to iOS devices via the "Lightning" port instead of the headphone jack, according to media reports.

Currently, the Apple-made EarPods use a regular 3.5 mm headphone jack and hence they can be used with any other device with a 3.5 mm audio port.

It also means you can use virtually any other pair of non-apple headphones with your iPhone.

But that is not going to be for long.

The port switch could also means headphones could be made to work exclusively with a particular app - or even launch a specific app once they are plugged in.

So, instead of being able to plug in your EarPods and listen to whatever streaming music app you want, a pair of future EarPods could only work with the iOS Music app and iTunes Radio.