The hearing aid feature is now active on my phone in the UK (18.3.1)
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Hearing Aid UK
- Thread starter Sype10
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Apple haven’t updated the country list yet but I found this:
I haven’t updated yet but I will update my wife's iPhone later and see if it's finally available so I can compare the old Transparency feature I have been using since September with the "real" version to see if it's any better.
Hearing Aid feature available today with AirPods Pro 2
Apple’s groundbreaking Hearing Aid feature is now available on AirPods Pro 2 in the United Kingdom.
www.apple.com
I haven’t updated yet but I will update my wife's iPhone later and see if it's finally available so I can compare the old Transparency feature I have been using since September with the "real" version to see if it's any better.
My first impressions of the AirPods Pro 2s as hearing aids after finally updating to 18.3.1.
I updated my iPhone last night and did a hearing test and first impressions when comparing to the pre 18.1 transparency feature are mixed so far.
In the old Transparency mode I didn’t have to change any of the default settings but the latest version is very different. I've had to take the volume down quite a bit and I have the occlusion effect that I simply didn’t have before. Not much but it's annoying as it wasn't there before.
The sound was so natural before using the feature in 17.7.1 I had quite a shock when I first started using them with the volume. Tapping on my keyboard sounded like somebody kicking the wall next to me. It was loud. My wife rustled a bag next to me and it made my teeth itch it was so loud. The extra volume is going to be great for people who actually need it but I have found that my hearing is not that bad.
The Costco test showed I had moderate to severe hearing loss in my left ear and the right was mild to moderate. It seems that is not the case at all. I have very little hearing loss in my right ear and mild in my left. The only thing I can think why that might be, is that the Costco test was my very first hearing test and my reactions were not quick enough when I heard the tones.
Update: I've just been playing with the settings found that Adaptive Mode is much better for me. It's much closer to the way they worked before I updated and the occlusion effect has gone. Weirdly, the tinnitus in my left ear seems better too.
An update to my update. The hearing protection feature cancels a lot more noise than the previous version.
I updated my iPhone last night and did a hearing test and first impressions when comparing to the pre 18.1 transparency feature are mixed so far.
In the old Transparency mode I didn’t have to change any of the default settings but the latest version is very different. I've had to take the volume down quite a bit and I have the occlusion effect that I simply didn’t have before. Not much but it's annoying as it wasn't there before.
The sound was so natural before using the feature in 17.7.1 I had quite a shock when I first started using them with the volume. Tapping on my keyboard sounded like somebody kicking the wall next to me. It was loud. My wife rustled a bag next to me and it made my teeth itch it was so loud. The extra volume is going to be great for people who actually need it but I have found that my hearing is not that bad.
The Costco test showed I had moderate to severe hearing loss in my left ear and the right was mild to moderate. It seems that is not the case at all. I have very little hearing loss in my right ear and mild in my left. The only thing I can think why that might be, is that the Costco test was my very first hearing test and my reactions were not quick enough when I heard the tones.
Update: I've just been playing with the settings found that Adaptive Mode is much better for me. It's much closer to the way they worked before I updated and the occlusion effect has gone. Weirdly, the tinnitus in my left ear seems better too.
An update to my update. The hearing protection feature cancels a lot more noise than the previous version.
Last edited:
Another possibility is that your hearing changed since you took the
Cotsco test.
Your reactions show that the new hearing aid function really does work differently from the previous transparency feature. You either adjust to sounds like tapping on keyboard being louder, or you don't. This is why many people fail to adapt to hearing aids -- they find that putting up with the extra noise isn't worth the gains in communication effectiveness.
You're suggesting that my hearing has got better in four months?
Maybe they do now work a bit differently but by tweaking the volume, brightness and balance down a little I can still hear really well. My left ear is back to how it should be. At 50% volume (the default setting) they were much too loud across the frequencies and after tweaking and setting the volume to 35%.
Four months? I was under the impression you had been using the transparency feature in iOS 17 a lot longer than that.
And the degree of discrepancy between your Cotsco test and the iOS 18 hearing test is so big, it's hard to explain. I'm just suggesting you shouldn't rule anything out. Badly administered test is a possibility, but so is dramatic change in hearing.
Good to hear you found a volume level that works for you.
