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How to use AirPods as hearing aids

How to use AirPods as hearing aids

Try this out and see if your ears could use a boost.

Leander Kahney
March 13, 2024

Apple reportedly will add hearing aid functionality to AirPods Pro in the iOS 18 update coming this summer.

But hang on, say what? Why is this dependent on iOS 18? What about the AirPods themselves — won’t they need some kind of hardware update to allow this?

Likely not. Thanks to external microphones (used for phone calls), active noise cancellation and Transparency Mode (which allows you to hear what’s going on around you while still listening to audio), Apple’s pro earbuds are already equipped, hardware-wise, to serve as hearing aids.

My own experience bears this out. I recently had to send my prescription hearing aids to the shop for battery replacement. While they were away, I used my AirPods Pro instead.

They worked pretty well in most situations, but they took a bit of setting up, including taking a hearing test to generate an audiogram (which you can do yourself for free).

I recommend you try this out, even if you don’t think you need to.

I had no idea about the extent of my own hearing loss until I got tested. And if you already own AirPods, they are a good, free way to dip your toes into the wonderful world of hearing aids without spending a ton of dough.

Also in today’s newsletter:

Imagine you’re lying on an operating table, and medical staff come in wearing a Vision Pro headset. Would you be freaked out or reassured?
This looks like a great power bank for your MacBook.
We were expecting new iPads last week. What happened? Perhaps a supply shortage has something to do with the delay?
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I was surprised by the results of yesterday’s poll (see below): Apple Cash isn’t as popular as I thought.
Don’t miss the X (aka tweet, below) about Brian Eno’s “addiction” to Photoshop. But I don’t think it was Photoshop he was addicted to!

— Leander Kahney, EIC.

How to use AirPods as hearing aids

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^{A message from the}^{Cult of Mac Deals team}

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^{A message from the Cult of Mac Deals team}

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Tweetz o’ the day

Brian Eno's diary entries on being being addicted to photoshop (1995)
— max (@maxbittker)
Mar 12, 2024

Apple Vision Pro is amazing
— Denis Rossiev ᯅ/acc (@Enuriru)
Mar 12, 2024

reintroducing the macbook 12".
M2 chip, starting at $699. this is the dream Mac for many. would you buy this?
— zell (@zellzoidesigns)
Mar 12, 2024

In case anyone was wondering, yes you can get more than 24 stand hours if you have a long enough flight east 🤓
— Marques Brownlee (@MKBHD)
Mar 12, 2024

One more thing ...

❝

I like to think that something survives after you die. It’s strange to think that you accumulate all this experience, and maybe a little wisdom, and it just goes away. So I really want to believe that something survives, that maybe your consciousness endures. But on the other hand, perhaps it’s like an on-off switch. Click! And you’re gone. Maybe that’s why I never liked to put on-off switches on Apple devices.

— Steve Jobs, 2011.

Today’s poll

Do you suffer from hearing loss?

Results from yesterday’s poll: Do you use Apple Cash?

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