Last year the FDA created a new category of hearing aids that can be purchased over-the-counter without a prescription, a medical exam, or a fitting. And with that in mind, Apple could be poised to enter this market with the AirPods Pro. According to Mark Gurman in the latest edition of his Power On newsletter, we shouldn’t expect to see any changes to the AirPods Pro hardware in 2024. Instead, Gurman writes that the “big news will be a major new hearing aid mode, coming alongside iOS 18.”
Back in November 2022, we told you about a study conducted at the Taipei Veterans General Hospital in Taiwan. An AirPods Pro and an AirPods 2, each paired to an iPhone, used the handsets’ Live Listen feature which employs the microphone on an iPhone to amplify sound and send it to a pair of AirPods. The author of the study, Yen-Fu Cheng, concluded that “These wireless earbuds are of course not perfect, but they would be a good starting point for many patients who don’t have access to professional hearing aids. They will see an increase in quality of life even with these earbuds.”
In 2016 Apple received a patent for biometric sensors that collect personal health data via a pair of earbuds
Cheng also felt that due to the “social stigma” of wearing hearing aids, some people experiencing hearing loss might feel better wearing a pair of AirPods. After all, a survey showed that 75% of Americans won’t wear a hearing aid because it makes them look too old. On the other hand, wearing a pair of AirPods might make someone look more “with it” (for lack of a better phrase).