New AirPods Pro Hearing Aid Mode Is Like Reading Glasses for Your Ears

In iOS 18, Apple plans to turn your AirPods Pro into hearing aids, and the results could be profound.

According to insider reports relayed by Apple rumormonger supreme Mark Gurman, Apple is planning to combine several existing AirPods features that will turn them into hearing aids. This, combined with a change in US law regarding over-the-counter hearing aids last year, could suddenly help millions of people who would need hearing aids, but would otherwise never use them.

"This, this will be a game changer for people with mild hearing loss for whom it’s not worth spending thousands of bucks on hearing aids," fitness expert, app designer, and deaf iPhone user Graham Bower told Lifewire via DM.

Hear Wear

To see why this is such a big deal, let’s think about a parallel device: reading glasses. If you’re having trouble seeing the words on the page or the screen, you can easily try on a few pairs of reading glasses next time you’re at the drug store or wherever, buy a pair for a few dollars, and the problem is solved. Maybe you really need a more complex lens prescription, or you just picked the wrong strength, but at least you’ve improved things in the short term.

Imagine that instead of this easy procedure, you had to see a specialist, undergo various tests, and then spend thousands of dollars on a pair of custom-fitted reading glasses. You wouldn’t bother.

By including hearing-aid functionality in its existing AirPods, Apple essentially brings the reading-glasses model to people with mild hearing loss. AirPods Pro might cost more than a pair of dime-store reading glasses, but they cost way less than a pair of hearing aids. And if you already own some AirPods Pro, then it’s free to try.

To be clear, we’re not suggesting that AirPods will replace properly-fitted personally-tailored hearing aids for everyone. AirPods will likely never be able to help people with extreme hearing loss or profound deafness, but that’s not the point. It means that millions of people who would otherwise suffer through their hearing loss, doing nothing, will have another easy option—especially for folks who feel stigmatized by regular hearing aids.

AirPod Accommodations

Apple’s new AirPod hearing-aid mode looks like it will combine already-existing features to do its magic: transparency mode, and headphone accommodations. All AirPods Pro users know about transparency mode. It’s the one that plays your music or podcast while also letting through an attenuated, volume-matched version of the ambient sounds around you, a kind of augmented reality for hearing.

Headphone accommodations is a less well-known feature, but it can already be used with any AirPods except first-gen plain AirPods. It lets you tweak the output of the AirPods to match your hearing—boosting high frequencies, for example. You can also upload an audiogram, a chart that shows hearing test results, into an iPhone to create your custom audio setup.

“With Headphone Accommodations you can upload your audiogram and it adjusts the sound to your needs,” says Bower. “With Live Listen added, it is just the same as hearing aids”

By combining these two technologies—transparency mode and headphone accommodations—Apple can turn the AirPods Pro into hearing aids. Hearing aids that integrate perfectly with your iPhone, Mac, iPad, or Vision Pro headset, and look cool while they do it.

So why now? Last year, the FDA changed the rules to allow over-the-counter (OTC) hearing aids. Previously, only Personal sound amplification products (PSAPs) were available over the counter. PSAPs are blunt instruments that boost sound but with little finesse. The FDA’s rule change allowed actual hearing aids to be sold without lengthy and expensive processes. This legislation also allows Apple to use the term "hearing aid" to describe the feature in iOS 18.

"Only one-third of people who could benefit from a hearing aid actually get one,” Rebecca Lewis, audiologist and audiology director of the Adult and Pediatric Cochlear Implant Program at the Pacific Neuroscience Institute at Providence Saint John's Health Center in Santa Monica told Lifewire in response to a question about OTC hearing aids. “Hopefully OTCs will improve access and encourage individuals to treat their communication difficulties."

AirPods Pro won’t replace high-end hearing aids—not unless Apple adds more complex signal processing to significantly boost audio frequencies—but that’s not the point. The point is that anyone will have easy access to hearing aids, at a price that’s still quite a bit lower than the alternatives, and which doesn’t require them to stop listening to music and other audio while they use them. Like reading glasses, only for ears. It’s a pretty big deal.