Having previously been available in the US and elsewhere, Apple has now rolled out its superb hearing aid feature in the UK – it works with its flagship AirPods Pro 2 wireless earbuds.
The update was previously unavailable for UK users due to ‘regulatory restrictions’ as it needed approval from the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC). A new policy for this was set out in mid-January, giving the green light for Apple (and others) to offer the feature.
The Hearing Aid feature joins the multitude of extra updates that have rolled out to Apple’s AirPods Pro 2 over the last 18 months or so, including adaptive noise cancellation, personalised volume and conversation awareness.
Whereas those features are nice to haves though, the Hearing Aid feature is set to be a real game changer for those of us who struggle with our hearing. So it could be that – like me – you have trouble hearing conversations in loud spaces or it could be that your general hearing is muffled. The intent is that you can stay more connected to the people around you and reduce any social isolation, particularly for people who don’t want to get full-time hearing aids.
Once set up, you can use the same hearing profile for other things you enjoy through your AirPods, too, such as movies or music and phone calls too.
In order to enable the Hearing Aid feature to boost audio around you, you first undergo a Hearing Test. This does what it says it does, giving you a clear summary of your results including a number that represents the hearing loss in your ears. You may also get tips to help you with your hearing, too. The test takes around five minutes to complete.
There’s also an audiogram. All of this is stored in the Health app where it stays private unless you decide to share it a heathcare provider.
The feature was present in the iOS 18 software from December, but it has been enabled for UK users via a server-side update, meaning you’ll probably already have it if you have AirPods Pro 2 with the latest software onboard.
