Why are AirPods Pro 2 Hearing Aid features not available in the UK?

Perhaps read my post again - I wasn’t “blaming the NHS” or “waiting for a test”

I was saying a recently had an NHS test and the results were identical to the AirPod test (enabled via the hack)

I’m more than capable of doing my homework but this feature was heavily marketed to UK customers without too much of a warning of its limited availability on launch - I’m sure it will come soon enough

@rasg thank you for the helpful reply. @me: AAARGH - look before you leap. I updated to 18 SPECIFICALLY to access the HA feature (as suggested by Apple). Oh well.

But back to the point: by "...an older IOS you could set them up on that" are you suggesting that you can configure the AirPods to an audiogram on an old device and that will persist onto the new one?

No I'm not BUT the AirPods work totally on their own once you have set them up with a device with an older IOS. To change settings you will need to use the device you set them up with. It's not ideal but they work fine. I never update anything until I know it works and the bugs have gone. And there are always bugs. On my M2 Mac Mini I am still on Ventura as it will cost me £500 to update our restaurant ordering system. It's good to have the latest for the new goodies if the bugs have been squashed but not at the expense of anything else.

For the first time ever Apple are now preventing you from going back to an older IOS.

Don’t know if this is a naive question but could you re assign the iPad

to an available region in settings e.g from UK to Ireland? where it is

available.

That would be the easiest fix ever! It won't make any difference. The only way you will get the Hearing Aid Feature in a country where they AirPods haven’t been approved is to set them up with an older IOS on a different device. In 18.1 or newer they won't work.

Not sure what ‘rasg’ is saying: transparency mode was always available regardless of iOS version. Those upgrading to 18 lost the hearing aid functionality and the hearing test which in turn feeds the ‘custom eq’ in Accessibility. Transparency mode and adaptive transparency was always there. 18.2 restores the hearing test and the ability to load the resultant audiogram into custom eq. Not sure what extra the ‘hearing aid’ function gives other than a name and official approval but this small step makes me a bit happier - I found transparency with the accessibility bits and ‘conversation boost’ was pretty good itself - will be interesting to see what an audiogram brings to this.

Well. Appears I’m wrong the hearing test will be there but one can’t link the audiogram to the headphone accommodation settings and set up a custom eq. 8-(

A pre 18 iOS is the only way so far…

Best I don’t update my iPad Pro.

Does anyone know if the custom eq persists on the buds, or does the custom setting get set according to the device its attached to?

The custom EQ persists on the AirPods. If you have set them up, for example, on an iPad Pro, it's bit big to cart around with you BUT you won't be able to change settings. The stems of the AirPods do allow you to change some basic settings though but I've never explored them.

very interested in this feature. Given hearing aids can cost north of £3k there might be kick back from the manufacturers. However. The MHRA statement is bizzare in that a simple search on pard show apple have registered for hearing aids in 2021.

confused I am

very interested in this feature. Given hearing aids can cost north of £3k there might be kick back from the manufacturers. However. The MHRA statement is bizzare in that a simple search on pard show apple have registered for hearing aids in 2021.

confused I am.

The original AirPod Pros had the hearing aid feature back in 2019. Apple didn’t market them as such but it's always been there.

Very annoyed - I bought AirPods Pro 2 at an airport where all the adverts said they include Hearing Aid feature.

Only after hours of fiddling (with frankly embarrassingly bad user experience) I came across an article that says the advertised Hearing Aid feature is not available in the UK at all!

If there ever was a clear case of false advertising, this is the one.

I’ve been massively frustrated by this. As I already have hearing aids, being able to apply my audiogram, was he main reason for getting the AirPod pros at Christmas.

had several calls with apple health team and got nowhere

really think someone has messed up though. The ability to do this was there, but they moved it in ios18. In uk though we don’t have enjoyed access to the section to get to media assist (which is what it’s now called)

Why can't Apple release in the UK with a caveat saying something like:

The hearing aid feature is not approved for use in your country use at your own risk and loads more T&C (agree/no agree)

It's not like they are that good anyway due to their limited battery life and won't last the whole day.

I have a pair of NHS hearing aids which use a battery, not ideal, but they do last the best part of a week and actually are very good (I hear 3K private ones aren't much better). I'm luckily enough to live in an area served by Specsavers but did need a referral from my GP. However, the Pro's are useful as a backup, or in the evening just to watch TV etc. and they are much better at handing off to my Mac or iPad. The NHS ones will only pair with my iPhone and refuse to pair with my Mac.

Interested to know if you ever worked out a way of applying your audiogram to music and movies etc using the iPad,

I’ve tried this option as my iPad is older, but as you can’t get the health app on an iPad, my audiogram isn’t there

ive also tried a very old iPhone running 15.8 but that didn’t work either.

do think someone at apple has really messed up here. Removing an existing function from Headphone Accommodations and putting it into the AirPod hearing health section (ie the very area we in the uk can’t now get into!!!!)

I do already have hearing aids, and have up to now used nuraphones for music. Bought the AirPods specially to be able to finally hear music tuned to my own audiogram though

I have mine working on a 2018 iPad running 17.7.1, the same IOS I have one my iPhone.

Have you tried taking a photo of your audiogram and loading the data from it manually?

Audiogram success

whilst in the uk we still don’t have the hearing aid feature, the latest iOS update does finally include the option to apply audiogram to media.

having a moderate hearing loss in the higher frequencies I have to say the impact of applying this is amazing

In that case we should be getting the feature with the next update 🤞

Let's hope so because we don't know how long the MHRA will take to approve them. Then there is the wait from Apple while they create the update.

Even when it arrives I won't be applying the update on my iPhone until I have tried it on a different device to see that all the options I currently have that are pre 18.1 are still there.