Your Apple AirPods Pro Can Test Your Hearing in Five Minutes, But Is It Accurate?
With active noise-canceling and solid sound quality, Apple AirPods Pro are some of the best earbuds you can pair with your iPhone, but they can do a lot more than deliver great sound. No matter your age, it's important to do what you can to slow or prevent hearing loss, and AirPods Pro may actually be able to help with that. AirPods Pro 2 and 3 models have built-in hearing test and hearing aid features that are worth looking into, whether you think you're experiencing hearing loss or not.
The hearing test feature arrived in October 2024 along with iOS 18.1. It's touted by Apple as a "clinical-grade" test and can be completed in as little as five minutes. Given that commercially available health devices like heart rate monitors can vary widely in how effective they are, there's good reason to doubt just how good the AirPods Pro's hearing test could actually be. While it's no replacement for seeing an audiologist, the evidence shows that Apple's hearing test can deliver accurate results under the right conditions.
To even release the hearing test and hearing aid features, Apple had to receive FDA authorization.
