By 2050, nearly 2.5 billion people are projected to have some degree of hearing loss, and more than 700 million will require hearing rehabilitation, according to the World Health Organisation. Can technology help? Apple products come with several features that make life manageable. Here are some of the features to keep an eye on beyond International Hearing Day, which was observed earlier this week.
Noise app
The Noise app tracks decibel levels of the ambient sounds around you, helping you identify when sound levels in your environment, or from your headphones, could negatively affect your hearing. When you configure the Noise app on Apple Watch and connect compatible headphones, Control Centre shows you if the sounds playing through the headphones reach unsafe levels.
Music Haptics
It syncs the iPhone Taptic Engine — which creates your device’s vibrations — with the rhythm of songs so you can enjoy music with taps, textures and refined haptics. The great thing about the feature is that it works with millions of songs across the Apple Music catalogue.
Sound Recognition
File picture of Sound Recognition feature on the iPhone
The feature listens for certain sounds and uses on‑device intelligence to notify you when they are detected. The feature can identify 15 different sounds or you can train your device to listen for electronic sounds that are unique to your environment, like the beeping of appliances in your kitchen, specific types of alarms or doorbells. On HomePod, Sound Recognition can even detect the sound of a smoke or carbon monoxide alarm. That’s not all, it supports CarPlay. Your iPhone will listen for and detect sirens and horns. You’ll receive a notification — onscreen in your car if you’re using CarPlay — when a particular sound is detected.
Live Listen
The assistive listening feature helps you have conversations in noisy environments. Simply turn on the feature and move your device towards the people you’re talking with. Audio is picked up by the device’s microphone and sent to your wireless headphones or Made for iPhone hearing devices. As a result, you can hear what they’re saying more clearly.
Sensory Alerts
Your device lets you know when something’s up and ensures that you notice it. Choose visual or vibrating alerts for incoming Phone and FaceTime calls, new text messages, new and sent mail, and calendar events. You can set an LED light flash for incoming calls or have your iPhone display a photo of the caller. If you’re on your Mac, have it flash its screen when an app needs your attention. Or if you’re on the go, turn on the Taptic Engine on your Apple Watch to give you a gentle tap every time a notification comes in.
Closed Captions
Closed captions involve text transcription displayed on screen in sync with a video’s dialogue and action. In addition to transcribing speech in a scene, it also captures non-verbal communication, music and sound effects. Supported in apps like the Apple TV app, closed captions are available in more than 40 languages for movies, TV shows, videos and podcasts — just look for the CC icon.
Transcriptions
Transcripts offer full-text versions of whatever you’re listening to, making everything more accessible and immersive than ever. Get a full transcript of your favourite podcast on Apple Podcasts on your iPhone or iPad.
Mathures Paul