Olive Union Olive Max Hearing Aids: For Mild Hearing Loss

You don’t have to be practically deaf to make use of a listening to help. Many medical doctors urge sufferers to get started with the devices early, earlier than listening to loss turns into vital. Olive Union’s Olive Max is the primary hearing aid I’ve encountered designed for this particular goal, constructed for customers with “gentle to average” listening to loss, which the corporate defines as 26 to 55 decibels of loss. That’s proper consistent with my prognosis, so I figured I’d be an ideal candidate for these new gadgets.

Out of the field, you’re prone to say what I—and everybody I’ve been round—instantly stated once I first laid eyes on the Olive Max: They positive are large. Like, actually large. Every appears to be like like a Bluetooth headset from the early 2000s, besides you must put on two. At the least the models, in a two-tone white and grey design, look sporty, together with a wrap-around ear hook that helps hold them in place. Additionally they carry an IPX7 water-resistance rating. However at greater than 12 grams every, they’re a stable 4 or 5 instances the load of a typical over-the-counter hearing aid. A complete of eight totally different ear ideas, in three totally different types, are included within the package to make sure you get a very good match.

As listening to aids, the Olive Max models work roughly as marketed, and informal customers can pop them out of the field and into their ears to get began with minimal fuss, although getting them hooked over your ear correctly might be difficult, particularly should you put on glasses. Controls on the again of every help deal with quantity (independently for every ear) and let you choose considered one of 4 environmental modes (TV, Assembly Room, Outside, or Restaurant). You can even use the buttons to toggle “Hear-Via mode,” which helps you to flip off environmental audio processing altogether should you merely wish to use the Olive Max as Bluetooth earbuds.

You possibly can fine-tune your listening expertise within the My Olive app—although, bizarrely, the listening to help guide doesn’t point out that an app exists, and even that you should utilize the listening to aids as Bluetooth earbuds. (You need the My Olive app (Android, iOS), not the incompatible Olive Good Ear app.) The app lets you make the identical changes because the bodily controls, but it surely additionally presents a noise-reduction and feedback-cancellation characteristic (professional tip: max out each of those), and it features a extra detailed graphic equalizer that allows you to fine-tune frequency response additional.

You possibly can’t check your listening to instantly inside the app, though a brief questionnaire will hook you up with varied “AI-recommended presets” based mostly in your age and some different fundamental inputs. In order for you something extra refined, you’ll must delve into the equalizer by hand, however that is largely a trial-and-error state of affairs. It’s additionally value noting that the My Olive app consists of an audio remedy system designed to assist people with tinnitus. I don’t endure from tinnitus so I wasn’t certified to check this characteristic.

{Photograph}: Olive Union