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Breakdown/repair rates of various hearing aids?

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I looked up ‘repair’ herein and it’s mostly people wanting fixed.
Is there any good information or data about which brands have a greater or lesser instances of having to be repaired??
For example, I remember someone several years ago telling me their Phonak HA often needed repairs…
My super ancient never needed repairs other than reconditioning.
Now I have a ‘modern’ HA and it’s died after only 3 years.
In terms of maybe having to get a new aid I’m interesting what brands need repairs more often than others…??
Thank you!!

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You need to confirm what the issue is with your before claiming a failure, could be anything, and no there’s no one particular brand that’s any better or worse then others, they all have issues at some point in time.

That’s not my question.
My question, rephrased, is ‘What brand(s) need repairs more often than other brand(s)??’
There’s not any information in this forum about this topic.
This question is independent of my own HA.

Rechargeable hearing aids break much less than disposable battery powered hearing aids because they are completely sealed.

(Says Jordan as he ducks under the table in anticipation of flying objects :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:)

Jordan

There is no great data regarding this question. Two sources I’ve seen: 1) Hearing Tracker used to post a survey of audiologist’s opinions on different hearing aid brands. Phonak and Oticon consistently were mentioned as most reliable but answers are likely skewed because those are also the most popular hearing aid brands. Consumer Reports also has a survey and all the major brands (Phonak, Oticon, Signia, Resound and Widex were listed as very good, as well as all of the Costco brands) Starkey was the only major brands listed as less than very good reliability.

In reply to @tom12010

@tom12010 said:

My question, rephrased, is ‘What brand(s) HAs need repairs more often than other brand(s)??’

Well that was answered, there’s NO one brand better then any others, they all breakdown at some point for whatever reason, Phonak has some issues with rechargeable batteries and chargers, Jabra microphones were getting some feedback on the forum, look at it this way, what phone or TV, Car has the most issues? So it’s just too hard to say as we all have different opinions.

@tenkan said:

Well that was answered, there’s NO one brand better then any others, they all breakdown at so

Also it depends on how well the owner looks after their hearing aids.

I’ve never had a hearing aid break down (apart from when I threw them down the toilet as a baby/toddler) but my Step Mum keeps breaking hearing aids as she doesn’t care for them properly.

Yes, very difficult to obtain hard, useful data on this, and much depends on how users take care of/sweat on their (getting such data for cars is far easier).

I am not an expert on this, but I suspect the chipsets that go into these devices are all made by the same clique of major chipmakers (like TSMC and Samsung), so that is not a strong variable in the equation.

In reply to @tom12010

@tom12010 said:

My question, rephrased, is ‘What brand(s) HAs need repairs more often than other brand(s)??’

Its a valid question but no one here seems know a good data source.

As @MDB says Consumer Reports seems to be closest to what you are asking. Their relaibility rating for Philips, Jabra (prescription), Rexton, Phonak, Widex, Resound etc are all 4 / 5. Eargo, Jabra (), Starkey and others are 3.5. How good is the data - hard to know.

@tenkan said:

look at it this way, what phone or TV, Car has the most issues? So it’s just too hard to say as we all have different opinions.

I think @tom12010 is looking for data not opinions. There is good data on which cars / car brands are more reliable.

@coastal_california said:

I think @tom12010 is looking for data not opinions. There is good data on which cars / car brands are more reliable

Yep I know that, that’s why I stated there’s nothing but the option of people who use them, oh and that goes for cars and phones etc it’s all hearsay, no scientific data available to say which is better then others, I’d take my mechanics word like any clinic trying to say which is the better brand bah bah, including consumer reports! Oh dear next it’ll be “I read it on Reddit”

This thread reminds me a bit of those two-page reports that you get and can be summarized as: “This information is unavailable in the public domain”.

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