I wonder if anyone has any sense of when a successor to Oticon More might come along. I think they’ve been out for two years or so.
I was an early adopter of OPNs and should replace them within the next year. I could just go for Mores, but, but…You know how it is.
FWIW, I’m in the disposable batt camp – I have the impression that the recent pattern among manufacturers is to launch with rechargeables and then add disposables later. So that could be a factor too.
A successor to the More seems likely, but there’s often little warning to an announcement. There’s a big audiology conference coming up in April. Don’t know if manufacturers sometimes time releases around it or not. Guessing what manufacturers will do really is a crapshoot. Are your current Mores still under warranty? If so, send them back for new ones and wait things out with new hearing aids and no time pressure.
My audiologist has told me that a new generation of receivers will be released this year, that should be more accurate at frequency response and possibly a wider frequency range. I have been wearing the More1 aids since June of 2021 and love them. Know the connectivity issues has been a problem for so many, but I don’t wear aids just for the connectivity I wear the More1 aids because I can finally understand speech to the point I don’t mind be part of a conversation. I have even told my audiologist that Oticon will have to pull off a miracle to come up with a better solution for me. I do expect a new generation of Oticon aids this fall or next spring. But from what I can tell Oticon has been busy trying to fix connectivity issues that I feel that are mostly caused by Apple.
The Oticon OPN came out in 2016, followed by the OPN S in 2019, followed by the More in 2021. If you observe this pattern, it seems likely that within a 3 year time frame, there would be an incremental platform improvement for the More, like the Velox platform for the OPN became the Velox S platform for the OPN S. So maybe in 2024 there will be a Polaris S platform for the More S or something like that.
The More is a major leap from the OPN and OPN S, and it’s hard to see how Oticon can top themselves with something better than the More so soon. So I’m just guessing here that in 2024, Oticon may release an incremental improvement release like a More S on a Polaris S platform. I’m guessing that the More S on Polaris S is still going to be a neural network based design, albeit now even better trained with more data sets because Oticon has had more time to collect more data for its AI after 2-3 years out in the market.
I really don’t know what the next major breakthrough for the industry would be after AI. It seems like almost all the major HA mfgs have already started to get caught up to offer an AI solution in one form or another. But the AI in the Oticon More uses pre-trained data. Maybe the next step would be to use an AI that can collect each user’s personal data (exposure to their own environments) to “self train” on-the-fly next.
If I were you (on the OPN), I would not wait for something after the More, because you’ve already been able to skip the OPN S generation. However, if your OPNs are still working for you, I would wait until 2024 to see if Oticon would have something newer than the More. But I would expect only an incremental improvement (like going from the OPN to the OPN S) and not a new breakthrough beyond AI.
My audiologist has told me that a new generation of receivers will be released this year
Wow, that is exciting! the miniFit receivers have been with us for several years (seems like forever). I wonder if the new receivers will work on all the older hearing aids that use miniFit receivers?
Seems they could improve wind & environmental noise via firmware update, no?
I would concur, unless it’s something significant enough that would require some tweaks to the Polaris platform so that it’s not backward compatible anymore and one would have to buy new with an incrementally improved platform → like how the Velox platform for the OPN had to be tweaked into the Velox S platform to accommodate the OPN S.
The OPN did get a firmware update to get Speech Rescue implemented into it. But then Speech Rescue was already available in the previous platform, they just didn’t get around to add it into the firmware code at the initial release time.
unless it’s something significant enough that would require some tweaks to the Polaris platform so that it’s not backward compatible anymore and one would have to buy new HAs with an incrementally improved platform
To my way of thinking, the one thing they could implement on a new SoC would be 5.3 for !
Are we sure it’s a new hearing aid and not just a firmware update?
I would say Oticon More is still state-of-the art. Better in wind and environmental noise and/or capabilities is something they could fix via a firmware update.
I would also guess LE Audio capabilities needs a new Oticon ON app since you need to be able to select the new transmitter (like you select Wi-fi on your phone). That might explain why they will have a “the next step” event in March?
Has there ever been a new hearing aid model released that didn’t claim “better in noise”? Roll up to get the new ACME 2 hearing aid! About the same in noise as the ACME 1!
Musician is undoubtedly right about speculation, but as the OP, I’m grateful for these comments and info. My audi got in touch with their Oticon rep, who said in effect that Mores are still state of the art. I guess Oticon has to say that, lest their sales fall off the cliff as buyers wait for the next iteration. They also said that if a new comes out, I would be able to swap it…tho my audi said the allowable period for that is usually around 3 months.
I’ll certainly keep my ears open, so to speak, for any news (even rumors) that come from the spring conference. My audi thinks I could probably wait a year before making a decision. But I will follow up on MDB’s recommendation to send my current set in. Guessing I’m out of warranty tho’.
I’m going to watch this closely. I have OPN S1s bought a bit ahead of when the Mores came out, so I’ve been waiting to catch the next technology wave, not to mention ding my insurer.
@MDB asked if your Mores are still under warranty. But you indicated that you have the OPNs and not the More. I’m guessing that @MDB meant to ask if your OPNs (not Mores) are still under warranty, and if yes (but almost expiring), then send the almost-out-of-warranty OPNs back for new OPNs to tide you over (because they’re now new replacements) so you can wait on the after-More generation much longer.
But now you’re saying that you’re out of warranty on the OPN already (assuming that you understood MDB to mean the OPN and not the More), there’s no point in following MDB’s recommendation to send in your out-of-warranty OPN because they won’t give you new in-warranty replacements for them anymore.
So all you can do is sit tight and wait and hope that your OPNs will hold up until then.
Hot Springs Village, Arkansas
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