Hearing Aid Wiki

Well, reviews are one thing.

Useful to extract information from within.

A wiki though usually gives these information in a more organized/structured format and this can be more efficient when doing comparisons.

An example could be how gsmarena offers comparison between phones.

The only other thing I could suggest is searching in this forum. That is what I do to try and find info.

This main site also lets you compare 2 models and discusses the differences. I thin now they also let you hear the differences.

These two links might help. Though, the information is always changing and as a result, will become obsolete and may be replaced with later/newer versions. Also, a newer version of the platforms will kill the second link.

• Hearing Industry Map
• Recent Platforms-Chips of the Big Five22

Tip: Click the resultant images to enlarge.

Have you picked a brand?
Phonak appear to market new hearing aids every two years.

DaveL

Appear is the key word because new in name is not necessarily new hardware, and sometimes new software upgrades are only minor, so you have to look a gift horse in the mouth.

I am not bad-mouthing Phonak in particular because they all boast and exaggerate.

But new hearing aids every two years is a stretch.

Yep, that’s true. But wait, only one new model (the Lumity Life-model), has inductive charging. The others still charge the same as the previous platform. Ah, but the Lumity Life model is also Waterproof, right? Wait again, it’s actually Waterproof(*) and tested by 1Bluejay as a bogus claim.

But wait, you also get several other software improvements, right? Well only if you buy the premium-90 model because the lower-tier models don’t have the new software improvements. See this post with the new software enhancements circled for you.

Again, I’m not bad-mouthing Phonak. The bean-counters of this world are after your money whether it’s hearing aids, medical insurance, dental insurance, grocery stores, soft drinks, and on and on. I’m just saying you should pay attention to the details, just in case the bean counters are counting on the fact that most ppl will not pay attention to these boring details.

I would also like to see something like that, but there was simply no interest in such a thing.
There have been some reviews, but almost never a review comparing all the technologies and other features to see what each hearing aid has to offer.
I even asked CliffAud on YouTube in the comments if he could do a comparison of hearing aids, all technologies, etc. and see what each one has and what it doesn’t have. He said he was not making comparisons between them.
This is my opinion, it is possible that the manufacturers don’t allow him to do comparisons, he and other youtube channels get hearing aids for free to try out to do some youtube review and probably get paid to do some advertising for such and such hearing aid and manufacturers they don’t want the competition to be mentioned.

I think it’s very bad, in my country Croatia, there is a well-known forum for general things and we have a topic about hearing aids and it is very rarely written in it. I discovered more information here on the hearing tracker and on youtube channels from various audiologists and studied the features myself.
And I think it’s bad that people who don’t do that, they often buy an expensive hearing aid and don’t see that that expensive hearing aid doesn’t bring anything more special than the competition that costs half the price. And because of that, I think the merchants here take too much advantage of people when they sell products.

In general, audiologists are reluctant to make detailed comparisons between specific hearing aids except to review a certain aspect (e.g., how bluetooth features work in the latest generation of HAs).

In my opinion this is because the “professional” standpoint of audiologists is that there is no overall “best” HA, that different HAs are appropriate for different requirements, and that proper configuration of a given HA for a person’s hearing loss is very important. Naturally, this point of view places considerable emphasis on the role of the audiologist (or hearing instrument specialist, etc.) as opposed to someone with hearing loss “shopping” for an HA based on technology or specifications alone.

They may also be wary of appearing to disparage any of the mainstream HA manufacturers by highlighting gaps in their product lines, but I’m not so sure about that as it’s not unusual to hear complaints about what’s not great from audis in the context of videos and other more limited reviews as it is. Personally I think they want to avoid giving the impression that you can pick an HA based on specs alone, and may also wish to maintain something of the “gatekeeper” role (even those who do provide quite a lot of information online don’t want to be totally systematic in this regard).

@DaveL

@DaveL said:

The new model Lumity was introduced about 2 yeas after the Paradise was introduced.

And where did you get this information?

My audiologist…Roughly two years.

Check out the reviews for the Paradise and Lumity models. They were done about 2 years apart.

It’s just a fact:

Phonak Hearing Aids: Models, Prices, and Reviews

Phonak's latest hearing aids, Audéo Infinio, cost between $2,498 to $4,398 per pair. Come find a full list of Phonak hearing aid models, prices, and reviews.

Phonak hearing aids1

2022: Phonak Audéo Lumity, Phonak Virto Paradise2
2021: Phonak Naída Paradise1
2020: Phonak Audéo Paradise, Phonak Naída M, Phonak Virto M, Phonak Brio 4…

@pvc said:

The bean-counters of this world are after your money whether it’s hearing aids, medical insurance, dental insurance, grocery stores, soft drinks, and on and on

So true! Airlines have the “diamond” “ruby” all the way down to “tin” before you can even board on top of which you’ll never have space to put your overhead bag in if you’re a TIN MAN.

I guess I’m lucky with my aids tho. With my cinderblock ears ain’t NO choice but the biggest, most powerful Shelby Cobra BTE. So I get the perks that come with that receiver.