You may not realize it, but putting on earphones to mask the noisy world around you could put you at risk from hearing loss, a problem that is hard to ignore. Thankfully, there is an app for that, as the Mimi iOS app helps you figure out how bad your hearing has become.
The app provides a series of hearing tests, wherein you tap on the phone’s screen if you hear a pulsating tone emanating from the device. After two minutes or so, you receive your own personal hearing profile, which displays how well your ears are able to listen to different frequencies.
You can also experiment on how well you ears respond to different scenarios, checking if you are able to hear a pre-recorded message through the “ears” of a middle-aged person or a construction worker.
Apart from testing how well you can hear, the developers of the Mimi app hopes to provide real-time audio enhancement, turning your iPhone into a very portable hearing aid. Using the data collected from your hearing test, it would tune the sound coming into the phone’s microphone for optimum listening.
While the developers plan to release the Mimi app for free, they intend on charging a monthly premium for unlimited hearing enhancements. As it is, the app is tuned to work best using Apple’s stock white EarPods, as well as the Sennheiser HDA 200s headphones.
Source: Engadget
