There are things you can do to make your mobile or smartphone easier to use if you’re deaf or have hearing loss.
Accessibility features on your phone
Most phones have settings and features you can use to make them work better for you.
Search for accessibility in your phone’s settings to see the full range of options.
Sound settings
You can change your sound settings to hear phone calls and media better.
There are usually different volume settings for different apps, so you can increase the volume for calls, media and alarms separately depending on your needs.
If you can hear more in one ear than the other, you can adjust how sound comes through when you’re wearing headphones or earbuds:
- use the left and right sound balance to adjust the volume of sound in each ear
- set the sound to mono so that the left and right headphones will play exactly the same audio
Visual and vibrating alerts
You can set your phone to vibrate for phone calls and other notifications. You can also adjust the vibration pattern and intensity.
Your phone may have an option to enable flashing alerts. This means the phone camera flash or display will flash a light when you get notifications for a call, message or alarm.
Connecting your phone to a hearing device
Most modern hearing aids and implants can connect wirelessly to your smartphone.
This lets you send sound directly from your phone to your hearing aids. You can also control your hearing aid settings using your phone.
Learn more about connecting your phone to your hearing aids.
Captions and speech-to-text
Most media apps have a setting to enable captions, so you can read what’s being said in a video.
Some phones have a built-in speech-to-text function. This means you can read a real-time transcript of a phone call or in-person conversation. There are also free and paid speech-to-text apps that you can download.
Learn more about speech-to-text apps.