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Lucid Audio is a company with a background in hearing protection for children and personal sound amplifying products (PSAPs). Their first and flagship hearing aid model is the Engage Enlite, which aims to combine "a deep scientific approach together with powerful wearable technology in an easy to order, easy to use, and affordable package."
But is it up to scratch? I'm going to have a closer look and see if it's as good as they say it is.
As with many online hearing aid companies, Lucid Audio takes a novel approach to hearing aid fittings. To help achieve this, the company collaborated with a nationally acclaimed audiology school to review nearly 100,000 audiograms and produce optimal pre-programmed settings for the Engage, eliminating the necessity for an in-person hearing exam.
Although it removes a barrier for getting hearing aids into the ears of those who desperately need them, As an audiologist, I still have mixed feelings about any hearing aid that you install yourself without the assistance of a specialist. With Lucid Audio's fitting method, the hearing aids can't be set to an optimal level of amplification or gain, which means there is an optimal amount of amplification or gain. An audiologist can check this in a clinic to provide you peace of mind that your hearing aids are performing as well as they possibly can. You won't be able to acquire that level of verification with do-it-yourself or online hearing aids. As a result, there is a chance that you will miss out on some hearing that you would have received in a clinic.
Black, gray, and beige are the three colors available for the Engage Enlite Hearing Aids. Overall, it's an excellent fit and is a relatively light hearing aid. It has a similar feel to most receiver-in-the-canal (RIC) hearing aids. As with all RICs, these hearing aids are designed for mild to moderate hearing loss, so they are not suitable for people who have severe hearing loss.
The Engage Enlite is available in two models. One is made for the iPhone, while the other is for Android. If you're thinking of committing to the Engage Enlite, be sure to buy the model that corresponds to your smartphone!
With a battery life of up to 20 hours and a handy portable charging case, the Engage makes full use of rechargeable power. Recharge them using the wireless carrying case that comes with your pair of Engage Enlite hearing aids. Twenty hours should keep you going for the rest of the day. As a result, I would charge the hearing aids every night. It takes four hours for them to reach full charge.
It's important to remember that the hearing aid has a battery door that can be opened. As a result, there is a slightly increased chance of moisture problems. If you live in a humid environment, having a battery door on your hearing aid that is exposed to moisture increases the risk of battery deterioration, as well as moisture issues. I find this kind of odd for a rechargeable battery - a closed battery case is found in most other rechargeable hearing aids.
Engage Enlite customers can stream music, phone calls, and podcasts from their phones to their hearing aids over Bluetooth. This pairs up nicely with the Lucid Hearing App, which I'll talk more about below.
The Lucid Hearing App is the dedicated app for the Engage Enlite. It allows you to manage your listening experience right from your phone, including adjusting sound quality and connecting to streaming media.
You can choose from four distinct programs using the app: mild, moderate, bass boost, and max. You can also alter the equalization or EQ using the app by giving yourself more gain in the treble, bass, or whatever settings you want to set to hear better. As someone who likes to tinker with settings, this function is ideal.
One thing to keep in mind: Even though I could change the sound EQ settings in the app, I couldn't save those changes and access them later. That means you need to start on one of those four preset programs, then change it on the app whenever you want to modify settings.
I liked using this app because it allows me to stream in a variety of ways. You can choose how much sound comes in through the hearing aid microphones versus how much of the streaming signal from your smartphone you listen to. So if you're someone who listens to many podcasts, plays music from their phone all the time, and streams a lot, you'll get much use out of this.
The Lucid Hearing app gets a three-star rating out of 40 reviews in the Apple Store. Some connectivity difficulties were mentioned, but I had no such issues.
The hearing aids themselves, however, do have a button on them. So you can also adjust the volume, alter the program, and find the perfect level for you using only the physical buttons and without opening the app.
The Engage Enlite is designed for mild to moderate hearing loss; those with severe hearing loss will not benefit from it. But the hearing aid is worth considering if you want a hearing aid that can stream through Bluetooth and is rechargeable. This is perhaps the cheapest hearing aid out there that can do both.
Today we're going to look at the Engage Enlite Hearing Aids.
These are affordable hearing aids that cost about one third the normal cost of hearing aids from a clinic. These are rechargeable. They have great streaming and connectivity to smart phones and they cost significantly less than standard hearing aids from a clinic. I'm excited to show you these hearing aids and their features. In this video, I will cover the look and feel, how it looks on my ear. The pros of the hearing aids, what they do well and the cons. So watch this video until the end to get that full detailed review. Welcome to HearWeb. Hello. My name is Dr. Ben Thompson. I'm an audiologist with HearWeb. This is our YouTube channel where we review hearing technology and make videos to educate. If you're interested, please subscribe to our channel.
First, the Engage Enlite Hearing Aids come in three different colors, black, gray and beige. I have the black hearing aids. Let's start with the look and feel of these devices. I want to give you a sense of how this hearing aid looks in my ear. So check it out. We have this receiver wire on the side of my ear and then up in behind the ear, we have this piece. I'll try to turn around so you can see how it looks behind my ear as well. Overall, it's a comfortable fit, it's a light hearing aid and it's very consistent. It feels very similar to the standard receiver in the canal hearing aids, which are the most popular style of hearing aids. The Engage Enlite comes in two slightly different models. One is for iPhone and one is for Android. You get to make that decision if you're considering buying those by selecting whether you use an Android smartphone or an Apple smartphone. The hearing aids are meant for mild to moderate levels of hearing loss, that excludes someone who has a severe hearing loss from these types of hearing aids. Reading the statement from the company's website, they partnered with one of the top audiology programs in the country, University of Texas at Dallas to evaluate nearly 100,000 audiograms and divided them into four groups with similar hearing loss traits.
I connected these hearing aids to my smartphone and I was able to demonstrate how those different programs worked. They have four different programs, mild, moderate, bass boost and max. Each of these programs give progressively more gain. I ran the hearing aids in a test box in an audiology clinic. They showed a difference in the gain settings of the different programs. Additionally the noise reduction features in hearing aids work pretty well. I enjoyed using the app because of the flexibility it gives to streaming. You can control how much sound is coming in through the microphones of the hearing aids versus how much of the streaming signal you're listening to from your smartphone. So if you're someone who listens to a lot of podcasts, constantly playing music from your smartphone, streaming a lot, then that feature is very neat and I would recommend using that. Additionally through the app, you can control the equalization or the EQ by giving yourself more gain in the treble or more gain in the base or whatever levels you want to set to hear better. That feature works very well for someone who likes to make a lot of controls through their phone. But for someone who just wants hearing aids that they put in their ear and don't have to think about it too much, they're probably not going to be using that app function. That said, these hearing aids do have a button on them. So you can change the volume, you can change the program and find the right level that you want. So you could just set them and forget them throughout your day instead of tinkering and adjusting a lot inside of the app. Inside of the Apple Store, the Lucid Hearing app has a three-star rating out of 40 responses. In those responses, some connectivity issues were reported. I myself had no connectivity issues. It was a very seamless and positive experience. And I was using an iPhone to connect to.
Now about the rechargeable case, you can have up to 20 hours of battery life on a single charge. So that should last you throughout the day. Therefore it makes sense to charge the hearing aids every night. They take four hours to reach a full charge. One thing to keep in mind here is that the hearing aid has this battery door, which can open. So that does create a slightly higher risk of moisture problems. If you live in a highly humid area, having a battery door on your hearing aid that's exposed to moisture, it gives it a higher chance of corrosion of that battery and problems with intermittency and moisture. Other hearing aids do have a closed battery port. So that's something to consider if you're around a lot of moisture or humidity. Okay you made it this far, now it's time to talk about the pros and cons of these hearing aids.
I myself had a good experience using them. This is the Lucid Audio Engage Hearing Aids. I feel one of the big pros of using these hearing aids is the customization through the smartphone app. As I mentioned earlier if you're someone who likes to make adjustments based on situations, if you're someone who is streaming a lot through the smartphone, you'll really love the app because of the customizations you can have. Another pro with these hearing aids are the affordability. They cost about one third of the normal cost of hearing aids from a traditional clinic. The hearing aids come with a two-year repair warranty and to see the most up to date price of these hearing aids, check the link to HearWeb in our description where we have the most up-to-date prices. The last pro that I want to mention is the modern sleek design of the hearing aids and the rechargeable battery. Rechargeable battery, very important. Having a hearing aid that sleek and not noticeable, also important. And I believe that Engage Enlite does that very well.
All right you still with me? We're going to switch now to the cons. The aspects of these hearing aids that you need to know if you're considering buying them. Number one is that you cannot create custom programs inside of the app. I saw this on our review and I noticed it myself that for someone who creates the certain setting with the equalizer, they're not able to save that setting and immediately access it later on. So you have to base your hearing off of those four preset programs and then adjust it in the app every time you want to change the setting. This may be a problem for you, this might not be a for you. But it is something worth mentioning. Some hearing aids out there, you can create custom programs inside of the app and save that program. Additionally of course, if you're working with an audiologist in a clinic, you can create custom programs and automatically have them as the hearing aid setting. The second con that I wanted to mention applies to any hearing aid that you yourself are setting up without the help of a professional. Is that there is there a risk of under fitting the devices. What that means is that there's an optimal level of amplification or gain that hearing aids can be set to. This can be verified in an in-person clinic by an audiologist to give you confidence to help you know that the hearing aids are working as best as they can. With the do it yourself hearing aids, online hearing aids, you're not able to get that level of verification. So that is a risk that you could potentially be missing out on some hearing that you otherwise would have had in a clinic.
Now, if you've made it this far you're probably interested in getting new hearing aids. There's a few other products that are worth considering. At HearWeb we have independent reviews of these different hearing aids by doctors of audiology. And we try to compare them so that your decision can be easier. Some other hearing aids to consider which I will show on the screen right now. Number one is the Audicus Wave. We made a full dedicated review video of the Audicus Wave. It's another rechargeable receiver in the canal hearing aid that you can buy online. It's worth considering there's some similar features with the current hearing aids we just reviewed. The second product that we also made a full review video on is the Lexie Lumen hearing aids. Those again are affordable online hearing aids with some differences from the Engage Enlite Hearing Aids. It's worth checking out the Lexie Lumen as well. And finally the MDHearingAid CORE. We made another video on the MDHearingAid CORE. That is an online hearing aid affordable and connects to smartphones as well. Thank you for watching this video. My name is Dr. Thompson, I'm an audiologist with HearWeb. You can check us out at hearweb.com. We have the most up-to-date prices on hearing aids as well as certain discounts and deals when available. Please subscribe to the YouTube channel here. And on this next video, you can see a full review of the Audicus Wave Hearing Aids. Thank you again for being here and make sure to check out hearweb.com for more help with your hearing.