How many channels should a hearing aid have?
The number of channels in a hearing aid is one of the main factors to consider before purchasing a new one, as it can determine the degree of correction of your loss.
The greater the number of channels in your hearing aid, the more accurate the correction of your hearing loss will be, as it will allow us to adjust the sound more precisely according to your needs.
Now, although this statement seems obvious, if you are about to buy a hearing aid, you probably want to know a little more about its operation and why. So today we explain what the channels of a hearing aid are and how to choose the number of channels that yours should have.
What are the channels of a hearing aid?
The hearing aids have built-in microphones capable of capturing the spectrum of the sound around them. And once they capture the sound, it is divided into different "chunks", which we call channels. It will then depend on the number of channels that the hearing aid integrates, the degree of detail in their division. That is, the more channels you integrate, the more it will divide the captured sound.
Hearing aids usually have between 4 and 24 channels, with 4 channels being the simplest and 24 channels being the most functional to the user. At Claso, we always recommend our clients to purchase hearing aids with 12 channels or more, as this allows us to adjust the sound in a much more personalized way, depending on the type of loss of each person.
Advantages of a hearing aid with more than 12 channels
Each user has a totally different type of loss than the previous one and therefore, each one needs very specific adjustments, depending on the results of their audiometry. Therefore, the more channels the hearing aid has, the greater the precision and customization when fitting.
In addition, state-of-the-art audiological solutions also work better in hearing aids with a higher number of channels, such as noise reducers. An example of this would be the Alpha 9 miniRITE T R Hearing Aid with 24 channels or the Audéo Paradise P90 13 T Hearing Aid with 20 channels.
However, as we have mentioned before, purchasing a hearing aid from 12 channels can also be a good option, it will depend on the type of loss, so we recommend you consult your audiologist. Among the examples of hearing aids with fewer channels, the Key 4 Hearing Aid with 12 channels or the Audéo Paradise P50 312 16-channel Hearing Aid may be a good choice.
If you are currently comparing different types of hearing aids, we invite you to visit our Online catalogue, where you can find the number of channels of all our hearing aids in the specifications section.