The short version
- RNID and GN Hearing have published a free guide for theatres that want to broadcast their sound directly to audience members’ hearing aids using Auracast.
- Auracast is a Bluetooth broadcast that any number of compatible hearing aids, earbuds or loaned receivers can pick up, with no neck loop needed.
- GN makes Auracast hearing aids, so the charity’s partner has a stake in the technology spreading.
RNID, the UK charity for deaf people and people with hearing loss, published a playbook on October 14 for theatres that want to adopt Auracast. It was written with GN Hearing and runs to six chapters, from why the technology matters in theatres and what deaf audience members told the authors, through planning, technical design and day-to-day operation, to telling audiences the service exists. RNID technology lead Alastair Moore said it is “grounded in independent research and the real experiences of theatre customers and venue teams.”
Auracast is a broadcast form of Bluetooth. A venue transmits its program audio once, and any number of compatible devices can tune in: hearing aids, earbuds, headphones or receivers lent at the door. That spares hearing-aid users the separate receivers and neck loops older assistive systems need. GN introduced the first Auracast hearing aid in 2023 and now builds it into every new ReSound and Beltone model, so its interest is commercial as well as civic. Neither organization says how many theatres use the system yet.
“It excites me that I may hear better in venues that I have not heard well in up to now,” London hearing-aid user Gideon Hoffman told HearingTracker.
