Questions

More than background music, less than a GPS nav session. The app uses layered detection that keeps the heavy work asleep until something interesting happens, so typical usage adds 3 to 7 percent battery drain per hour of active listening. Full disclosure, always-on microphone access is not free. Read the battery deep dive.

It depends on the sound. A smoke alarm across the house, yes. A microwave beep through a closed door, probably not. SoundSense works best when your phone is in the same room as the sounds that matter. We are working on a mic puck for other rooms, but that is a future release.

No. SoundSense is a supplement, not a replacement. Keep your primary life-safety equipment. A smoke detector is required by code for a reason. A hearing dog is a trained being. SoundSense works alongside both, not instead of either.

Your phone captures short audio buffers in memory, runs them through a sound classifier on the device, and immediately discards the audio. Nothing is written to storage. Nothing is sent to a server. Not even in crash reports. You can verify this by putting your phone in airplane mode; the app keeps working.

Apple's Sound Recognition is a good starting point and runs entirely on-device. SoundSense goes further in three ways. It lets you train your phone on your specific sounds, in three samples. It scales alerts to urgency, so a fire alarm and a microwave beep are never treated the same. And it uses context, where you are, what time it is, what is normal for the environment, to decide how loudly to interrupt you. Apple's feature is a useful baseline. SoundSense is built specifically for people who depend on sound awareness every day. Read the full comparison.

Yes. SoundSense delivers alerts through visual notifications, haptics, and Apple Watch vibrations. It does not depend on your hearing aids or implant to work. If you use Made for iPhone hearing aids, audio cues can also route there if you want them.

Not in 2026. iOS came first because it lets us guarantee the privacy and performance story on one platform. Android is on the roadmap, after the iOS app earns it.

Not in the free version. Family sharing and caregiver alerts are part of SoundSense Pro, which is launching after the free app proves out. If this is important to you, join the waitlist and tell us how you would use it.

Yes. The classifier ships bundled with the app. There is no server. Put your phone in airplane mode, disconnect Wi-Fi, walk into a basement with no signal, SoundSense keeps listening and alerting. The only thing that needs the network is cloud sync of your sound names and settings, which is optional.

The free app ships with 11 preset categories: smoke alarm, carbon monoxide alarm, doorbell, knock, name called, baby cry, alarm clock, microwave, oven timer, car horn, and siren. You can enable or disable any of them. Custom training lets you add your specific sounds beyond the presets.

The free app will mirror iPhone notifications to Apple Watch through standard iOS behavior. The dedicated Watch app, with custom urgency haptics, on-wrist alerts, and a standalone timeline, is a SoundSense+ feature when that tier launches.

English at launch. Full ASL video support for tutorial and onboarding content is in progress. Additional spoken-language localization will follow based on what the community tells us matters most.