26 March 2025
UPDATE
Groundbreaking health features available today on Apple Watch and AirPods Pro 2
Apple Watch delivers new sleep apnea notifications, and AirPods Pro 2 provide the world’s first all-in-one hearing health experience including a clinical-grade, over-the-counter Hearing Aid feature to users in Malaysia
Starting today, Apple brings new sleep and hearing health features to Apple Watch and AirPods Pro 2 to users in Malaysia, further delivering on Apple’s commitment to health with experiences that enrich users’ lives. These new features expand across products, bringing informative and powerful ways to support users in their sleep and hearing health for conditions that impact billions globally.
Using an innovative new Breathing Disturbances metric, sleep apnea notifications come to Apple Watch, adding to the many ways Apple Watch acts as an intelligent guardian for users’ health.1
Apple is providing the world’s first end-to-end hearing health experience with a clinically validated Hearing Test feature, an over-the-counter Hearing Aid feature,2 and Loud Sound Reduction3. The first-of-its-kind software-based Hearing Aid feature helps make access to hearing assistance easier than ever at an approachable price point.
“At Apple, we believe that technology can help you live a healthier life, and we’re excited to enable incredible new health capabilities for serious conditions that affect billions of people around the world, while continuing to keep user data private,” said Sumbul Desai, M.D., Apple’s vice president of Health. “With Apple Watch, we continue to offer our users the ability to uncover important health conditions with new sleep apnea notifications. And on AirPods Pro, powerful features put users’ hearing health front and centre, bringing new ways to help test for and receive assistance for hearing loss.”
A Powerful Way to Detect Signs of Sleep Apnea
Sleep is an important area of health as it impacts a person’s overall physical and mental wellbeing. Sleep apnea is a prevalent disorder in which breathing momentarily stops during sleep, preventing the body from getting enough oxygen. The condition is estimated to impact more than 1 billion people worldwide, and in most cases, goes undiagnosed. If left untreated, it can have important health consequences over time, including increased risk of hypertension, type 2 diabetes, and cardiac issues.
Breathing Disturbances is an innovative new Apple Watch metric that uses the accelerometer to detect small movements at the wrist associated with interruptions to normal respiratory patterns during sleep. Every 30 days, Apple Watch will analyse breathing disturbance data and notify users if it shows consistent signs of moderate to severe sleep apnea so they can speak to their doctor about next steps, including potential diagnosis and treatment.
Because overall quality of sleep is important, Breathing Disturbances can also be used to assess restfulness of sleep. Breathing Disturbances can be influenced by alcohol, medications, sleep position, and more. Users can view their nightly Breathing Disturbances in the Health app, where they are classified as elevated or not elevated, and can be viewed over a one-month, six-month, or one-year period.
For more informed conversations with their healthcare providers, users can export a PDF that shows when sleep apnea may have occurred, three months of breathing disturbance data, and additional information. Educational articles are also available within the Health app to help users learn more about sleep apnea.
The sleep apnea notification algorithm was developed using advanced machine learning and an extensive data set of clinical-grade sleep apnea tests. The feature was then validated in a clinical study — unprecedented in size for sleep apnea technology. In the clinical validation study, every participant identified by the algorithm had at least mild sleep apnea.
“Empowering consumers everywhere to have the ability to reliably identify the presence of abnormal breathing patterns during sleep can help uncover a woefully underdiagnosed and serious medical condition such as sleep apnea,” said Sairam Parthasarathy, M.D., University of Arizona Health Sciences Center for Sleep, Circadian, and Neurosciences’s professor and director in Tucson, Arizona. “This is a major step forward in improving public health.”
Sleep apnea notifications and Breathing Disturbances add to a range of sleep health features for Apple Watch users. In addition to monitoring important overnight health metrics like heart rate and respiratory rate, Apple Watch also helps users meet their sleep goals and track their sleep over time.
The World’s First End-to-End Hearing Health Experience
Approximately 1.5 billion people around the world are living with hearing loss, according to the World Health Organisation. Research has also identified links between hearing loss and impact on a person’s overall wellbeing, including dementia and social isolation.
To help users better understand their hearing health, Apple is introducing an end-to-end experience focused on prevention, awareness, and assistance.
Prevention
According to the Apple Hearing Study — a longitudinal, virtual public research study conducted in collaboration with the University of Michigan School of Public Health and the World Health Organisation — one in three people are regularly exposed to loud environmental noise levels that can impact their hearing. That can include common scenarios like taking the subway while commuting, mowing the lawn at home, attending a sporting event, and many more.
In order to help users minimise exposure to loud environmental noise while preserving the entire dynamic range of what they’re listening to, Loud Sound Reduction is available on AirPods Pro 2. The ear tips help to provide passive noise reduction, while the H2 chip helps to actively reduce louder noise at 48,000 times per second. On by default in Transparency and Adaptive Audio listening modes, Loud Sound Reduction can be helpful in a variety of loud settings. Plus, with an all-new multiband high dynamic range algorithm, sounds at live events like concerts remain even more natural and vibrant.
Awareness
Hearing loss often worsens gradually, leaving many people unaware that they may be living with the condition. To give users even more insights into hearing health, Apple is introducing an intuitive, clinical-grade hearing test based on the standard clinical approach called pure-tone audiometry that users can take themselves with their AirPods Pro and a compatible iPhone or iPad.
Users can take the convenient test in about five minutes from the comfort of their own home. The Hearing Test feature leverages advanced acoustic science and provides users with an interactive experience. When a user completes the test, they will see an easy-to-understand summary of their results, including a number representing hearing loss in each ear, a classification, and recommendations. The results, which include an audiogram, are stored privately and securely in the Health app, and can be shared with a healthcare provider to have more informed conversations.
The Hearing Test builds on learnings from the Apple Hearing Study and was developed using large-scale, real-world data. The feature was then validated against the clinical gold standard of pure-tone audiometry.
“Hearing health is a cornerstone of overall wellbeing. Protecting and preserving our hearing enhances our quality of life both in the short-term and long-term,” said Rick Neitzel, University of Michigan School of Public Health’s professor of Environmental Health Sciences and principal investigator of the Apple Hearing Study. “I’m thrilled Apple is introducing important tools to support people’s hearing health. These tools will help people protect their ears from noise pollution, be aware of changes in their hearing over time, and have important conversations with their healthcare providers when they need additional support.”
Assistance
Learning about hearing loss is a critical step to getting necessary assistance, which can often be challenging due to cost and access. Global research shows hearing loss often goes untreated. In fact, the Apple Hearing Study revealed that 75 percent of people diagnosed with hearing loss haven’t received the assistive support that they need.
AirPods Pro add an innovative over-the-counter Hearing Aid capability for users with mild to moderate hearing loss. Using the personalised hearing profile from the Hearing Test, this new feature seamlessly transforms AirPods Pro into a clinical-grade hearing aid. After setup, the feature enables personalised dynamic adjustments so users have the sounds around them boosted in real time. This helps them better engage in conversation, and keeps them connected to the people and environment around them. With the incredible audio quality of AirPods Pro, the user’s personalised hearing profile is automatically applied to music, movies, games, and phone calls across their devices, without needing to adjust any settings. Users can also set up the Hearing Aid feature with an audiogram created by a hearing health professional.
The Hearing Aid feature was clinically validated in a controlled, randomised study that evaluated the perceived benefit of the feature and its custom settings compared to an audiologist-assisted setup.
After taking the Hearing Test, the user’s hearing profile can also help to personalise the AirPods Pro listening experience for even more people, including those with little to no hearing loss who can still benefit from specific adjustments at individual frequencies. To help provide the best listening experience, Media Assist is an all-new feature that helps boost certain parts of speech on a phone call or instruments within a soundtrack to help an even broader population.
These features build on the hearing health tools Apple currently offers its users. For example, with the Noise app, Apple Watch users can enable notifications for when environmental noise levels might affect their hearing health. On iPhone, users can set a headphone volume limit where they can turn on Reduce Loud Audio and drag a slider to a preferred decibel level. Apple also offers additional accessibility features for users to customise settings to meet their hearing needs.
“For decades, Apple has led the way in designing products for everyone and supporting users with a broad spectrum of hearing abilities,” said Sarah Herrlinger, Apple’s senior director of Global Accessibility Policy and Initiatives. “These features on AirPods Pro will make an impact on so many people by driving more awareness around hearing health and empowering individuals with new customisable tools to help them stay connected.”
- Sleep apnea notifications are available in more than 150 countries and regions, including the U.S., the EU,Japan and Malaysia. A complete list of regions is available at apple.com/my/watchos/feature-availability. The feature is supported on Apple Watch Series 9, Apple Watch Series 10, and Apple Watch Ultra 2. It is intended to detect signs of moderate to severe sleep apnea for people 18 years or older without a diagnosis of sleep apnea.
- The Hearing Test and Hearing Aid features are available in more than 100 countries and regions. A complete list of regions is available at apple.com/my/airpods-pro/feature-availability. The Hearing Test and Hearing Aid features are supported on AirPods Pro 2 with the latest firmware, paired with a compatible iPhone or iPad with iOS 18 or iPadOS 18 and later, and is intended for people 18 years or older. The Hearing Aid feature is intended for people with perceived mild to moderate hearing loss.
- The Loud Sound Reduction feature works with AirPods Pro 2 with the latest firmware when paired with a compatible iPhone, iPad, or Mac, running iOS 18, iPadOS 18, or macOS Sequoia or later.
Press Contacts
Eva Borri
Apple
(65) 9770 1057
Izzie Saleh Ali
Apple
(65) 8876 5933
