Earpiece

Although there are systems that allow physically challenged users to communicate by twitching facial muscles, for some people even those muscle movements are impossible. A new setup offers a possible alternative, however, by going into the ear.

New York-based Vinci is looking to forge a more independent path for its latest headphones, which pack their own self-contained minicomputer with 3G, Wi-Fi, voice-control, and fitness tracking, all of which means they need no external smartphone to function.

As many of us know from personal experience, accessing a smartphone's touchscreen can be difficult when your hands are full. That's why scientists have developed a hands-free system that lets you control a phone via facial gestures – and those gestures are detected in your ear.

Australian start-up, Lingmo International, has brought us one step closer to real-time universal translation. The Translate One2One is set to be the first commercially available translation earpiece that doesn't rely on Bluetooth or Wi-Fi connectivity.

A New York startup claims it's ready to make the fictitious Babel fish a reality; the Pilot earpiece from Waverly Labs sits in your ear and is designed to provide near real-time translations of multilingual conversations.

In the last year or two we've seen several hearing wearables pop up, using the same smartphone-connected principles as smartwatches to augment, enhance or block out your ears' experience of the world. Let's look at today's best hearing wearables.

Etymotic's HD-15 High-Definition electronic earplugs let users hear normally when things are quiet, but kick in when sudden loud noises occur.

Go wireless with the Kisai Escape C from Tokyo Flash

The Nap Vieeb Plus II is an earpiece alarm that wakes you when you start to doze off.

Brickhouse Security’s Micro Bluetooth Earpiece is so small it actually fits inside the ear canal to allow covert two-way communication via any Bluetooth mobile phone or two-way radio.