According to statistics from Hearing Industries Association, more than 90% of all hearing instruments sold in the United States are digital. Digital no longer means more expensive when it comes to hearing aids since digital is the standard. Hearing aid manufacturers now have full portfolios of digital instruments, with technology at all levels and all price points. In fact, due to the limited availability of analog parts as well as the fact that only a few hearing aid manufacturers still sell and service analog hearing aids, it is forseeable that analog hearing aids will be more expensive to buy and maintain for the long term. Not to mention the fact that there are many benefits of digital signal processing. Features such as digital feedback cancellation that reduces or eliminates hearing aid whistling, advanced noise reduction technology to increase hearing comfort, and automatic directional microphone systems to improve speech understanding in background noise are not possible with analog systems.
