These are very user friendly. I had no problem getting started and they fit perfectly. My hearing is not perfect, of course, but my hearing is for sure much improved.

The Lexie B1 hearing aids by Bose are incredibly easy to use and lightweight! I suffer from hearing loss that is especially bad if there are a lot of other ambient voices, the Lexie Hearing app allows you to focus in either in front of you or all around. The app also allows for either preset or customized hearing profiles for different settings and environments. The box contains everything you need to get started and you are immediately welcomed by the Bose quality materials one would expect from a product made by Bose. It contains the hearing aids inside the very nice, compact carrying case that in no way screams "these are hearing aids." The box also contains the quick start guide to get you started with fitting and using the Lexie Hearing app, along with different size ear tips and wires. The fit is very comfortable and easy to adjust to your preference and the aids themselves are incredibly lightweight! You will barely know they're there, which can be an issue if they call out... a good fit is especially important to prevent this! The carrying case has no electronics but offers a very protective environment for your hearing aids while you're not using them. There is no power switch, instead you open the battery door to turn them off for long periods... a simple but odd solution. The battery is incredibly long lasting, even if you forget to open the battery door, the battery will survive well into the next few days. I have only had to replace the batteries once in the month I have been using these (I mostly wear them in the afternoon when out or during in-person work meetings, 3-4 hours a day). Overall, I would absolutely recommend these to anyone who is suffering from hearing loss and is looking for an off the shelf solution to help make your life better! I would even recommend these over the B2, as the common hearing aid battery in this device promotes life beyond the lithium battery in the B2 and easily replaceable when travelling in places that may not offer USB power options.

The Lexie B1 OTC hearing aids right out of the box look great, of good quality all round. In the box there are the aids, manual, brush, extra domes, batteries, measuring tool and finally the carrying case. The aids are intended for mild to moderate hearing impairment and they amplify sound. These are over the counter yet of high quality but not for everyone. With that said, with the Bose logo on them, I have gotten asked about them since Bose makes great sound products. Setup, after getting everything out of the box there are options on how to set them up. First you can use the manual that is included and It shows everything you need, from safety, setup, how to wear, app controls care and maintenance as well. There is also support on their website and it includes videos, unfortunately the video on how to measure your ear is not fully shown since it stops before ending. So look for the video that shows how to measure your ear to determine to correct size receiver wire Lexie B1and B2, this other video is complete. Lastly if you download the app, it walks you step by step on how to set them up. It has a few things that are convenient such as it comes with different dome sizes and each ear might have a different size so keep that in mind and measure each side. Also the color coded sides, blue is left and red is right so I do not have problems putting them on. As for the volume, It is easy to increase and decrease world volume from the aid. Furthermore in the Lexie application this can be done as well as increasing the treble and bass. Also directionality is great because it can amplify everything or just the front; this last one is for better focus to have a better conversation when surrounded by noise. Also in the app volume can be adjusted on each ear since one ear might need more volume than the other. Comfort, they are comfortable to wear all day, it just takes time to adjust and get used to them, I really like how well designed these are because these are smaller, thinner and just well-hidden around my ears. The aids come with batteries and they are easy to change and best of all, the aid will let you know “low Battery” so time to exchange, if you do not want to change batteries then consider the Lexie B2 since the set is rechargeable. The very nice case that these aids come with looks great and there is plenty of space for them. I would like for them to have an off switch even if it’s from the app, to turn them on, I would press volume up. I would prefer that instead of opening the battery compartment every night. Overall, I like that they are easy to use even if I didn’t use my smart phone a lot. I also like that if I need help, Lexie Experts are available to assist. Lastly they are FSA/ HAS and HRA eligible.

Likes: Decent sound. The most important thing is sound quality. Overall these are good. Definitely have to adjust them to get the best sound. Can be extremely sensitive. It took me a while to find that perfect sound. Clearly your surrounding environment makes a huge difference. The App makes adjustments pretty easy. I like the carry case. Well made and designed. It is packaged well and neatly. Dislikes: To me this is not properly advertised. These are NOT Bluetooth in the way that most think. The Lexie App is the ONLY thing that works via Bluetooth. You CANNOT stream music, radio, and more importantly, hearing Apps. I have several hearing Apps that were recommended by my audiologist. I cannot use any of them because these hearing aids will not connect to your phone. I have serious tinnitus and require masking Apps to combat the noise. Using these I cannot use any of them. The other thing I do not like is there is no on/off switch. The only way to turn them off is by opening the battery compartment. For people with poor fine motor skills or large fingers, that does not make it easy to power them on and off. At this price point, that makes no sense to me. A simple power button is needed. So if you take them out and forget to open the battery compartments, they will stay on and kill the batteries. Lastly, these are NOT for very large ears. I’m 6’2” and these are a very tight fit. These are not adjustable at all in terms of size. Instead of sitting behind my ears and being near invisible, these pull down on my ears and can be easily seen. If I pull them behind my ear to be near invisible, they pop out of my ear canals. Bottom Line: If you need hearing aids, do your homework. For basic hearing needs, these are fine. But at this price point, I think rechargeable batteries, a power button, and Bluetooth Streaming Capability should be present. I feel like I’m paying for the BOSE name more than anything. In the end, I just can’t recommend these. I really wanted to love these. I was mostly disappointed.

I have been anxious to try these over-the-counter (OTC) hearing aids ever since Bose first announced they were working on them a couple years ago. I have used hearing aids fitted by an audiologist for eleven years now, and my experience with them (two different brands) have been somewhat less than what I had hoped for. Bose decided to sell their technology rather than bring to market the hearing aids themselves, hence the “Lexie B1, Powered by Bose”. I find it interesting that the body of the hearing aids and the carrying case all are branded “Bose” rather than “Lexie”. They are marketed for users with “mild to moderate” hearing loss, and my hearing loss is defined as moderate, but is probably toward the end of the moderate scale away from mild. This gave me some doubts as to whether or not they would be powerful enough for me, but I wanted the opportunity to experience the ability to try to tailor them to my liking on my own without having to make multiple trips back to the audiologist for programming tweaks. The Lexie B1 is designed as a “receiver-in-canal” (RIC) hearing aid which is one of the most popular, if not the most popular design of hearing aid today. “Receiver” is kind of a confusing name for what is essentially a “speaker” and is the part where the amplified sound comes out of. The main body of the hearing aid rests behind your ear and contains the microphone(s), battery compartment, amplifier and sound processing circuitry, and the button that controls the volume. The receiver is covered with a soft rubber “dome” that holds the receiver in your ear canal and is connected to the body of the hearing aid by a thin wire that lies flat against your skin. The Lexie B1 mimics the style of many “prescription” hearing aids that you buy from an audiologist. But like any electronic device there are differences in design and features due both to designer choice and the price point that the device is manufactured to be sold at. My hearing aids (a top-of-the-line model) from an audiologist were just over five times the MSRP price of the Lexie B1 OTC hearing aids, so is it fair to make a direct comparison? Absolutely not. But, it is inevitable that I do so if only to point out what Lexie got right and what a user might be shortchanging themselves on by going the OTC route. The User Manual that comes with the Lexie B1, Powered by Bose is very well done, especially the part that explains hearing loss, what to expect from using hearing aids, when to see a medical professional, how to fit and set up the devices, and all of the usual warnings and precautions. That being said, this style of hearing aid and the care and maintenance that goes along with it, is not really a device that you gift to your 80-year-old parent or grandparent and leave them to their own devices. There is a certain amount of manual dexterity and visual acuity required to use this product properly. I’m going to be upfront and admit that the amplification of the B1 is not enough for me to utilize them as a viable alternative to my prescription hearing aids, especially out in public. Maybe if I were using them in a quiet setting and watching TV or having a conversation with one other person they would be sufficient, but they just don’t have enough amplification for my individual needs. The nice thing is that Lexie gives you a 45-day money-back trial period just like the prescription aids do, so you really have nothing to lose in trying them. Some observations and inevitable comparisons - I was hoping for a tone control with more adjustability, kind of like a graphic equalizer with the ability to make a lot of different adjustments over the frequency scale rather than just a slider control that simply varies between bass and treble. Besides the “world volume” control, there is a balance control in case you need one side louder than the other. Volume is also adjustable via the buttons on the hearing aid bodies and the control on either aid will adjust the volume in both units. In addition to these adjustments, there is also a directionality setting so you can choose to have the microphones concentrate on sounds in front of you rather than all around you such as when trying to have a conversation in a noisy place. There are what Lexie calls “Environment Settings” which are a way of saving volume, tone, balance, and directionality settings as a group, custom-tailored to specific circumstances such as noisy indoor, outdoors, music, etc. This allows you to easily change a variety of settings with the push of one “button” on the phone app. Prescription aids also have these “programs” that your audiologist can create and some aids allow you to change these via the buttons on the hearing aids so that you don’t have to do it with the phone - the B1 requires you to access the phone app to make any change other than simple volume control. The wires that connect the body of the hearing aid to the receiver are much stiffer and more resistant to having their shape reformed than what I am used to. This seemed to make it harder for me to get the receivers inserted into my ear canals. Maybe this would get easier with more experience with this product. In the user manual, Lexie states that the “Expected Service Life of Product and Components” is two years, and the B1 comes with a one year warranty. Prescription aids commonly come with two or three year warranties and my eleven-year-old hearing aids still work - but with advancements in technology, five years is probably a more realistic life expectancy for prescription devices. I’m giving the Lexie B1 a rating of four stars because the design is better than a number of other OTC hearing aids I have seen in the marketplace, so it deserves better than an average (three star) rating. I’d like to give it five stars but can’t because of the rudimentary adjustability of its frequency response curve - I think if you’re going to make a product that offers user adjustability, you should allow it to offer true customization to the user’s needs. For those people that are reluctant to use a hearing aid because of the social stigma that is still attached to hearing aids, this design is so unobtrusive that when I got my first pair of aids, no one at work noticed them until I started telling people seven months later. I kid you not when I say people just do not notice these hearing aids, so put your concerns aside and quit cheating yourself by continuing to live with a major part of your live being compromised. An OTC hearing aid is a good jumping off point for those consumers still debating if they are ready to make a positive change in their lives.