From zero-delay sound processing to cloud-based fitting and AI personalisation, Widex is redefining how hearing technology restores the world as it really sounds: clean, clear, and beautifully natural.

For nearly two decades, Morten Jepsen has been part of that mission. As Director of Sound and Audiology at Widex, he represents the company’s long-standing focus on delivering natural sound – hearing that feels as close as possible to real life.

“The way we talk about the customer,” Morten explains, “is that it’s the hearing care professional who in the end chooses our products for their patients. But we obviously care a lot about the patient too. Our main focus is on the end-user experience and the benefit of the sound processing.”

At the heart of that philosophy is a simple goal: to help people hear naturally, without feeling like they are using a device at all.

The Widex philosophy. 

For Widex, sound quality has always been more than a technical specification: it’s a philosophy. “We’re trying to help patients overcome a huge challenge in their life,” says Morten. “We want to give them a solution where they feel they don’t have a device.”

That means recreating sound in a way that reflects the world as it really is. “We try to make the sound as clean and clear as possible and represent sounds as they are in real life,” he explains. “We try not to manipulate it too much. The idea is that patients have unfiltered access to sound as it is in real life, so their auditory system and cognitive capabilities can use that for their benefit.”

This principle has guided Widex, influencing both its engineering and its sound philosophy. “It started long before I joined,” Morten notes. “We want to get high-quality sound to patients; that’s the best proposition for outcomes. It’s been a journey since the introduction of digital hearing aids and beyond.”

The technology behind Widex’s natural sound.

Widex’s engineering choices reflect this philosophy. The company’s time-domain signal processing is designed to reproduce sound faithfully, as it exists in the real world.

“What that brings is high-fidelity, unfiltered sound,” Morten explains. “We reproduce the sound as fast and faithfully as possible to the ears of the patient.”

Widex’s approach also relies on one of the industry’s most competitive digital sampling rates. “Our sampling rate is 33,000 hertz,” he says. “It’s the precision of how we sample the sound from the physical domain into the digital domain. The higher it is, the better the analysis, and the better the reproduction.”

This precision ensures that Widex hearing instruments preserve the nuances of real-world sound rather than distorting or over-processing them.

PureSound™ and zero-delay processing

This focus on authenticity led to the development of PureSound™, one of Widex’s most important innovations.

Morten recalls how the idea emerged: “We started thinking about PureSound™ and zero-delay technology because we realised that when we put a hearing aid in the ear, things sound different. They don’t sound like they really are. So in a way, we were destroying sound by putting a hearing aid on the ear. We asked ourselves: what can we do to reduce that effect?”

The result was a new processing concept designed to minimise delay and maintain the natural timing of sound. “PureSound™ is a sound quality breakthrough,” Jepsen says. “It allows us to present sound immediately as it comes in from the real world. People tell us they just forget they have hearing aids. They just hear the sound amplified.”

Widex’s Allure platform, the second generation of this technology, builds on PureSound™ with additional benefits for speech understanding in noise, all while maintaining the same respect for the zero-delay principle.

AI and real-time personalisation.

Widex has also introduced artificial intelligence to help users tailor their listening experience through their smartphones.

“Our application of AI runs in the smartphone app, what we call the AI Assistant,” Morten explains. “It optimises the sound experience in a situation based on artificial intelligence processing.”

The process starts with the user. “If a patient believes their hearing aids can sound better in their situation, they can open the app and start the AI Assistant,” he says. “The system asks for their listening intention. For example, they might say they want to listen to speech in a concert hall. Then the AI gives two options and asks which one sounds better. The user can stop when they find the sound that fits them best, or continue refining. It’s an iterative process with AI.”

Behind the scenes, the app uses machine learning and big data to analyse what works best in different listening environments. “It’s preference-based and it’s pretty advanced under the hood. When you find your optimum, you can save it as a programme in the hearing aid.”

The result is a truly personalised hearing experience: one that adapts to both the listener’s environment and their intent.

How Widex supports clinicians.

While much of Widex’s work centres on the patient experience, the company is equally committed to supporting hearing care professionals.

“The view and the legacy of Widex,” Morten says, “is really to make the ideal tool for the clinician. It’s always a balancing act between making it easy and having all the handles you need. We’re passionate about providing clinicians with the right feature set, following their best practices and standards of care.”

That means giving professionals both simplicity and control. “We call it precision fitting,” Morten explains. “We know clinicians care that the patient gets what they need from amplification, and we try to make that as easy and transparent as possible, while still giving them the fine-tuning tools they need.”

Verification and outcomes are central to this approach. “We have high standards,” Morten adds. “We push the hearing aid and the fitting software so clinicians can verify the results they expect. We believe that giving professionals the right tools leads to good patient outcomes, not just technically, but in overall satisfaction.”

Compass Cloud: a new era of fitting.

The company’s Compass Cloud software marks a major step forward in clinician support. Being cloud-based allows for seamless updates and feature additions without downtime.

“Being in the cloud gives us the opportunity to make updates for the clinician day-to-day,” Morten explains. “It’s like what you experience with Microsoft Office or Google applications. You always have the latest version. It’s about building software that’s easy to use, accessible, and has the right level of features for good patient outcomes.”

Over time, this platform will also open the door to AI applications that support the fitting process itself. “There’s great potential in AI applications in fitting software,” Morten says. “The system can learn from the behaviour of other clinicians or users, making fittings smarter and more efficient. That frees up time for clinicians to talk with patients, to counsel and manage expectations, which is just as important as the technology itself.”

How Widex supports the patient journey.

Widex’s focus doesn’t end with the device. The company is deeply involved in understanding the entire hearing journey; especially for first-time users.

“This is really a high focus for us,” Morten explains. “We do a lot of research to understand what it takes – what kind of sound philosophy, what kind of technology – to support that process. We look at the whole patient journey, from deciding to seek help, to getting the hearing aid, to personalising it.”

Internally, Widex calls this concept ‘Beyond the Product’, acknowledging that hearing rehabilitation involves more than just hardware. “We’re a hearing aid company, but we don’t only develop hearing aids,” Morten says. “We think about the rehabilitation journey of the patient, acknowledging that the hearing aid is just part of it. The smartphone apps, the fitting software, the cloud systems – they all come together as part of the same ecosystem.”

This holistic view ensures that every Widex innovation, from the device itself to the digital tools surrounding it, supports the clinician and the patient in equal measure.

Hearing the world, naturally.

From high-precision sound processing to AI-assisted personalisation, Widex’s work is driven by one core belief: the most effective hearing care is the one that sounds natural.

“Our essence is unfiltered access,” Morten says. “You decide what’s important. And we believe that leads to real benefits.”

As a proud member of BIHIMA, Widex continues to champion innovation that puts people first.“It’s really about giving people clear, unfiltered sound, and letting them hear life as it truly is,” Morten concludes.