Smartphone with rock solid BT for Phonak/Unitron hearing aids

Hi all,
I’m going to buy a smartphone and I’d like to use it with my Unitron Moxi Blu HAs (note that they share almost the same Phonak’s platform) to make my calls. Due to unknown reasons I’ve noticed that some smartphones of my friends, even the middle-level ones (eg. Samsung A23), sometimes loose their bluetooth pairing to Phonak/Unitron HAs and it’s necessary to pair them again manually. In other words: pairing is ok, I move more than 10 meters away from my smartphone and pairing is lost, then I move back near to my smartphone and it happens that sometimes the pairing is automatically restored but other times it’s not and a manual pairing is the only solution.
Basing on your personal experiences I’d just want to know if there’re more “problematic” smartphones, I mean ones with a weaker bluetooth pairing in the sense I’ve explained above, so I’ll avoid them, and more reliable ones.
Please tell smartphones names and models and… your personal % of successes/failures with your Phonak/Unitron HAs :slight_smile:

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Sorry at this time there isn’t such a thing as rock solid Bluetooth.

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I have an A31. Coincidentally, after a long time of not, the mood struck me to listen to my locally stored music last night. Might have been about an hour. No problems.
I also sometimes listen to videos on my computer via bluetooth. No problems. I don’t have to re-pair. It just connects.
Maybe your A23 is the troublemaker in this. Is the OS all up to date (as far as they go)? Apps all updated? Security patches all updated?
Bluetooth is not about range. It’s limited anyway. But you might be confusing re-pair with re-connecting.
Edit - I have the Phonak/Costco KS10’s.

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I have tried Android phones in the past, I just don’t like them…For my sins, I much prefer iPhone, and most of Apple’s other wares, they ooze quality, in my opinion, expensive, but cream always rises to the top, in my book, you get what you pay for… I am acutely aware, some folks hate the Apple Eco System, each to their own, or perhaps it’s more to do with how Apple operates, to me it just works, and works well…Bluetooth is solid with Phonak Naida Lumity 90 UP BTE’s, rock solid, moving in & out of range, the Naida’s automatically reconnects with my iPhone 12 Pro, iPad Pro M4, or MacBook Pro M2, it all work’s seamlessly, I will shortly be upgrading to the iPhone 16 Pro, I am overdue an upgrade, I prolonged the iPhone 12 Pro’s life, by replacing the battery, approximately 2 year ago, that doubled the runtime of the iPhone, and considerably shortened the overall charging up time, in fact, the new battery, was far better than the original battery, when new, by some considerable distance… Those whom are familiar with Apple products, will no doubt be aware, putting in a 3rd party battery, isn’t without its problems, with very annoying reminders, that this battery isn’t an Apple product, and therefore refusing to install updates, but I managed to find a workaround, and all was well… :grin: IMO, iPhone & Phonak, just work well together, they are…Rock Solid!!! Cheers Kev :wink:

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Actually sometimes is a matter of re-pairing and other times is a matter of re-connecting anyway it’s a real pain for me, especially because until now I’ve been using an old keyboard phone with BT to make hands free calls and I’ve to re-pair and/or re-connect it again and again it so I guess if I get a “modern” smartphone then BT will be better but, as I told, some friends of mine that wear Phonaks HAs share these same issues with their smartphones.

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I have costco KS 10 for about 2.5 years.

Bluetooth does that. You will notice it with a speaker, earbuds, headset, etc.

Simply keep your phone in your pocket.

I use mine constantly for music. Business calss etc. No problem at all.

I have the Sennheiser OTC hearing aids, which are dumbed-down Phonaks. I have solid bluetooth with my Samsung Z Flip 5 (just received my new Z Flip 6 so I will shortly see if that makes a difference). Sennheiser/Phonak use classic bluetooth, not LE, so the results are typically much better than LE.

I have been planning to get prescription HA’s, but I decided to wait until Auracast is properly supported on Android.

OK - back in the saddle here after a glorious 3 weeks in Europe!!! Let me just digress to say: THANK GOD I had battery aids!!! There were 2 of 3 places we stayed where it would’ve been awkward to plug in a rechargeable base. I had LONG days, some of which included flights or ferries, and I was also glad I’d paired + connected to a portable Astell&Kern music player, so I could enjoy that hands-free.

My own experience with Phonak aids is that (perhaps due to my living in a large metro area in the USA) I rarely if EVER drop a phone connection. Just to get the nomenclature right: you PAIR to a phone, then CONNECT to it. So if the connection is dropped, I don’t know why the aids would also no longer be paired?

I have Phonak Lumity Life 312s, and they are paired + connected to my Samsung Flip4 Android phone. I’ve had virtually ZERO issues with phone calls streaming here in the greater USA. Years ago, when I lived a mile high on a mountaintop, calls would be dropped from my older Audeo B-Direct aids, but that’s history.

I took my older Phonak Marvel 13-battery aids on this trip to use as backups, and BOTH pairs of aids did superbly on islands, in cities and wherever I had cell phone reception.

Perhaps you are experiencing issues of: interference, poor cell reception (and believe me, even 5G has its issues!) or incompatibility with aids + phone. The only tedious route to fix this is to swap out aids, phones, location and all to see what’s the root cause. GOOD LUCK and keep us posted.

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I am an android user, and have my Phonak aids paired to my Pixel 8, with zero issues.

I usually leave my Pixel 8 on all night using the do not disturb function, and the hearing aids in the charger which turns them off. In the morning, I place them in my ears, turn them on, and they connect immediately to my phone. Should I turn off the phone, I just need to go to bluetooth settings and select the Pixel 8, which connects, with no issues.

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I agree with cvkemp that you can never count on “rock solid bluetooth.” You might get it, but there’s an element of luck. To increase your chances you should be good with any late model, high end iPhone, Samsung or Pixel phone.

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My idea about this issue is that the important “thing” to evaluate for my goal lays more on the technology of the phone than other all considerations so I think I’ll buy a recent phone, I mean not released before 2022, but my budget is only 150 euros (about 150 USD) so I can’t get neither a high end device nor a middle one.

Some interesting devices to evaluate could be Xiaomi POCO M5 with “Bluetooth 5.3, A2DP, LE” (year 2022) and Motorola Moto G34 with “Bluetooth 5.1, A2DP, LE” (year 2023) though my HAs carry on only “Bluetooth 4.2 Dual-Mode”.

If you want to stick with Android, I have found that Samsung’s S series phones manage the Bluetooth pairing pretty reliably. All mobiles seem to be pricey these days, but I currently have an S22 which is several phones back from their current product line. I got the “baby” phone (not the Pro or Ultra) because the others were too big for me to hold. I also tried the new Pixel phones and found those were okay too. I did have problems when I had my Costco KS9s but not with my new Phonak L70s. BUT you need to understand that there are really no rock solid anything with pairing HAs to phones. My experience has been very good, but as with any technology YMMV.

I think you mean “connection”. Constantly losing pairing would mean it needs to be sent off for maintenance.

My Samsung S21 FE stays connected, in my pocket or on the table. I normally dont take my phone out of my front pants pocket to answer calls.

Based on my experience, I suspect the phone is usually not the issue. I’ve only ever used late-model iPhones, and I’ve had no issues maintaining a connection indoors while the phone is on my person or within 5-10 feet. Anything else is hit-or-miss. When I go for a walk outside, sometimes just holding the phone in my hand at my side seems to be too great a distance (and I have fairly short arms!). It’s particularly bad when it’s windy. I’ve never had the problem with airpods or other bluetooth devices, so I don’t think it’s the phone.

Phonak is supposed to be one of the better brands for this, so I’ve just resigned myself to the fact that while proper hearing aids may be vastly superior to airpods for hearing assistance, they’re not in the same league for streaming or connectivity.