Why Summer Is the Hardest Season for Hearing Aids
Britain's summers are getting hotter. The Met Office has confirmed that summer 2026 has already delivered multiple official heatwaves, with above-average temperatures and further hot spells expected through August, particularly across southern England and Wales. For most of us that means sun cream, fans, and complaints about the trains. But if you are one of the roughly 2 million people in the UK who wear hearing aids, hot weather brings a quieter, more expensive problem: heat, sweat, and humidity are among the most common causes of hearing aid failure — and summer concentrates all three.
Modern hearing aids are remarkable pieces of engineering. A single device packs microphones, a processor, a receiver, and a battery into a case smaller than a broad bean. But that miniaturisation comes at a cost: there is very little internal space to buffer the electronics from moisture and temperature extremes. Audiologists consistently report a spike in repair bookings during and after hot spells — corroded battery contacts, crackling sound, muffled output from blocked microphone ports, and devices that simply stop working after a day at the beach.
The good news is that almost all summer damage is preventable with a few simple habits. This guide covers exactly how heat and moisture harm your devices, a daily summer care routine, what to do about swimming and sea water, and how to travel abroad without putting your hearing aids — or your hearing — at risk. If your devices are already misbehaving, it may be time to book an appointment with a local audiologist for a professional clean and check.
How Heat, Sweat and Humidity Damage Hearing Aids
Direct heat: the parked car problem
Most hearing aid manufacturers specify a safe operating range that tops out around 40–45°C. That sounds generous until you remember what British summer does to enclosed spaces. On a 28°C day, the interior of a parked car can exceed 50°C within half an hour — hot enough to warp plastic casings, degrade adhesives, dry out receiver components, and permanently reduce battery capacity. The same applies to windowsills, conservatories, beach bags left in the sun, and the parcel shelf of a caravan. Direct sunlight is worse still, because dark casings absorb radiant heat and can climb well above the surrounding air temperature.
Sweat: worse than rain
Counterintuitively, your own perspiration is a bigger threat to a hearing aid than a rain shower. Sweat is salt water, and salt accelerates corrosion on battery contacts and circuit boards. It also creeps: sweat running down from the hairline pools exactly where a behind-the-ear device sits, and wicks into microphone ports and battery drawers over hours of wear. The damage is cumulative — a device can tolerate weeks of sweaty wear and then fail without warning once corrosion reaches a critical connection. People who wear glasses or sunglasses alongside hearing aids face an extra complication, as the arms of the frames channel sweat directly along the top of the ear. Our article on hearing aids and exercise covers sweat management in more detail.
Humidity and condensation
Humid air alone rarely destroys a hearing aid, but rapid changes do. Walking from a hot garden into an air-conditioned car or supermarket causes condensation to form inside the device, exactly as it does on a cold drink brought outside. That internal moisture sits on the circuitry with nowhere to evaporate. Warning signs include sound cutting in and out, static or crackling, distorted or weak output, and a device that works in the morning but fades during the day.
Batteries suffer too
Traditional zinc-air button batteries are activated by air and are particularly sensitive to heat and humidity, which can cut their life dramatically and cause them to swell or leak in extreme cases. Rechargeable lithium-ion aids fare better in daily use but should never be charged in direct sunlight or a hot car, as heat during charging is the fastest way to age a lithium cell. Whichever type you use, our guide to hearing aid batteries explains how to store and handle them properly.
Your Daily Summer Care Routine
None of this means leaving your hearing aids in a drawer until September — untreated hearing loss carries far greater costs than any repair bill. It means adopting a short routine that takes less than five minutes a day.
Every evening
- Wipe down both devices with a soft, dry cloth — never wet wipes or alcohol unless your audiologist has approved them. Pay attention to the microphone ports and the area that sits against the skin.
- Open the battery drawer overnight (for battery-powered aids) to let air circulate and moisture escape.
- Use a drying kit. A hearing aid dehumidifier — either a simple desiccant pot (from around £10) or an electric drying box (£30–£100) — is the single best investment a hearing aid wearer can make in summer. Overnight drying removes the day's accumulated moisture before it can corrode anything.
Every day, while out
- Store aids in the shade. Whenever you take them out — to swim, shower, or nap in the garden — put them in a hard case, in a bag, in the shade. Never in a parked car and never on a towel in direct sun.
- Apply sun cream and insect repellent first. Both products clog microphone ports and degrade casings. Apply them, let them dry, wash your hands, and only then put your hearing aids in.
- Consider sweatbands or sleeves. Slim moisture-wicking covers for behind-the-ear aids cost a few pounds and absorb perspiration before it reaches the electronics — well worth it for gardening, sport, or a day out in a heatwave.
- Wear a brimmed hat. It shades the devices, reduces sweating around the ears, and keeps rain off if the weather turns — a genuinely all-British solution.
A fuller year-round routine, including wax guards and tubing care, is covered in our hearing aid maintenance guide.
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Find appointments →Swimming, Sea Water and Sand
What IP ratings actually mean
Many modern hearing aids advertise an IP68 rating, and many wearers understandably read that as "waterproof". It is not. The rating means the device survived brief submersion in still, fresh water under laboratory conditions. It says nothing about swimming (moving water forces itself into ports), sea water (salt is highly corrosive), chlorinated pools, or soap and shampoo. The rule audiologists give is simple: water-resistant means it will probably survive an accident; it does not mean you should swim in it.
Before you get in the water
Take your hearing aids out and store them in a hard, ventilated case in the shade. If you are somewhere without safe storage, a zipped inner pocket in a bag out of the sun is better than a hot car. If you rely heavily on your aids for safety awareness — around children, boats, or traffic — plan for the gap: tell companions you will hear less, and stay in sight of anyone you need to communicate with.
If your hearing aid gets wet
- Do not switch it on or press any buttons — powering wet electronics is what causes short circuits.
- Remove the battery immediately (or power off a rechargeable) and open all compartments.
- Shake gently, dab dry with a soft cloth, and leave it in a drying kit or a ventilated spot for at least 24 hours. Never use a hairdryer, radiator, oven, microwave, or airing cupboard — heat finishes the job the water started. The rice trick is largely a myth; a proper desiccant kit works far better.
- If it was sea water, the salt left behind keeps corroding even after drying. Book a professional service promptly.
Protect your ears as well as your aids
Summer swimming is also peak season for otitis externa — swimmer's ear — a painful outer ear infection caused by water trapped in the ear canal. Hearing aid wearers are at elevated risk because ear moulds hold warmth and moisture against the canal. Dry your ears thoroughly before reinserting your aids, never put them into wet ears, and if your ears feel itchy, blocked or sore after swimming, see a pharmacist or GP before the infection takes hold. Trapped water can also compact wax against the eardrum; our guide to ear wax build-up explains the warning signs.
Taking Hearing Aids on Holiday
Around 45 million overseas trips are made by UK residents each year, most of them in summer, and many to destinations considerably hotter than home. A little preparation prevents the two classic holiday disasters: a dead hearing aid on day two, and a lost one with no backup plan.
Pack like an audiologist
- Batteries or charger — more batteries than you think you need (heat shortens their life), or your charger plus a travel adaptor. A power bank is invaluable for rechargeable aids on long journeys.
- Your drying kit — even more important in hot, humid destinations than at home.
- Cleaning tools, spare wax guards, spare domes and tubing — small, light, and impossible to buy in a hurry abroad.
- A hard storage case and, ideally, your old hearing aids as an emergency backup.
- Documentation — a note of your hearing aid make, model and serial numbers, and your audiologist's contact details.
Insurance and NHS replacements
Check whether your travel insurance or home contents policy covers hearing aids abroad — many policies exclude them by default or cap single-item claims well below the £1,000–£3,500 cost of a private pair, so they may need listing separately. If you wear NHS hearing aids, be aware that while repairs are free, most NHS trusts charge a contribution (commonly £50–£100 per aid) for devices that are lost or damaged beyond repair, and replacements can take weeks. Losing an aid on holiday is exactly the scenario the storage case exists to prevent.
Flying with hearing aids
Keep hearing aids and all batteries in your hand luggage, never the hold — lithium batteries are required to travel in the cabin, and hold luggage goes missing. Wear your aids through security (they very rarely trigger scanners) and keep them on during the flight so you can hear announcements. Cabin pressure changes do not harm the devices, though your ears are another matter: our guide to hearing aids and flying covers ear pressure, tips for comfortable descent, and what to do about in-flight audio.
Loud Summers: Festivals, Fireworks and Garden Parties
Heat is not the only seasonal hazard. August is the loudest month in the British calendar — Reading and Leeds, Creamfields and the Notting Hill Carnival all land within a fortnight, alongside outdoor cinema, county shows and a thousand village fireworks displays. Sound systems at major festivals routinely run at 100 dB or more near the stage, a level at which permanent damage can begin within minutes of unprotected exposure.
Hearing aid wearers have an advantage here that often goes unused: modern devices can act as sophisticated hearing protection when configured properly. Many aids include loud-environment programmes that compress peaks while keeping speech audible — ask your audiologist to activate one before festival season rather than simply removing your aids, which leaves you both under-protected against surprise peaks and unable to follow conversation. For everyone else, filtered earplugs costing £10–£30 reduce volume without muffling the music.
The warning sign to respect is the classic one: ringing ears or dulled hearing on the morning after a loud event. That temporary threshold shift is not harmless recovery — it is evidence that hair cells in the inner ear were pushed beyond their limits, and repeated episodes convert temporary damage into permanent noise-induced hearing loss. If a loud weekend leaves your ears ringing for more than 48 hours, our guide to protecting your hearing explains what to do next — and a baseline hearing test will tell you exactly where you stand.
Hay Fever, Heat and Your Hearing
Summer does not only test your devices. Late-summer weed and mould spore allergies — following the grass pollen peak of June and July — inflame the lining of the nose and throat, and with it the Eustachian tubes that ventilate the middle ear. The result for many people is blocked, pressured ears and noticeably duller hearing that comes and goes with the pollen count. Antihistamines and steroid nasal sprays usually settle it; hearing that stays muffled after allergy season deserves a proper assessment rather than another summer of guesswork.
Dehydration matters too. The inner ear is sensitive to fluid balance, and people prone to dizziness or tinnitus often find symptoms worsen in hot weather when they are not drinking enough. If a hot spell leaves you with ringing ears, a sensation of fullness, or hearing that seems to fluctuate day to day, do not write it off as "just the heat" — persistent changes are a reason to book a hearing test. It is quick, painless, and the fastest way to separate a temporary seasonal problem from something that needs treatment.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can I wear my hearing aids in hot weather?
Yes — daily wear in hot weather is fine and far better than going without. The risks come from moisture and extremes: sweat accumulating over long active days, devices left in parked cars or direct sunlight, and swimming while wearing them. A nightly drying kit and shaded storage eliminate most of the danger.
Are IP68 hearing aids waterproof?
No. IP68 means water-resistant under laboratory conditions — brief submersion in still, fresh water. Swimming, sea water, chlorine, soap and steam can all defeat the rating. Treat IP68 as accident protection, not an invitation to swim.
What should I do if my hearing aid gets wet?
Switch it off without pressing other buttons, remove the battery or power down, open all compartments, dab dry, and leave it in a drying kit for 24 hours. Never use direct heat such as a hairdryer or radiator. If sea water was involved, book a professional service, as salt continues to corrode after drying.
Why does my hearing aid battery die faster in summer?
Zinc-air batteries are air-activated chemical cells, and heat and humidity accelerate the reaction and the corrosion that ends it. Store batteries somewhere cool and dry (not the fridge), keep the tab on until use, and carry more spares than usual in hot weather.
Can hay fever affect my hearing?
Yes. Allergic inflammation can block the Eustachian tubes, causing pressure, fullness and temporarily muffled hearing. It usually resolves with antihistamines or nasal sprays as the allergen fades, but hearing that remains dull after symptoms settle should be checked with a hearing test.
