Designing accessible
clinical-grade hearing care on Galaxy Buds
Designing accessible
clinical-grade hearing care on Galaxy Buds
2025 - Present
2025 - Present
Hearing loss is one of the most underaddressed health conditions globally, often overlooked because professional care is expensive, inaccessible, or stigmatised. The design challenge was making a clinical-grade medical experience feel like a natural part of using your earbuds without oversimplifying results that carry real health implications.
Stakeholder workshops across product, clinical, and regulatory teams
End-to-end user flows covering all result types, device states, and error paths
Wireframing across the Hearing Test and Hearing Aid setup flows
Edge case design: disconnection mid-test, poor earbud fit, environmental noise
Supporting usability testing and FDA-regulated content review
The Hearing Aid feature received FDA clearance as an over-the-counter hearing aid. The Hearing Test is registered as a Software as a Medical Device (SaMD). Both features are launching on Galaxy Buds3 Pro and Buds4 Pro in Q4 2026.
How do you make a clinical experience feel
easy to use without losing what makes it clinical?
The Hearing Aid feature got FDA clearance in August 2026
Challenge
My Role
Outcome
As a Product Designer on the digital health team at Samsung Research America, I worked on the Hearing Test and Hearing Aid features for Galaxy Buds. Two features that together form Samsung's first FDA-cleared hearing care experience built natively into consumer earbuds, requiring no separate app or clinical visit.
Hearing loss is one of the most underaddressed health conditions globally, often overlooked because professional care is expensive, inaccessible, or stigmatised. The design challenge was making a clinical-grade medical experience feel like a natural part of using your earbuds without oversimplifying results that carry real health implications.
Bringing medical-grade hearing care to a device
people already wear every day.
Context
How do you make a clinical experience feel easy to use without losing what makes it clinical?
Challenge
Bringing medical-grade hearing care to a device people already wear every day.
As a Product Designer on the digital health team at Samsung Research America, I worked on the Hearing Test and Hearing Aid features for Galaxy Buds. Two features that together form Samsung's first FDA-cleared hearing care experience built natively into consumer earbuds, requiring no separate app or clinical visit.
Organization
Samsung
Team
2 UX Designers, 1 Product
Manager,Developer team
Timeline
13 months