Always-On Live Caption Watch Face for Hard-of-Hearing Users

mobile app real project •• multiple requests

Hard-of-hearing users want real-time speech-to-text streamed to their wrist so they can follow a conversation without staring at their phone. Apple's Live Captions are iPhone-only and screen-bound; Google Live Transcribe is the same. XRAI Glass exists at $699 plus subscription. Nothing turns a $200 Apple Watch or Wear OS watch into a glanceable caption display, which is exactly the form factor users keep asking for.

builder note

Real on-device speech-to-text on a watch is hard battery-wise... so do it phone-side and stream text to the watch via BLE, with a Watch face complication that shows the last sentence. Charge $4.99/mo with a generous free tier. The HoH community is loud, loyal, and tells each other about good apps.

landscape (3 existing solutions)

Captions are everywhere except on the wearable people already own. Watch screens are small but real-time live captions don't need much... 30 chars at 2 lines is enough to follow a sentence.

Apple Live Captions iPhone-only and displayed on phone screen. The whole point is to NOT look at your phone.

Google Live Transcribe Android phone screen only. Same fundamental form factor problem.

XRAI Glass AR glasses at $699 + $360/yr subscription. Solves the form factor but at a price most HoH users can't justify casually.

sources (2)

reddit https://www.reddit.com/r/hardofhearing/comments/1su9vkm/any_... "it's kind of unpractical to look at my phone all the time when we are talking" 2026-04-24

reddit https://www.reddit.com/r/hardofhearing/comments/1sz9kql/how_... "how do you transcribe audio messages" 2026-04-29

accessibilitydeafhard-of-hearingwatchoswearable