Open-ear earphones

Bone conduction

Born in the medical world in 1977 with the first hearing implants, bone conduction broke into the consumer market from 2011 onwards thanks to Shokz (formerly AfterShokz). Winning over athletes who wanted to keep their ears free, the sector grew from a $550 million market in 2021 to over a billion in 2026.

Yet the technology is hitting its limits. Making bone vibrate takes a disproportionate amount of mechanical energy. The result: disappointing battery life, almost no bass, and an unpleasant tingling at high volume.

What's more, the hype is mostly about keeping your ears open rather than about sound travelling through bone. As a technology, bone conduction offers very few advantages in the end. What people often appreciate is the headband form factor of the product.

The alternative: my vision of an all-day wearable

To build a device you wear all day long, the future belongs to the open-ear format with air projection. But rather than fitting it with conventional speakers, I believe the answer lies in a technology borrowed from hearing aids: balanced armature drivers.

Using this building block in a consumer earphone solves the equation of the ideal wearable:

• Unbeatable energy efficiency: power consumption is so low that long battery life becomes realistic, even running on a coin cell.
• Extreme miniaturisation: the component is tiny, making it possible to design a light, discreet object that is completely invisible in everyday life.

It isn't the path the big manufacturers are taking today, but in my view it is the only credible architecture for designing the ultimate audio extension: an ultra-light product, ready to use from morning to night. A kind of audio "augmented reality".