EXCELLENT EBULLIENT EUHA SMASHES THROUGH 10K ATTENDANCE CEILING

It had to happen.

Since being blitzed by the pandemic, when the EUHA Congress bravely became the first big event to open in Germany (barely post-Covid) in September 2021, it was in the wind that what has become the world’s best attended and most vibrant audiology gathering would finally break through the 10,000 glass ceiling for attendance.

When the dark business suit is the sartorial standard at an event, the bold and glarey easily steal the spotlight.
Photos: PW

While all aspects of the event have now been qualified by happy organisers as “excellent”, the brightest spotlit statistic was the “overwhelming” more than 10,000 participants.

On the ground at the Congress, the first day certainly did have the vibrations of an event that was climbing a new peak. Dry statistics alone will not sum it up; there was a pleasant aura to everything, an infectious ebullience spreading through 150+ stands in the industry exhibition, out to the lecture halls and, through social media, way beyond the Nuremberg Messe centre.

A marked international presence graced this year’s EUHA industry exhibition for the first time in real numbers since the 2020 pandemic.
Foto Rechnitz/EUHA

Watch an Audiology Worldnews video of the EUHA 2025 industry exhibition.

Demant supremo Søren Nielsen addresses his audience at the Oticon stand.
Photo: JH

A confirmed international EUHA

In the jungle of hearing tech, claims and messages swing in all directions.
Photos: PW

The EUHA organisers have confirmed that exhibitors came from 19 countries, the top four being Germany, China, Denmark and France (52% of exhibitors from Germany, 48% other lands). While the annual Congress tends to have a very German flavour – it is, after all, organised by the BVHI, the German Hearing Instruments Industry Association – the ambience in 2025 was palpably less Germanic, even with the event’s international partner this year being the Deutsch-speaking Austria. English could be heard everywhere. The many participants from China were making full use of the global lingua franca.

Stands at the EUHA industry exhibition spanned the familiar and not-so-familiar, the small and not-so-small.
Photos:PW

This is no irrelevant observation. EUHA is already the dominant event worldwide; should the organisers consider running a show beyond the German borders, for instance in a glamorous location such as Paris, Zurich, or Barcelona – an expanded EUHA could aim to smash even more impressive ceilings in terms of attendance. The typically four-day Web Summit, albeit in the most cutting-edge of fields, is expected to attract 70,000 participants in November 2025 in Lisbon, where it moved in 2016. An EUHA event hitting 15k in Europe would make a statement for audiology.

Auracast tried out at EUHA

EUHA 2025 also served as a test field for the new Bluetooth technology, Auracast. Already offered at the Sydney Opera House, this element of the next-generation Bluetooth LE Audio standard was tried out successfully in the EUHA lecture hall, Live Area, and at various exhibition stands, providing a medium for translations and party music at the Nuremberg winter huts for the big party night at the Congress.

Commenting on the Auracast trial run, an EUHA spokesperson commented: “A new dimension in hearing care has begun. This congress set completely

new standards in many areas and will remain a fond memory for many participants.”

MORE EUHA NUMBERS

The specialist lecture programme provided 26 expert lectures, 4 tutorials and 35 national and international speakers. The event kicked off with the Knowledge Symposium and a lecture by Dr. Markus Peifer from the German Confederation of Skilled Crafts.

The stage programme in the EUHA Live Area brought 24 short presentations over three days, and a special programme on the Sound of Future on the closing day, Friday, October 24.

A total of 260 trainees and students were invited to the congress free of charge, and there was a special programme for young professionals in the industry.

EUHA AWARDS

Prof. Roland Laszig won the Foundation Award of the Research Association of German Hearing Aid Acousticians (FDHA).
Foto Rechnitz/EUHA

The Foundation Award of the Research Association of German Hearing Aid Acousticians (FDHA) was presented to Prof. Roland Laszig.

Eva Keil-Becker, chair of the EUHA Sponsorship Award award jury, said in her laudatory speech that the award winners are “people who believe in something… who get involved…who want to make a difference.'”

The following young scientists received awards: 1st place: Jonas Weber – Development of a suitable metrological test for adaptive directionality in hearing

aids; 2nd place: Lea Hackenberg – Determination of the influence of an in-situ measurement on the transmission behaviour of hearing aids; 3rd place: Dr. Chen Xu – Crucial Elements of a Virtual Hearing Clinic on Mobile Devices: Psychophysics, Diagnostic Parameter Estimation, and Validation.

Who will be the 2026 EUHA international partner?

The nation to partner EUHA in the 2026 Congress, which takes place in Hanover from October 14 to 16, is yet to be decided. Since the partnering initiative began in 2023, the partners have been, successively: Switzerland, Denmark, and now Austria. The EUHA organisers will announce their decision on the next partner early in 2026. To date, the partner choices have not presented notable language difficulties, but candidates will at some point presumably speak in tongues less akin to German.

France would be a very long shot for the next partner, Audiology News UK understands. There were many British voices at EUHA 2025, but if you have money to throw away, you could lose it on a UK-EUHA partnership. The UK has as much chance of being an EUHA partner anytime soon as the Faroe Islands national football team has of winning the World Cup. Beyond the problems that Brexit has created for UK professionals to participate in events on the European mainland, an EUHA source suggested to this publication that the UK audiology profession is too fragmented to present an organisation with which to negotiate a partnership.

The Faroe Islands have, nevertheless, performed well in the 2026 FIFA World Cup qualification – UEFA Group L, and maintained an outside chance of making the play-offs until the last weekend of qualifying games.