How Assistive Tech Is Changing Lives

There's more to tech than just phones and tablets! There's a whole world of assistive technology available to those who are differently abled. In today's blog, we'd like to explore the world of assistive tech and share with you some of the current and future breakthroughs that are available.

1. Adaptive Controller for Inclusive Gaming

The reach of gaming is just getting bigger and better. In recent years, Microsoft has introduced the Xbox Adaptive Controller to help make gaming more accessible and "primarily to meet the needs of gamers with limited mobility". This is a totally new way of thinking about how the audience will interact with video games and can be completely customised to benefit all sorts of gamers with a myriad of physical limitations.

2. Braille Displays

For years, watches and timepieces for the hearing impaired have predominantly been audio devices that would announce the time audibly upon request. However, there are now smart watches that have braille displays that allow users to read the time by the bumps on the watch face. A similar technology is even starting to appear as braille e-reading devices.

3. Phones becoming smarter

Phones offer a lot of accessibility features at no extra charge, and these can be super helpful. iPhones specifically offer magnifying text so that it's the screen is legible for visually impaired individuals, to voiceovers, which read screen text to the user or voice control that allows the phone to be controlled with voice commands. Also, a double or triple tap on the back of your iPhone can be set to trigger all kinds of actions.