WordSuccess Alternatives: Apps for More Than Words

Start with what WordSuccess gets right. It is fully free — no subscription, no trial that expires. It carries the Advanced Bionics name but works with any brand of hearing device, so cochlear implant and hearing aid users are both welcome.

The practice itself is solid. A placement test finds your starting level, then you climb a long ladder of recorded words that gets harder as you go, in quiet and with background noise. A two-person "Listening Coach" mode lets a partner run practice with you. It runs on iPhone, iPad, and Android.

WordSuccess trains one skill: telling single words apart. That is a good foundation, and for some people it is enough. But real conversation is not a list of words. Once single words feel steady, many people want to practice full sentences, back-and-forth conversations, and longer stories — material WordSuccess does not cover.

Two other reasons come up. WordSuccess is English only, so it does not help if you want to practice in Spanish, German, or another language. And its store listings have not been updated since the middle of 2024, so it reads as finished software rather than an app that keeps growing.

SoundSteps is ours, so keep that in mind. It picks up where single-word practice ends: word pairs, then sentences, conversations, and stories, all real recordings, with background noise you can add on any activity. Difficulty adjusts as you go. It works with any hearing device or none, runs in any browser with nothing to install, and covers a growing list of languages — Spanish, German, French, and more. Your first 7 days include full access with no card.

Hearoes, from an Australian team, is a game-style app built with audiologists and speech pathologists. It starts early — everyday sounds, pitch, and syllables — and climbs to sentences, which suits newer cochlear implant users. The download is free with limited content; full access is $9.99 a month or $99.99 a year. It runs on iPhone, iPad, and Android.

ReDi, from MED-EL, is fully free and works with any hearing device brand. It gives AI feedback on both your listening and your speech, and its store listing shows many languages. It gets updates more often than any other manufacturer app. It runs on iPhone, iPad, and Android; there is no web version for practicing on a computer.

It depends on what you want to practice next. If you like WordSuccess and want it to keep going past single words, SoundSteps continues into sentences, conversations, and stories. If you are newly activated and want to build up from basic sounds, Hearoes meets you earlier. If you want free AI feedback on your speaking as well as your listening, ReDi is the one to try.

Whatever you pick, give it two to four weeks of steady use before you judge it. For a wider list of no-cost options, our roundup of free auditory training apps covers the rest.