Breaking Barriers in Communication: How Nagish is Redefining Accessibility With AI

What Nagish Does to Enable Communication

Nagish is an AI-powered mobile app that enables Deaf, DeafBlind, and hard-of-hearing individuals to communicate independently and privately. Certified by the FCC and free for users, the platform provides real-time speech-to-text and text-to-speech capabilities over the phone and other devices. By eliminating reliance on interpreters or human transcribers, Nagish restores autonomy to its users, allowing them to engage in conversation on their own terms.

Nagish and the Current Landscape of Accessibility

Globally, more than 430 million people experience hearing loss, including nearly 50 million individuals in the United States alone. Historically, these individuals have had to rely on captioning services or live interpreters to access essential communication. While these legacy solutions have been effective to a degree, they often come with significant drawbacks, including long wait times, high costs, and a loss of privacy due to the involvement of third parties. Furthermore, for younger populations, veterans, and working professionals, the stigmas associated with visible assistive devices add just one more hurdle to daily interaction.

In recent years, major tech companies like Google, Apple, and Microsoft have integrated accessibility features into their platforms. However, these features often serve as add-ons rather than core offerings. Nagish distinguishes itself by putting accessibility at the very center of its mission. Unlike competitors, the app offers FCC-approved services for both IP Captioned Telephone Service (IP CTS) and Internet Protocol Relay, marking the first time AI-powered platforms have been certified for such services.

Despite progress in the broader accessibility sector, immense challenges remain. Many Deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals feel that communication barriers have negatively impacted their career decisions, limiting job opportunities and professional growth. Others believe that these barriers have strained their relationships and social lives, while some feel accessibility limitations have negatively affected outcomes from healthcare providers. In short, many hurdles remain until society reaches true accessibility for these communities.

The Birth Story of Nagish

Nagish was founded with a simple but powerful vision: communication is a basic human right. The company was built on the idea that while hearing aids and transcription services are supportive, they do not provide a fully independent and stigma-free solution. By combining AI innovation with regulatory approval, Nagish has built a product designed from the ground up to meet the specific requirements of its users regarding privacy, speed, and reliability.

The Nagish Solution and Vision

Nagish’s app transforms the way people with hearing loss interact with the world. Through advanced AI, it accurately converts speech-to-text and text-to-speech in real time. Nagish ensures seamless communication across personal and professional contexts, including workplace meetings, medical appointments, and even emergency 911 calls.

Unlike legacy services that involve third-party operators, Nagish relies solely on transformative technology and does not store call contents beyond the duration of the call, ensuring full privacy and dignity for users. Connectivity with hearing aids and cochlear implants makes the platform highly adaptable, while its intuitive interface means that anyone, regardless of age or technical fluency, can use it effectively.

The app is being adopted at an impressive clip. Since 2024, it has achieved nearly 1,000% user growth, utilized by employees at Fortune 500 companies such as Comcast, NBCUniversal, Amazon, and Pfizer. Nagish handles millions of call minutes monthly, reflecting the critical role the company now plays in daily communication for tens of thousands of hard-of-hearing or deaf individuals around the world.

However, there remains much more to do, which is why Nagish recently acquired Sign.mt, an award-winning AI company specializing in real-time sign language technology. The company will use this acquisition to expand its research into AI and potential applications for sign language. With over 500,000 deaf and hard-of-hearing people using American Sign Language (ASL) as their primary language, and only around 10,000 certified ASL interpreters nationwide, AI has the potential to fill the gaps. Nagish aims to provide a solution that enriches and empowers those who need it, promoting accessibility in ways that have never been achievable before.

How Nagish is Changing Lives: A Customer Story

The impact of Nagish extends beyond technology—it changes lives. For veterans coping with hearing loss, often compounded by PTSD or tinnitus, traditional hearing aids are either insufficient or stigmatized. Nagish’s tools allow veterans to reconnect with families, manage medical appointments, and reenter the workforce with a new sense of empowerment, and without embarrassment. As one 100-year-old user described in a spotlight story, the simplicity and reliability of Nagish allow him to maintain independence and stay connected, proving that accessibility should have no limits regardless of age or circumstance.

The Team Culture at Nagish

The team at Nagish embodies its key value: inclusion. Led by CEO and co-founder Tomer Aharoni, the company has pursued not only technical excellence but also regulatory leadership, achieving unprecedented FCC certifications. The team’s ethos reflects a blend of empathy and innovation, ensuring that users’ dignity remains the guiding principle behind every new feature. The culture at Nagish prioritizes building technology that is stigma-free, discreet, and designed to normalize assistive communication in everyday life, empowering individuals of all types.

Perspectives from Nagish Leadership

“Communication should never be a privilege - it is a fundamental human right. Nagish exists to ensure that everyone, regardless of hearing ability, can connect independently and with dignity.”— Tomer Aharoni, CEO & Co-founder of Nagish

Find out more about Nagish:https://nagish.com/