Ever been in a situation where you needed captioning but there was no internet? Caption Companion is a captioning tablet that works completely offline without the need for an internet connection. No account, no sign-up, and no subscription required either. It’s also the first ASR product to pass the NCSP, a live captioning certification exam that only human captioners had thus far been able to pass. Caption Companion comes uniquely paired with a SmartMic for unprecedented accuracy and versatility.
Caption Companion Featured on This Week in Hearing
Premier Visual Voice is proud to share that Caption Companion was recently featured on This Week in Hearing, a nationally respected podcast dedicated to advancing conversations around hearing loss, accessibility, and assistive technology. The show is widely followed by individuals with hearing loss, accessibility advocates, audiologists, educators, and organizations responsible for ADA compliance and communication access.
In this in-depth episode, host Shari Eberts—a leading hearing health advocate and author—sat down with Margaret Downs, Executive Director of Premier Visual Voice, and Matthew Call, Director of Technology, to explore the origins of Caption Companion and the real-world challenges that inspired its creation. The discussion offers a behind-the-scenes look at how decades of hands-on experience in live captioning and CART services directly shaped the device’s design, functionality, and performance standards.
One of the most important themes of the conversation is that Caption Companion was built from lived experience, not theoretical use cases. Margaret Downs shared her journey into the captioning profession as someone who is legally blind and deeply familiar with accessibility barriers, while Matthew Call discussed his background as a certified captioner, interpreter, and technologist with strong ties to the Deaf and Hard of Hearing community. Together, their experience led to a single guiding principle:
Accessibility technology should remove friction, not create it.
That philosophy drove the development of a purpose-built captioning tablet that works out of the box—without requiring internet access, user accounts, subscriptions, or complex setup. During the episode, they explain why relying on consumer devices and inconsistent audio sources often undermines caption accuracy, and how Caption Companion’s audio-first design and dedicated SmartMic dramatically improve real-time speech-to-text performance in real-world environments.
A major milestone highlighted on the podcast is Caption Companion becoming the first AI-based captioning solution to pass the NCSP certification exam, administered by the Global Alliance for Speech-to-Text Captioning. This rigorous evaluation goes far beyond basic word accuracy, testing punctuation, capitalization, sentence structure, and overall readability—criteria historically met only by human captioners. Passing this certification represents a significant breakthrough for AI-powered accessibility and reinforces Caption Companion’s reliability in professional, educational, medical, and public settings.
The episode also explores how Caption Companion is already being used across a wide range of scenarios, including disaster relief, job interviews, classrooms, healthcare appointments, workplaces, conferences, and public venues seeking scalable ADA-compliant solutions. Its ability to display captions directly on the device, connect to large screens via HDMI for open captioning, or be checked out by individuals like an assistive listening device makes it uniquely flexible for both personal and institutional use.
To hear the full conversation—including personal stories, technical insights, and practical use cases—listen to the complete episode of This Week in Hearing featuring Premier Visual Voice and Caption Companion.Unlimited, accurate offline captioning can have a huge impact on disaster relief efforts creating a communication lifeline whether it be in-person or from the radio. Auditoriums, theaters, and churches can install them for open captioning in their venues, or check them out alongside assistive listening devices for individual viewing. (See this research from the CCAA that if only one assistive communication technology was to be available at large public venues, the first choice of respondents was CART or captions.) Schools of all types (colleges, universities, K-12 school districts, etc.) are finding that Caption Companion can save them a lot of money while simultaneously increasing communication access for their students, staff, and faculty. Employers and non-profits are experiencing success creating a solid ADA baseline on which to build for any deaf or hard of hearing employee or client. Caption Companion is also being used at conferences and conventions (see here for a great example). Voc Rehab departments and Assistive Technology programs stand to benefit immensely by gaining access to this new communication tool.
Caption Companion by Premier Visual Voice was recently featured on This Week in Hearing. Youtube. For more information or to purchase, check out https://premiervisualvoice.com/product/caption-companion
