A Low-Cost Wearable Navigation Aid with Real-Time Obstacle Detection and Mobile Voice Guidance for the Visually Impaired

The significant contribution of this research is the development of an affordable wearable navigation aid that integrates real-time ultrasonic obstacle detection, multimodal auditory and haptic feedback, Bluetooth communication, and smartphone-based voice guidance. The proposed system provides a practical, map-independent mobility-support solution with low-cost hardware and offline mobile functionality, achieving 97.8% mean distance-measurement accuracy and an overall user satisfaction score of 4.3/5.