Binaural, free‐field, speech‐reception thresholds (SRTs) in 70‐dBA noise were measured with conversational sentences for 24 hearing‐impaired subjects without a hearing aid, with a hearing aid at the right or at the left ear, and with two hearing aids. The sentences were presented in front of the listeners and interfering noise was presented either frontally or laterally. Subjects used their own binaural behind‐the‐ear hearing aids and adjusted the gain(s) for optimum intelligibility in 70‐dBA noise. Subjects had nearly symmetrical hearing losses with an average over 500, 1000, and 2000 Hz of between 30 and 65 dB. For hearing losses below 50 dB the SRT in both ears was determined by the S/N ratio even when only one hearing aid is used with the unaided ear at the shadow side of the head. It appears that, just as for monaural hearing aids, a second hearing aid generally does not improve the SRT under conditions with a high noise level. However, for situations with a low noise level or a high absolute threshold, in which a monaural hearing aid is profitable, a binaural aid is even more profitable.