Don’t hold your breath for an Apple smart ring
This week Samsung unveiled its $400 Galaxy Ring in an attempt to take on such devices as the Oura Ring, Evie Ring, and Ultrahuman Ring Air in the nascent smart ring category, but even though Apple has filed numerous patents for smart rings over several years don’t hold your breath for an Apple smart ring to appear anytime soon.
I like the idea of wearing a ring as a health tracker, and I wear one called the Evie. But as I used it, I realized that a smart ring would be a problematic product for Apple (at least with how the technology stands today), and I see it as going against Apple’s current product goals.
Looking at the Oura ring — probably the most popular smart ring model today — one aspect that made it stand out was it would take all your data and turn it into various health scores. Samsung is using that same idea in the Galaxy Ring with what it calls an “energy score.” But in the upcoming WatchOS 11 update, Apple will be offering Vitals app to measure overall health on a daily basis. The Apple Watch will also measure intensity and duration of workouts with Training Load Scores. All of which is done with Apple Watch sensors, which can get more robust data than what’s possible in a ring.
Apple markets its products as a way to help you live a healthier life, but more than that, the Apple Watch is promoted as something that can save your life — something a ring cannot claim to do. The Apple Watch can alert users to potential heart health problems, or dial 911 after someone is in a crash or takes a hard fall.
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MacDailyNews Take: Smart rings in their current incarnations, and for the foreseeable future, are just too limited to be interesting or, even, really useful.
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