![]() ![]() Daytime heart rate monitoring is among a handful of new features available at launch, along with period production (something I admit that I did not have an opportunity to test) and improved temperature sensing. You will, however, sometimes see a green glow emanating from the inner circle, as the ring’s sensors grab a heart rate reading. On the face of it, the device looks like a standard ring - and that’s really the appeal. And, indeed, I found that the exact fit tended to evolve over the day. Ultimately, I found the final product to be a bit looser than its plastic counterpart, but the ring stayed on fine. I chose my size and color (a matte black) and waited. You’re encouraged to wear one around for 24 hours, as the human finger has a way of swelling and contracting during the day. If you don’t know your ring size, the company will send a sizing kit à la Warby Parker, featuring a number of plastic dummy rings. It’s a single-color metal band, round, but for a flatish edge that denotes the top of the product. Design-wise, the product is virtually identical to its predecessor. Again, I’m not a ring guy, but the simple fact of it occupying less real estate makes it less invasive. Let’s take a moment to appreciate the built-in irony of a sleep-tracking device that’s hard to wear to bed. Again, as someone who isn’t a ring person, it took some getting used to, but as a bit of a restless sleeper myself, it’s easier to wear to bed than a big, bulky smartwatch. It’s also a relatively simple lift given that it’s a minimally invasive product. My guess is that sort of buy-in won’t be difficult to engender among those willing to plunk down $299 for a ring. It’s not that readings are going to be bad for the first two weeks, so much as things will be better when you’ve been wearing the device for a bit and Oura has a clearer idea of your habits, sleep and biometrics.Īnd it’s understandable, given that we’re all different, and customization is a key to any sort of health device. But here, the company insists that a fortnight is required for setting a kind of baseline measurement. When reviewing hardware, you generally like to spend as much time with the product as possible. It was a strange request, as far as these things go. That was Oura’s recommendation/soft demand for reviewing the product. That said, I’ve been wearing the Ring 3 for the prescribed two weeks. I’ve also, honestly, become fairly attached to my smartwatch. This is one of the big reasons I’m not going to be a regular Oura user. I don’t particularly like rings and don’t wear them (cue: “Don’t Fence Me In”). The more I’ve begun to think about the Oura Ring as a fitness band (or, perhaps more appropriately, health band), the more it has begun to make sense.īefore we venture any further, a confession: I’m not a ring guy. Companies like Fitbit and Xiaomi still sell a ton of the things on an annual basis, but they’ve largely fallen out of fashion in favor of their more fully featured brethren. If anything, it’s a successor to the fitness band - a category we don’t think about much these days, but one that utterly dominated the wearable category before Apple sunk its teeth into the space. The Oura Ring 3 is, in a word, an investment. The new service arrives with additional features, but also sticks behind a paywall metrics that were previously free to users. There’s also the fact that, starting with the Ring 3, Oura is adding a $6/month subscription fee that kicks in after a six-month grace period. At $299, we’re well within smartwatch territory on the pricing front. After all, two activity trackers is overkill for most. I suppose this is true, in the vaguest sense - likely for most people, it’s one or the other. I was thinking of the device as an alternative to my Apple Watch. I admit I was thinking about the Oura Ring incorrectly.
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