By Mantra Chhabra
Remember when Apple Vision came out, and after wearing it, all the influencers started waving their arms like some Schizophreniacs?
That seemed like the new status quo until this hi-fi piece of technology faded into obscurity. But with smart rings, that future seems more subtle and serious.
Yes, smart rings exist, and they have been around since 2015 – the era of selfie sticks and vines. Then how come we are hearing about them now, almost a decade later?
Well, as it turns out, any piece of technology takes time to find its perfect form. And smart fitness rings are no exception. Over the last few years, their interest has grown fast, with companies like BoAt, Oura, Samsung, and Ultrahuman entering the market. For many people, 2024 and 2025 felt like a turning point where smart rings moved from niche gadgets to everyday wearables. Today, they are ready to offer what smartwatches always lacked: health tracking without the bulkiness or the fear of lighting up during movie screenings.
Smart rings are small, quiet, and designed to be comfortable so that you forget that you are even wearing them. But are they the next big piece of technology in health tracking?
Fitness at your Fingertips
The moment you hold a smart ring, you won’t be able to tell the difference between this and a normal ring until you look inside. Here, small sensors quietly track metrics like your heart rate, sleep patterns, body temperature changes, movement and activity. Different smart rings show different metrics.
The ring then sends this information to an app on your phone, where it’s turned into simple charts and scores. You can track how many steps you took in a day, what your average heart rate was, and how deep was your sleep last night.
Well, as it’s turning out, doctor’s visits are slowly turning into a thing of the past.
Plus, most of these smart rings come with a battery life that keeps them functional for 5 to 9 days. So, you can wear them day to night without missing a beat.
And to make things even better, you can set goals to meet your fitness plans, for example, how many calories you need to burn or take in a day.
Most users and reviewers are well-pleased with the device’s functionality, calling it a game-changer for health and performance.
In other words, the smallest gadget on your body might soon be the smartest one.
But, What’s Excluded in the Package?
No doubt we are evolving every day, and smart rings are improving too, but they are not medical devices and certainly do not offer the precision that the latter pieces of technology do.
Readings by smart rings can change based on some factors that do not affect the outcome drastically. Some of the factors are finger size, skin type, and daily habits. In one experiment, a YouTuber took a walk and counted his steps manually. Then, he compared the data with four smart rings. The results were all over the board. Each ring showed different data on different days. Some were close. Some overpredicted, while others miserably under. But none was up-to-the-point precise. This showed that while smart rings are a great benchmark to understand your health and activity, they are yet to replace medical-grade tools or be treated as the absolute truth.
Another thing to keep in mind is that smart rings collect very personal data, including sleep and heart patterns. Now every smart ring manufacturer has a different privacy policy, but there is still a high chance that this sensitive data can be handed over to advertisers, or worse, breached by hackers, as happened with FitBit.
Adding to that concern is the cost factor. The best smart ring options can be very expensive. So if you have slippery hands or a case for forgetting where you put your things, it’s better to skip buying a smart ring.
And then there’s the monthly subscription. For some companies (we’re looking at you, Oura), buying the ring is not enough. You have to pay extra just to access all their smart ring features.
Lastly, health tracking can take over your life, literally. It can lead to orthorexia, which in essence means having an obsession with healthy eating. In his article for Vox, writer Adam Clark Estes explains how health tracking led him to a pit of anxiety. “I started eating weird. I’d shovel nuts into my mouth before breakfast, skip lunch to avoid stressful push alerts, and once I ate a mixing bowl full of romaine lettuce to feel better about a single slice of pizza.” he writes, “My wife drew the line when I started taking pictures of my meals, so that some app’s AI could analyze the nutrients in them.”
Smart rings sometimes react to perfectly normal body changes, like a glucose spike, as if you are nearing a heart attack. And the next thing you know, you are searching the web, falling deeper into a rabbit hole of health panic. So, they are not suitable for you if you are the anxious kind.
So, Is Smart Ring Just a Hype or Here To Stay?
Smart rings are no longer just a tech experiment. They’re becoming a quiet part of daily life for many people. They won’t replace doctors or smartwatches; they are just an additional step to monitor yourself more closely. All they will give you is a different approach to better take care of your habits and regulate them better.
