Wearables have become a complement to our daily technological lives. Even though customers are becoming more dependent on their phones, that doesn’t necessarily translate into more phone purchases. As companies look to diversify their revenue streams, the wearable accessories market has exploded in recent years. Devices like the Apple Watch, AirPods, and smart rings have become increasingly popular, but they also have drawbacks. There are concerns, such as the e-waste cycle that these non-scalable devices offer, and how little they actually know about our health data.
Even though I use AirPods and an Apple Watch daily, in addition to third-party health apps to help me make sense of my data, I still feel more dependent on this information, even though I could also gauge how I’m feeling, how rested I am, etc. That said, it’s not just me who might fall for yet another gamification of zipping my rings, reaching for unrealistic goals, and getting paranoid every time I forget to sleep with my watch on, causing me to lose important data about my vitals.
Wearable devices are useful in many situations, but it’s important to understand that, as with any technology, it has both advantages and disadvantages. Here are some uncomfortable truths about wearable devices and why we should take these technologies with a grain of salt.
A tracker can’t change your behavior
I’ve worn an Apple Watch for almost ten years. Like most Apple Watch users, I thought getting an Apple Watch would be a great way to get in shape. After all, I just need to set a minimum goal, walk at least 30 minutes a day, get up every hour for a minute (or just shake my arm to fool the algorithm), and I will become a healthier person, right?
Well no. From 2017 until at least mid-2020, I can assure you that I was far from a healthy person. I tried to walk. I tried cycling. But I have always been very inconsistent. Worse yet, notifications from the Apple Watch telling me I was late, or that I should get up, or maybe that instead of praising me for a really good activity, it just wanted me to do it again the next day, didn’t put me in the mood to become a healthier person.
That said, I had to change my mind to realize that if I couldn’t get my life back together at 25, at 30 it would be much more difficult. The Apple Watch was a great tool when I decided to start working and tracking my data, but before that it was just a constant reminder that I didn’t have the right mindset to prioritize myself, which means a wearable can be a great tool when you’re already in the process, but it’s not the first step.
Fitness Gamification Can Be Bad
How to stay addicted to a smartwatch or smart ring? Gamify the experience. Rings, streaks, motivational phrases, trophies – you name it. In some ways, this toxic goal of being so focused on fitness has the same effects as getting a match on a dating app or getting noticed by people on your latest social media post. However, once you don’t meet the criteria, once you’re not as fast, as strong, or beat a score, then gamification is horrible.
For example, I track my workouts, as well as the amount of water I drink each day and my sleep. Like many people who are also very interested in their health data, we understand that all this does is worry us because we might be behind on our water goal, on the amount of sleep required for full recovery, or, again, life might happen and we won’t be able to close that long streak of perfectly filled rings.
Gamification works for a reason: it hooks you on something (like people and their endless Duolingo streaks), but that doesn’t mean it makes you a healthier person or actually helps you. On the contrary, sometimes it seems like you’re doing wonders, but all you can say is that “the apple is on the table.” That said, when wearables focus too much on gamification, not only is the product right for you, but it also may not help you achieve the goals you actually have.
Sometimes you rent your own data
Depending on the laptop you are using, a subscription may be necessary to unlock the full potential of the sensors. As soon as your free trial ends or if you decide not to pay for the subscription, you are stuck behind a paywall. The information that has been so useful to your daily life is reduced to only show you basic health scores, or sometimes it simply stops syncing and saving your data until you decide to pay extra.
Although Apple doesn’t do this with its users, the company requires you to wear an Apple Watch at all times. For example, if you have a paired Apple Watch but leave it behind, iPhone won’t count the number of steps you took that day. While the company now touts that users can workout with an iPhone and AirPods, it still expects customers to have an additional device. After all, if it can’t keep your information up to date, how can it offer true gamification of your health?
Additionally, once a tech company decides your device is no longer useful or accurate enough, they may simply stop supporting it. When this happens, you will need to purchase a new one, otherwise you may not be able to continue getting the information provided by your otherwise perfectly functional laptop.
Counting calories is a crazy assumption
It’s an uncomfortable truth, even for me, but the fact is that to date, fitness trackers fail to accurately measure calories burned. Even though a Stanford study claims these trackers are great at measuring heart rate, they can’t be trusted to measure calories burned. Among all the smartwatches tested, the best ones saw a drop of around 27 percent. However, others were down 93 percent. With this, you may think you’ve gone the extra mile when you haven’t – or worse yet, the tracker might tell you you haven’t done enough when you actually have.
While the Stanford data is almost a decade old, a more recent study conducted at Harvard continues to use the same data and proposes a machine learning model to interpret leg movement using a specific device. That said, customers should be aware that the information available with these wearable devices cannot be considered set in stone. In the same way that fitness trackers don’t know how many calories you’ve burned, they can’t tell how rested you are or how stressed or good about life you feel. The problem is that these numbers represent the average of a population, but they don’t account for everyone, even though we all have unique bodies. In this way, relying too much on health data from wearable devices can be worse than just going out and practicing regular workouts for your well-being.
There is an environmental cycle of electronic waste
Some portable devices may have a replaced battery. For example, Google recently set a new standard with its latest smartwatch, which earned a higher repairability score thanks to iFixit. But once we compare this device with the market reality, the story is different. Replacing Apple Watch components is difficult, and it’s virtually impossible to repair the earbuds or smart rings. This way, once these devices reach their lifespan limit of a few years, users are left with a simple choice: throw away the products and buy them again.
Add to that the fact that the industry continues to release new products and resale of wearables is not ideal, with subscription models being the focus of many wearables brands. Customers are only contributing to an environmental cycle of e-waste because these devices don’t last long enough and companies want us to keep updating them with new ones. For example, imagine buying a two-year-old pair of AirPods; you’d essentially be paying for headphones that barely work.
While you can always buy used wearables, what can you do when a company like Apple announces that some smartwatches released less than four years ago won’t receive the latest watchOS 27 software update because they don’t have a powerful enough chip to outsource requests to an iPhone?
