Hands up if you wear a fitness tracker. From rings that track our sleep to watches measuring steps, we’ve come a long way from the simple pedometer (remember those?). Statistics show that around 82% of active people wear a smart tracker, and post-pandemic, we’re all about knowing how stressed we are. Wearable tech that analyses heart rate, breathing patterns and oxygen levels is taking off, but is it really as good as it sounds?

“Wearables that include a stress tracker function, use physiological measurements to offer an insight into the kind of stresses put on the body through exercise or in everyday life,” explains Dr Rachael Kent, King’s College London academic and author of The Digital Health Self: Wellness, Tracking And Social Media.

“Stress trackers across the consumer market have varying levels of ‘intelligence’ when it comes to monitoring your stress. The majority of exercise-oriented trackers focus on metrics which monitor your heart rate variability (HRV). This measures the time intervals between your heartbeats, and in turn stress trackers monitor small fluctuations in your heart’s function, which may be linked to age, health status, time of day, but also your mental health and physical health.”

Pretty clever stuff.

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