The Oura Ring
By Lyndsay Weingardt
It’s been one year of wearing my Oura ring and I couldn’t love it more. The Oura ring is the first wearable designed to paint a truly holistic picture of your health. By simply wearing the ring on your finger, it continually collects data on over 20 biometrics that directly impact your wellbeing, day and night. Even better, the data is available to you in real time.
For the most accurate and optimal data collection, the Oura ring is designed to be worn at all times, except while it’s charging. The company recommends wearing the ring on either your pointer finger or middle finger for best accuracy. I ordered the ring directly from Oura’s website (linked here), but it can be purchased in store at most Best Buy and some Target stores. Regardless which route you take, sizing is the most important component of purchase. When you order a ring from Oura, you will be sent a sizing kit where you can experiment with size and finger preference to ensure you are getting the best fit for yourself. The same sizing kits can be found in-store. I’ve never been one to sleep in rings so I was a little unsure if I would like that aspect. However, after the first night, I was surprised by the lightweight, comfortable fit. The ring rarely feels restricting (a good reminder to stay hydrated), but also never feels as if it is going to come off.
I’ve been very impressed by the battery life. I typically only charge my ring when the battery runs low - about every 3 nights. I like to charge my ring while doing my nighttime routine before bed so I can ensure all my data is collected during the day and while I sleep. The ring charges quickly - about an hour for full battery. In my experience, the Oura rings are pretty bulletproof, I never take it off. Mine has survived many days at the lake and in the water, moving and heavy lifting, paint, puppy bites and normal everyday wear.
Arguably the best part is the Oura App, which you can download to your phone. The Oura app is where your ring sends all of your data using a bluetooth connection. The app is very user friendly and has so many great features including easy access to scores, graphs, encouraging affirmations and further explanation on all data points. There is lots of data, but the information is simple to read and access on the app. The Oura ring requires a monthly membership costing $5.99.
Okay, on to the metrics it tracks and the ones I find most useful in my daily rhythm! Some of the main metrics are sleep, readiness, stress, activity, heart rate variability, heart rate, blood oxygen, women’s cycle through body temperature, symptom radar, heart health, among many others.
My personal favorite metrics are my sleep score, daytime stress and readiness score. For as long as I can remember, I have struggled to get consistently good quality sleep. I've always stayed up late and woke up before the sun rises, regardless of how many hours I actually slept. I've tried endless amounts of sleep remedies to fall asleep, stay asleep and get good quality sleep . What I’ve realized is the quality of sleep we get every night is easily one of the biggest factors that impacts our overall health. Some of the key aspects of the sleep data the Oura ring collects is latency (amount of time to fall asleep), total sleep as well as time spent in each sleep stage (REM, light, deep sleep) and your average heart rate and oxygen saturation. The combination of all of this data produces a nightly sleep score. I love the sleep score because it has made me tremendously more aware of my evening and sleep habits. Not only can I see where I need improvement but these scores can also be helpful when trying anything new! For example, I’ve experimented with taking magnesium supplements before bed and have seen a rise in my sleep score. This indicates to me that magnesium before bed is helpful to my body.
Stress, stress, stress. The thing we all hate but all seem to have. Stress is another factor that greatly impacts our overall health and often gets overlooked. Most of us are living in a constant stressful state and don't even realize it. I will admit, I have been highly aware of the constant state of stress I have been in for years but until now, I never had a way to accurately track it or understand my stress patterns. The Oura ring uses your health metrics, mainly focusing on your heart rate, to track different states of stress levels. It quantifies your stress into four levels: Restored, Relaxed, Engaged, and Stressed. You can look at how your stress levels change throughout the day and then correlate the level of stress to an activity, event or emotion that occurred that day. The app notifies you if you've had a highly stressful or highly restorative day to bring awareness and reflection to what may have influenced it. The app also has a tag feature where you can add things you have done which can help track with more accurate details. For example you can tag that you were sick, took supplements, drank alcohol among many others- all things that may impact your scores.
The readiness score uses all of your health data to calculate a daily readiness score every morning. Some of the key data points that influence your readiness score include your sleep, previous day activity, temperature, heart rate variability and oxygen. The readiness score has made me so much more aware of my body's needs which I think most people struggle with from day to day. Instead of assessing how we feel, we often just push ourselves, regardless of where our body is at that day. This can sometimes cause more harm than good. Having a super productive or active day followed by a night of poor quality sleep should be a consideration for how we show up the next day. Maybe a steady walk instead of a high intensity workout would be more nourishing to your body. Instead of waking up and following old patterns, I can be more aware of how my body is responding and then tailor my day for it. What I try to do now is instead of continuing to push myself when my body is already running on low fuel, which creates more stress, I try my best to just support it. The readiness score is a great way to get a snapshot of where your body is and determine if it's a good day for your "normal" routine or if you should take it easy. The readiness score also helps determine any other additional support needed for that day. If I have a higher heart rate and low HRV, I'll focus on replenishing my electrolytes, water intake and might take additional magnesium. Being aware of what my body actually needs based on the data makes a tremendous difference in my health, how I feel on a daily basis and helps guide me to make proper decisions to support my body.
Jordan has also found the Oura ring to be vital in her wellbeing in this season of high stress. The sleep score and stress are the metrics she prioritizes. The app gives you bedtime guidance on the ideal time to start getting ready for bed and fall asleep based on your best sleep scores and lowest resting heart rate. It sends notifications when it’s time to start settling in and she has found this helpful. She prioritizes getting to sleep by 10pm because her deep sleep usually happens early in the night. During the day she pays attention to her stress levels. If she is in the stressed level for too long, she’s developed strategies to break that cycle whether it’s a short walk, quick meditation or stress tincture or homeopath. Because the Oura ring monitors in real time it’s been helpful for her to experiment with different strategies and then see if those strategies bring her out of the stress response.
The Oura Ring is personally one of my favorite wellness investments! It’s a great tool to get a more detailed daily glance at your personal health and wellness biometrics. The easy accessibility on the app and the live updates also make this an ideal way to track in real time and stay aware of your everyday habits.
